NetApp Acquires SolidFire: Implications for Its Flash Storage Strategy

Recently NetApp announced a cash acquisition of the flash‑startup SolidFire for US$870 million. A few days earlier we summarized NetApp’s flash journey, noting the recent launch of the ALL‑Flash FAS 8000 series and the unexpected strategic change.

NetApp is a leader in converged storage but has only been an active participant in flash. After acquiring LSI’s Engenio to address SAN performance gaps, NetApp introduced EF flash products (EF540/550) in late 2013, later integrating flash into the FAS line with Mar OS and the FlashRay system. In June 2015 the company re‑branded its FAS line as All‑Flash FAS (AFF) and now, with the SolidFire acquisition, may replace FlashRay and AFF, reflecting a hesitant yet evolving flash strategy.

From recent years, NetApp appears to focus more on data management than on storage hardware; all‑flash will become part of a broader solution, with the ONTAP software and Data Fabric integrating all storage forms, including the newly acquired SolidFire.

SolidFire is a technically strong flash startup that supports all major storage software. It uses a two‑layer metadata management architecture with key‑value metadata and a LBA→Block‑ID→Location mapping, enabling efficient deduplication and garbage collection via block‑marking.

SolidFire product lines include the SF2045, SF4805 and SF9000 series, supporting FC and iSCSI, all sharing the same storage features and hardware‑software platform.

SolidFire is built on a scale‑out distributed architecture; the SF2045, SF4805 and SF9000 models can expand from 4 controllers up to 100, offering varying performance and capacity options.

Simple Summary:

1. The acquisition of flash startups is now common in SDS and SSD markets; SolidFire’s purchase will augment NetApp’s flash portfolio and may finally retire the hesitant FlashRay and AFF lines.

2. NetApp’s flash strategy has been indecisive; integrating SolidFire into its Data Fabric or Cloud ONTAP may be more complex than the previous FlashRay approach, but the hope is that this direction is finally correct.

3. Other flash‑focused startups such as PureStorage, Nimbus, Violin Memory and Fusion‑IO could also become acquisition targets for companies like HDS or Fujitsu.

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