The Supercomputing provider Cray has announced a partnership with Seagate focused on the ClusterStor high-performance storage business.
As part of the partnership, Seagate and Cray will collaborate on future ClusterStor products. Cray will continue to support and enhance the ClusterStor product line and to support customers going forward.
Cray expects to add more than 100 Seagate employees and contractors and to assume certain customer support obligations associated with the ClusterStor product line.
‘This partnership will be an exciting next step for Cray as we broaden our portfolio and expand our ability to create a leadership position in high performance storage products,’ said Peter Ungaro, president and CEO of Cray. ‘Building upon our long-term strategy and the amazing growth of data, storage is becoming more important in our market. With the push to exascale computing and the explosive growth in artificial intelligence, deep learning and analytics, the ability to integrate compute and storage into supercomputing systems is more critical than ever.’
‘Adding Seagate’s ClusterStor product line to our DataWarp and Sonexion storage products will enable us to provide a more complete solution to customers,’ continued Peter Ungaro. ‘Current ClusterStor customers and partners can be assured that we will continue to advance and support the ClusterStor products. In addition, I look forward to welcoming our new Cray employees along with the ClusterStor partners and reseller channel – strengthening our strategic positioning for growth into the future.’
‘In 2012 Cray became our first OEM and has continued over the years to be our largest and most strategic ClusterStor partner. Today’s announcement is really the perfect evolution of that continuing, special partnership in HPC,’ said Ken Claffey, vice president and general manager, Storage Systems Group at Seagate. ‘As the leader in the supercomputing market, Cray will be a great home for the ClusterStor, employees, customers and partners.’
Highlights of the transaction and partnership include:
- Seagate’s existing ClusterStor Lustre, Secure Data Appliance and Spectrum Scale customers will be able to receive service and support from Cray.
- Cray expects to add more than 100 employees, primarily in R&D, customer service and channel and reseller support.
- Cray and Seagate will collaborate to incorporate the latest Seagate technology into future ClusterStor and Cray® Sonexion® products.
- Cray will receive certain assistance from Seagate to provide support on existing service contracts.
- The transaction closing is expected to be completed late in the third quarter of 2017.
- Cray expects the net impact of the transaction for Cray to be in the range of breakeven for 2018.
- Cray will provide further detail on its second quarter 2017 financial results conference call on July 27, 2017. Instructions for joining the conference call can be found below.
