Spectra reveals shiny necklace of BlackPearl partners

SpectraLogic's BlackPearl disk/object gateway-to-tape archives need front-end apps amended or developed to send data, prompting a raft of partnerships announced at NAB in Las Vegas.

The company says BlackPearl-enabled apps using its DS3 (S3-based) API have direct access to its archive of media content stored as objects. These can be retrieved via LTFS.

Announced partnerships with available front-end clients include:

• Avid|Interplay Archive: A set of media production and asset-management technologies to access and create media, automate ingest, production and distribution processes, and link with planning, traffic, analytics and rights-management business functions
• Cambridge Imaging Systems, Imagen: Preserves content for the long term, enabling controlled access through a customisable website
• Empress, eMAM: Media asset management platform with collaboration tools and online proxy library of digital content in native resolution in storage and in archive, on premise or in the cloud

Partners with clients in development include:

• Archimedia: Atlas
• Film Partners: MXFserver
• Levels Beyond: Reach Engine
• Marquis Broadcast: Project Parking
• QLS Distribution (CatDV): FocalPoint Server
• Tiger Technology: Tiger Series
• TMD: Mediaflex
• Vidispine: Vidispine Enterprise MAM
• Vizrt: Viz One

That's a nice round dozen partners indicating a good degree of media and entertainment industry acceptance of BlackPearl's usefulness.

Spectra and NetApp have integrated NetApp's StorageGRID Webscale object store with the BlackPearl Deep Storage Gateway as a proof-of-concept exercise.

The NetApp object store sits in front of BlackPearl and sends/retrieves data to/from it via NetApp's S3 end-point connector and the DS3 interface. In other words, StorageGRID WebScale can store its objects on tape as well as in Amazon's cloud, and use automated policies to do so.

Spectra has also developed a BlackPearl client for its nTier Verde NAS array to automate data moves from the disk array to tape through the BlackPearl gateway.

Slowly but surely, Spectra hopes a necklace of BlackPearl partners will wrap itself around the neck of the media and entertainment industry and stream old and cooling media object assets out to Spectra's tape libraries. ®