IMT’s NetApp Installations Cross the 50 Petabyte Milestone

Integrated Media Technologies (IMT) has now shipped more than 50 petabytes of NetApp storage — including NetApp E-Series and FAS systems — into both IT and media operations within IMT’s nationwide customer base. The NetApp hybrid storage portfolio is accelerating application performance and lowering the total cost of ownership for IMT’s customers.

“In use cases where our customers demand storage area networks for uncompressed or very high bandwidth applications, we work in partnership with Quantum and NetApp to fully test and integrate E-Series storage with the StorNext 5 ecosystem.” said Jason Kranitz, SVP of Sales, Integrated Media Technologies Inc. “For our IT customers preferring network-attached storage, IMT may deploy NetApp’s Data ONTAP®, the world’s No. 1 open networked branded storage operating system1.”

NetApp systems power a wide spectrum of media workflows for IMT customers, including 4K post, visual effects, broadcast network active archives, and local TV news production. IMT’s media experts provide outstanding support and professional services to satisfy customers across the country.

IMT counts several major media companies among its recent new customers using NetApp storage:

In the realm of 4K is Burbank, California-based post facility My Eye Media, which performs quality control on audio and video content for Hollywood studios, television networks, and online entertainment providers. My Eye Media engaged IMT to deploy a NetApp E-Series storage system and a flash-based Quantum StorNext M445 metadata appliance using StorNext 5, Quantum’s collaboration storage platform, to increase storage capacity, throughput, and file-system stability in 4K projects. After IMT engineers integrated the NetApp E-Series storage system and Quantum StorNext 5 into My Eye Media’s environment, the post house can now accommodate its customers’ 4K workflows and deliver the highest-quality media experience every time.

In terms of broadcast network production, IMT assisted the MLB Network in building its new Creative Services SAN infrastructure and rebuilding its post-production initiative. During the season, MLB’s post operation records over 5,000 hours of content weekly and archives over 30 terabytes of content per day, all while enabling efficient access to more than 500,000 hours of archived content. Relying on IMT’s expertise, MLB deployed two 1.4 petabyte storage area networks on the NetApp E-Series storage system using Quantum StorNext 5, resulting in a highly available, reliable storage environment for the network’s vendors.

To accelerate the rendering process for visual effects (VFX), IMT designed a clustered Data ONTAP system that includes three terabytes of NetApp Flash Cache™ PCIe-attached intelligent caching. Clustered Data ONTAP enables hot data sets — which are being accessed by hundreds (or thousands) of render cores — to be cached into flash automatically. This process gives the VFX render operation needed performance without putting a caching appliance in front of the storage system. As a result, IMT’s customer base can avoid administering and maintaining a second separate caching system, which is what they expected they might have to do.

IMT has also helped multiple clients create a NetApp-based solution to improve storage for local TV news production. The NetApp FAS8000 unified scale-out storage solution makes enterprise-class network-attached storage fast enough to support the concurrent workflows that are common in broadcast news production. Editors, journalists, and producers can tap into the NetApp FAS8000 platform to share and collaborate, with enough bandwidth to work simultaneously on different tasks. Meanwhile NetApp clustered Data ONTAP, the operating system running on the FAS systems provides nondisruptive operation for a news infrastructure that is always on, even during major upgrades and data migrations.

IMT’s team of IT professionals has focused its investments in seven Solution Practice areas: hybrid cloud, software-defined data center, information security, converged infrastructure, data protection, big data, and emerging technologies.

“Leveraging our eight-year history as a solution integrator of media technologies, we have developed strong project management and system integration processes, along with professional services and support offerings that help ensure our clients maximize business outcomes with their technology investments,” said Eric Wyner, senior vice president and general manager of Integrated Media Technologies Inc. “We are proud to offer all of these valuable differentiators to our clients as the ‘IMT Advantage.'”

To further solidify IMT’s leadership in the industry, in late 2014 IMT earned one of NetApp’s elite partner certifications: FlexPod Premium Partner. IMT’s experience and expertise with Cisco for UCS compute and Nexus network, along with NetApp FAS8000 (including clustered Data ONTAP) and E-Series, make IMT uniquely qualified to integrate this reference architecture as a common building block for private and hybrid cloud implementations and on-premises infrastructure standards.

“Today’s production operations are evolving quickly, and in the process, one thing remains constant, the need for greater amounts of efficient, affordable, and accessible storage. That’s why NetApp designs storage solutions and cultivates integrations with complementary technologies to suit a wide range of media-specific workflows,” said Jason Danielson, media and entertainment solution marketing manager at NetApp. “IMT puts their expertise to work to make the best use of our technology and introduces it to a wide range of customers. We congratulate IMT on this deployment milestone and greatly appreciate their contribution to our company’s success.”