Solving the World's Biggest Problems at Scale, with WekaIO President, Ken Grohe

The No. 1 feature of technology is storage. Ok, so that’s not true. But, it’s one of the most critical pieces of hardware that enables software to function. How fast, how easy, and how much data can be accessed and leveraged inside of applications plays a critical part in technologies effectiveness and user experience. File systems have largely evolved unnoticed.

“Existing file systems written 20 years ago are like Microsoft word. It works, but you can't collaborate with it. You don't get the full effectiveness. In fact, if you had a project that started at night, and had to be done the next morning, everyone would overwrite everyone else's work. And whoever was in charge would have a major headache, and the best work wouldn't be done. In the case of a parallel file system, everyone gets the full use every single day to do as much work as they can. So there's no latency, you're not waiting for anything.”

Ken Grohe, President and CRO at WekaIO, a company that is working to solve those data and storage obstacles by eliminating and replacing legacy systems with a cloud-based collaborative file system structure, and we’re not talking about files like a spreadsheet. We’re talking about huge massive files like Electronic Medical Records, Gene Maps, and other critical files that now can be updated around the world like an excel file. 

Hear how WekaIO played a role in Covid Vaccine development in a way that would not have been possible just a few years ago. Learn more about that plus other applications of modern file systems next, on IT Visionaries. 

Main Takeaways

• Out of Storage: Nobody buys computers just because of their storage capabilities. But while storage is often overlooked, it is also the engine that powers the speed of your system. Currently there are three types of storage: Cloud, GPU and Flash. In order to create the fastest and most reliable system, your storage needs must be optimized for all three.
• What is a Weka-Byte?: According to research conducted by the Weka team, nine out of 10 big data centers are now operated by Weka. The reasoning for the shift? While most storage systems are designed with terabytes in mind, which are units of information which are equal to one million 1012, which is how traditional storage companies operate, a Wekabyte is considered 10100 , so nearly 10 times of the size. 
• The Rise of the Data Chief: The newest member of the C-Suite is also becoming one of the most important members of leadership teams: The Data Chief. As more companies possess unstructured data, they are going to need someone with the data literacy and requisite knowledge to understand how to properly use that data.

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