Palo Alto November 21, 2010– Moonwalk 8 is now available. This major new release of the award winning enterprise data management software introduces a number of features, including an enhanced communication model that will allow users to fully optimise new advances in communication technology, essentially future proofing the unmatched scalability made possible by Moonwalk’s unique stateless architecture.

This release will ensure that Moonwalk users can continue to effectively manage those ever increasing amounts of data within both local and globally distributed enterprises.

Moonwalk 8 also includes enhanced migration features that effectively deliver file level disk to disk backup for supported file systems and, building upon Moonwalk’s already significant Cloud capability developed to support S3, further simplifies the operation of Moonwalk’s existing archiving capability, whether it be with in-house storage devices, or with private and/or public clouds.

Unlike traditional data management solutions that are constrained by the overhead of various layers of middleware, both hardware and software, Moonwalk’s unique, stateless and distributed processing model ensures scalability across the entire data management infrastructure of the enterprise.

This approach to data management means faster data transfers, faster recoveries and in general, ensures the most efficient utilisation of storage infrastructure and network bandwidth.

Moonwalk migration significantly reduces the amount of primary storage as files are automatically and transparently migrated to tiers of cheaper storage for longer retention needs, whether these be driven by demands for a convenient cost effective storage repository, the requirement to archive, or by more demanding constraints of compliance.

Moonwalk is a game changing solution, particularly for large businesses who need to take charge of the data management issue, but at the same time, are reluctant to be lumbered with that ongoing burden of a significant additional tier of technology required to implement a data management framework.

The Moonwalk 8 enhanced communication model will ensure that data transfer speeds will continue to take advantage of future significant increases in data transfer capability made possible by the advent of Gbit networks. As businesses look for ways to manage larger amounts of data and implement higher bandwidth pipes, Moonwalk 8 will allow them to attain maximum possible throughput by fully optimising both the raw bandwidth and the packet sizes to match the data types being handled.

Moonwalk 8 introduces new migration capabilities that simplify the utilization of cloud storage for archiving corporate data. By implementing a complete data and meta-data backup capability, cloud storage can be utilized as an archive target via a simple premigrate policy.

Full instances of these files can remain in both locations for as long as required to meet the governance demands, after which time the primary copies can be stubbed, thus reducing the primary storage footprint. Uniquely to Moonwalk, the concepts of HSM and Archive have been combined to deliver a very simple, powerful and effective means for optimising storage and meeting the compliance demands for holding data.

Moonwalk 8 includes support for the latest HCP object store from Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) with its authenticated name space capability. The HDS platform is a ‘cloud ready’ technology that manages the security and immutability of data from any number of unique sources that are stored in a common hardware archive environment. Data ownership is locked into the actual storage platform of that data.

Moonwalk enables immediate and secure access to the HCP environment, thus providing a seamless and scalable solution to one of the most advanced data protection and recovery environments available in the market.

Moonwalk 8 is a significant new base platform to underpin not only the previous versions’ broad footprint of file system and device support, but also to expand support of the next generation of devices and environments. It also includes an array of new features aimed at further simplifying the management of unstructured data within the enterprise.

Moonwalk 8 enables the enterprise to reduce the cost of data management whilst meeting the ever-evolving needs for the provision of access to information from a operational perspective, for reasons of governance and for reducing the business risk associated with compliance.