The Associated Press Sets the Bar for HD Video With EMC Isilon

SEATTLE, Jan. 18, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) today announced that The Associated Press (AP), one of the world's largest sources of independent newsgathering, has deployed EMC® Isilon® scale-out NAS to support the Big Data demands of its high-definition video production and archive workflows. By implementing a single EMC Isilon system and software, AP has boosted the performance of copy and transfer rates, streamlined storage management, improved reliability, and lowered its video archive storage costs, without compromising on any of these dimensions.  Although EMC Isilon was initially deployed specifically for AP's video editing workflow, the news organization soon began using Isilon to archive content as well, realizing significant cost savings.  

Customer Benefits:

• Simplified IT management – EMC Isilon allows AP to aggregate all storage assets into one pool, assign users appropriate levels of service, and easily perform other storage management tasks. EMC Isilon is also enabling AP's transition from four storage tiers to two (object-level and block-level).
• Accelerated content access –EMC Isilon delivers a 6X video copy and transfer rate performance increase over AP's previous tape archival system.
• Increased reliability – EMC Isilon provides 99 percent reliability vs. AP's legacy tape-based system, which failed 10 to 15 percent of the time.
• Easy scalability – EMC Isilon scale-out architecture and management software will enable AP to seamlessly and effortlessly scale from about 800 terabytes today to about 2.5 petabytes by mid-2013 and add capacity and boost performance as needed.
• Lower storage and IT costs – AP is realizing savings of up to 45% per terabyte of HD video content with EMC Isilon, compared to the tape-based archival system it had been using. 
• Ease of use – IT staff required no training to deploy and configure EMC Isilon.

Customer Challenges and Solution:

As newsgathering organizations continued transitioning to HD video in 2011, AP needed to upgrade its standard-definition video content offerings. However, the tape-based video archival system AP had deployed for standard-definition video was not up to the task of handling more performance-intensive HD content. The tape system had a high per-terabyte cost, sluggish access and transfer rates, and failed 10 to 15 percent of the time. In addition, every few years tape technology changes, requiring organizations to convert existing tapes to make them compatible with the latest standards.

Having previously implemented Isilon for its video editing workflow, AP expanded its use of Isilon into video archiving as part of a complete video infrastructure revamp to support the HD video upgrade, from camcorders to servers to storage. AP deployed EMC Isilon NL-Series and X-Series platform nodes in its New Jersey and London data centers to support its video production and archival system. The Isilon OneFS® operating system, and SmartPools and SmartConnect software enable AP to aggregate all storage assets into one pool, assign appropriate levels of service to individual users, and easily perform other storage management tasks. EMC Isilon enabled AP to transition from four storage tiers to two (object-level and block-level), and to unify multiple content archives in one infrastructure, further simplifying IT management and reducing storage costs.

Customer Quote:

Don Merrick, storage and backup services manager, Associated Press

"As part of its multimillion-dollar upgrade, the AP is transforming its video business by switching its entire newsgathering, production and distribution systems to HD, forming the largest rollout of HD by any news agency globally. As part of a complete production environment transformation, we deployed EMC Isilon to take our video storage capabilities into the next generation. Now we don't have to compromise capacity for performance – we can grow both at the same time. With EMC Isilon we've made content access much faster for our clients, and we're gaining a competitive advantage over other content providers."

EMC Quote:

Sam Grocott, vice president of marketing, EMC Isilon

"Media organizations around the world depend on the Associated Press for timely content, whether it's video, still images, or news articles. Every second counts in the newsgathering process, and EMC Isilon is helping AP deliver the fastest possible video content access to its customers while also helping AP reduce storage costs and simplify IT management."

About Isilon

Isilon, a division of EMC, is the global leader in scale-out NAS. We deliver powerful yet simple solutions for enterprises that want to manage their data, not their storage. Isilon's products are simple to install, manage and scale, at any size. And, unlike traditional enterprise storage, Isilon stays simple no matter how much storage is added, how much performance is required or how business needs change in the future. We're challenging enterprises to think differently about their storage, because when they do, they'll recognize there's a better, simpler way. Learn what we mean at http://www.isilon.com.

About EMC

EMC Corporation is a global leader in enabling businesses and service providers to transform their operations and deliver IT as a service. Fundamental to this transformation is cloud computing. Through innovative products and services, EMC accelerates the journey to cloud computing, helping IT departments to store, manage, protect and analyze their most valuable asset — information — in a more agile, trusted and cost-efficient way. Additional information about EMC can be found at www.EMC.com.

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This release contains "forward-looking statements" as defined under the Federal Securities Laws.  Actual results could differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of certain risk factors, including but not limited to: (i) adverse changes in general economic or market conditions; (ii) delays or reductions in information technology spending; (iii) the relative and varying rates of product price and component cost declines and the volume and mixture of product and services revenues; (iv) competitive factors, including but not limited to pricing pressures and new product introductions; (v) component and product quality and availability; (vi) fluctuations in VMware, Inc.'s operating results and risks associated with trading of VMware stock; (vii) the transition to new products, the uncertainty of customer acceptance of new product offerings and rapid technological and market change; (viii) risks associated with managing the growth of our business, including risks associated with acquisitions and investments and the challenges and costs of integration, restructuring and achieving anticipated synergies; (ix) the ability to attract and retain highly qualified employees; (x) insufficient, excess or obsolete inventory; (xi) fluctuating currency exchange rates; (xii) threats and other disruptions to our secure data centers or networks; (xiii) our ability to protect our proprietary technology; (xiv) war or acts of terrorism; and (xv) other one-time events and other important factors disclosed previously and from time to time in EMC's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.  EMC disclaims any obligation to update any such forward-looking statements after the date of this release.

SOURCE EMC Corporation