As networks and compute environments evolve, so do the tradeoffs between local/remote and centralized/decentralized locations. One thing is clear: in the past five years, the amount of data being generated, transferred, and stored is already massive and is expected to reach 850ZB by 2021*. 5G brings a new level of network abilities and data transfer rates that set the stage for many desired rich media and real time applications. In the past, general purpose storage capabilities greatly exceeded any network, data and application requirements; however, with the aforementioned enhancements and the insurgence of end points, edge computing and cloud capabilities, general purpose storage no longer cuts it. Today and in the future, storage has to meet various types of use cases, workloads and environments and is becoming an integral part of the design of any network, data base or application. Without clearly defining storage from the end point (through edge and cloud looking at both user and application needs) 5G and future environments will not rise to their full potential.

*Source: Cisco VNI Nov’18; Intel; WDC analysis