Whether it’s artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), edge computing, or even Web 3.0, digital capabilities are transforming the world of business. But as enterprise information technology (IT) professionals navigate this rapidly changing landscape, one thing remains certain—it’s going to produce lots and lots of data, and managing that data is going to require massive investments. In fact, Gartner research found that end-user spending on public cloud services topped $332 billion in 2021 and projects it to grow to $397.5 billion in 2022.

Yet despite the need to level up their capabilities, IT departments find themselves in a damned-if -they-do, damned-if-they-don’t situation. In many companies, IT is perceived as a legacy organization, slow to adapt as new technologies demand new services. But at the same time, IT is also under pressure to control spend and get the most out of every investment dollar—and oh yeah, they better deliver results, too!

To help enterprise IT leaders solve this conundrum, Hitachi Vantara has rolled out a robust suite of anything-as-a-service (XaaS) offerings through its EverFlex platform. Hitachi Vantara, a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi Ltd., is a data storage and solutions systems provider headquartered in Santa Clara, CA.

“There has never been more uncertainty, volatility, and risk in making long-term technology decisions than there is today,” explained Patricia Harris, Vice President of Marketing at Hitachi Vantara. “And there’s never been more at stake to get it right. Organizations need more choice to address this acquisitional uncertainty.”

“Acquisitional choice” is both the promise and the payoff for EverFlex XaaS portfolio. The usage-based consumption model allows Hitachi Vantara to deliver scalability, flexibility, and continuous modernization in real-time to their customers—all within a predictable budget that frees up space for innovation and other strategic goals.

Hitachi Vantara’s core business is providing end-to-end coverage of big data and its applications, including converged infrastructure and cloud infrastructure, data storage, data protection, servers, software for machine learning, social collaboration, cloud and storage management, and IT knowledge and analytics.

With XaaS, Hitachi Vantara delivers these services via a consumption-based model. Customers can purchase infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), software- or applications-as-a-service (SaaS, AaaS), storage-as-a-service (STaaS), operations-as-a-service (OaaS), data protection-as-a-service (DPaaS), and more, along with a portfolio of add-on services from which to choose. These services are available for a monthly or usage-based fee.

Strategic Responsiveness

This consumption-based model gives Hitachi Vantara’s customers built-in responsiveness to unexpected financial pressures. With EverFlex, companies can deploy infrastructure tailored workloads at any level of complexity, on- or off-premise. And by avoiding upfront costs of deployment and paying only for what they use, it frees up budgets to invest in other areas of the business.

Simplified Operations

EverFlex simplifies purchasing options and integration costs and enables users to host data on the edge, in colocations, or in a cloud environment of their choice. Not only does a service-based offering avoid sunken CapEx, it also lightens resources needed to manage IT infrastructure. IT employees can dedicate more time to the core business.

Overall Savings

The consumption-based model also has the potential for additional cost savings through consolidation, optimization, and automation of data centers. For example, many companies with on-premise data storage see a low asset utilization; by operating as a service, they can now spend less on baseline infrastructure. With IaaS, Hitachi Vantara has seen organizations achieve an average savings of more than 33% in total cost of ownership (TCO).

Agile Scalability

EverFlex plans allow their customers to change their utilization from month to month. This gives companies the ability to scale up or scale down as needed. It also allows IT to shift resources laterally to align with growth in certain areas, reallocating resources from underutilized services.

Flexibility for the Future

But Everflex isn’t just good for Hitachi Vantara’s customers, it is also good for Hitachi Vantara. Analysts are taking notice of the company’s efforts. Gartner named Hitachi Vantara a Leader for primary storage in the 2021 Magic Quadrant. And GigaOM rated Hitachi Vantara as the best primary storage for large enterprises. The future of technology will no doubt continue to surprise, but for Hitachi Vantara, the promise and the potential are eclipsing the uncertainty.

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