How to Pull Your Mainframe Data into the Cloud with Hitachi Vantara and Model9

Gary Lyng
Vice President Product and Solutions Marketing

February 01, 2023

As most enterprises well know, the mainframe is still not dead. Far from it. We have known for a long time now that the mainframe continues to provide value to customers in key industries around the globe. This of course, means mainframe data is continuing to grow as much as other enterprise applications, and as such, it needs to be controlled and easily managed.

But that’s often easier said than done. One issue has been IT managers’ penchant for keeping mainframe data on mainframe dedicated-storage, away from the rest of the business. That, however, is simply no longer economical. What’s needed is the ability to offload dark, cold data from the mainframe to a long-term data retention platform. And this platform can’t be based on slow, boring tape backups. It must be fast, efficient, compliant and cloud based.

The question becomes: How do you do it? Well, Hitachi Vantara, in partnership with Model9, has developed a cutting-edge solution that modernizes mainframe back-up and recovery solutions, and costs.

First of all, we add in Hitachi Vantara’s Hitachi Content Platform (HCP) object storage in conjunction with Model9’s patented software technology. This securely unlocks mainframe formatted data, allowing it to be copied or moved for use in any private, hybrid, or public cloud environment.

Physical Tape Be Gone!

This totally eliminates the need for physical or virtual tape libraries, provides ransomware protection, and even enables you to run data analytics as part of a comprehensive data management solution.

Model9’s technology connects a mainframe formatted Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) 5000 Series directly to HCP over TCP/IP, enabling the transfer of any mainframe data, whether stored on disk or tape, without the need for any expensive interim disk storage.

To be sure, this is not a new partnership for us. Our long-term relationship with Model9 has resulted in some of the benefits you can enjoy today, such as secure storage with object locking capability, unparalleled resiliency with HCP 10-9’s and VSP 100% data availability guaranteed. And there’s more to come.

Together, Model9 and Hitachi Vantara can reduce your costs by as much as 50%. We lower backup and archive MSU consumption by replacing multiple data management software licenses and hardware components with one single software and hardware solution.

Additionally, you can simplify daily storage management operations and maintenance, as there are no additional databases or control data sets to maintain in z/OS. Again, reducing your total TCO.

Hitachi has been investing in and supporting our mainframe customers for over 40 years, helping you get the most out of your data anywhere. Read more about these solutions below.