Research Notes

Research Note: NetApp Updates Google NetApp Cloud Volumes

Steve McDowell April 20, 2025

At the recent Google Cloud Next event, NetApp and Google Cloud announced enhancements to Google Cloud NetApp Volumes, their fully managed file storage service. The updates focus on increasing scalability, performance, and integration capabilities while reducing complexity for enterprise workloads.

Key improvements include throughput increases to 30GiBps for Premium and Extreme service levels, independent scaling of capacity and performance for the Flex service level, integration with Google Cloud’s Vertex AI Platform, and support for Google Cloud Assured Workloads.

Research Note: Azure NetApp Files Enhancements

Steve McDowell April 20, 2025

NetApp recently announced enhancements to their Azure NetApp Files (ANF) offering, introducing a new Flexible service level along with new capabilities to provide greater control over storage resources.

Research Note: UALink Consortium Releases UALink 1.0

Steve McDowell April 17, 2025

The UALink Consortium recently released its Ultra Accelerator Link (UALink) 1.0 specification. This industry-backed standard challenges the dominance of NVIDIA’s proprietary NVLink/NVSwitch memory fabric with an open alternative for high-performance accelerator interconnect technology.

Research Note: Hammerspace $100M Series B to Accelerate AI Infrastructure Growth

Steve McDowell April 17, 2025

Hammerspace, which provides a high-performance data orchestration solution for AI and hybrid cloud environments, announced it’s raised $100 million in a Series B funding round.

The round, led by Altimeter Capital and including participation from ARK Invest and other strategic investors, values Hammerspace at more than $500 million.

Research Note: Dynatrace & AWS New Strategic Collaboration

Steve McDowell April 16, 2025

Dynatrace and AWS announced a multi-year strategic collaboration agreement, deepening their decade-long partnership that began in 2014. This expanded collaboration aims to address enterprise challenges in digital transformation through enhanced AI-powered observability and security solutions.

Research Note: HPE Updates Aruba Networking Central

Steve McDowell April 14, 2025

Hewlett Packard Enterprise recently announced significant enhancements to its HPE Aruba Networking Central platform, which expand its deployment options and strengthen AI and analytics capabilities. The platform now supports four distinct deployment models: public cloud SaaS, virtual private cloud, on-premises, and network-as-a-service.