Storage & Data Management Watch: Storage Becomes Strategic as AI Transforms the Data Infrastructure Layer
The CODEW Storage & Data Management Watch | August 14, 2026
The storage industry is undergoing a structural transformation that extends far beyond the familiar narrative of AI-driven demand growth. This week's developments—NVIDIA's open-sourcing of cuFile and launch of Storage-Next, the accelerating NAND shortage, and the deepening integration of AI data pipelines with cloud economics—point to a single conclusion: the data layer is no longer a passive repository. It is becoming an active, strategic component of the AI infrastructure stack. The question is no longer simply how much data organizations can store, but how quickly they can move, process, retrieve, govern, and protect it.
The Data Infrastructure Lead
NVIDIA Opens cuFile APIs, Shifts Storage from Passive Repository to Active Data Path
At FMS 2026, NVIDIA open-sourced its cuFile APIs and the underlying vertical storage software stack, with Google, Intel, and Meta serving as inaugural maintainers. The software enables GPUs to read from and write to storage directly, bypassing CPU routing. This is not a minor performance optimization. It is an architectural reorientation. NVIDIA also formally launched the Storage-Next initiative, bringing together more than 40 storage and flash suppliers, including DDN, Kioxia, and Micron, to align GPU-driven storage behavior into interoperable standards.
NVIDIA's thesis is straightforward: AI agents are generating massive storage traffic, and GPUs can now initiate storage requests directly, creating thousands of concurrent operations that require storage systems to encrypt, compress, verify, and reconstruct data simultaneously. The move includes a framework called SCADA (scaled, accelerated data access), designed so parallel GPUs pull only the data an application needs directly from storage into GPU memory. NVIDIA tied these efforts to its Vera BlueField-4 STX, which combines Vera Rubin processors and Spectrum-X Ethernet networking.
Why this matters: NVIDIA is not just selling GPUs anymore. It is defining how the entire AI infrastructure stack—including storage—should operate. By open-sourcing cuFile and launching Storage-Next, NVIDIA is effectively setting standards for the storage industry. Vendors that interoperate with NVIDIA's vision will thrive. Those that don't will be marginalized.
AI Storage Watch
VDURA and Wasabi Build the AI Storage Tiering Playbook
VDURA and Wasabi Technologies have formed a technology alliance connecting GPU-adjacent AI data infrastructure with predictably priced, S3-compatible cloud storage. The partnership targets AI factories, neoclouds, and enterprise HPC environments that need to keep active datasets near GPUs while moving inactive data to lower-cost cloud capacity.
The operating model is elegant in its simplicity: keep data near compute while active; move it when idle. AI infrastructure teams frequently retain inactive datasets and checkpoints on high-performance systems because migration introduces complexity. This leaves expensive performance capacity occupied by data that no longer requires low-latency access. VDURA provides the performance tier with NVMe flash and HDD storage under a unified global namespace. Wasabi supplies the cloud tier for active archiving. Critically, Wasabi does not charge per-GB egress or API request fees. This pricing model addresses one of the primary barriers to tiered AI storage: unpredictable retrieval costs.
Meta Slashes AI Loading Times from Hours to Minutes
Meta rebuilt its storage systems after slow data repeatedly stalled expensive AI GPUs, dramatically reducing AI dataset loading times from hours to minutes through aggressive SSD caching. The development underscores a broader reality: storage performance is becoming a first-order constraint on AI training efficiency. As Meta's experience demonstrates, even the most powerful GPU clusters are only as productive as the storage infrastructure feeding them. The company's move to prioritize storage performance reflects a growing recognition that data access latency is now a competitive differentiator in AI development.
Graid Technology: 100 Million IOPS on Protected RAID 5
Graid Technology achieved 100 million random 512-byte IOPS on a protected storage volume built from 32 Kioxia XD8 NVMe SSDs. In benchmark testing with a WholeGraph training workload, the configuration delivered training performance on par with the baseline environment. This is significant because AI workloads increasingly depend on massive volumes of fine-grained, random I/O to keep GPUs fully utilized. As Graid CEO Leander Yu put it: "Customers do not need to choose between performance and protection."
Enterprise Data Management
IBM Netezza Nexus: Open Lakehouse Cataloging Arrives
IBM announced Netezza Nexus, an open lakehouse catalog for Apache Iceberg, now in Private Tech Preview. Nexus enables secure, governed, multi-engine access to data stored in Apache Iceberg tables. The value proposition is zero-copy analytics: teams can query the same data from any engine without copying or moving it between platforms.
This addresses a critical pain point. Open table formats like Iceberg allow data to remain accessible across tools, but open formats alone are not enough. Data still needs a trusted catalog layer to manage metadata, enforce access, and ensure engines work from the same version of the data. Nexus centralizes data lake governance with consistent metadata, access control, and policy enforcement. It can also federate with external catalogs. For IBM, this is a pragmatic move: Netezza can continue supporting warehouse workloads while participating in a broader open lakehouse ecosystem.
Milvus 3.0 and DynamoDB Vector Search Signal Market Maturity
Zilliz released Milvus 3.0, a major architectural update bringing lake-native data access to the open-source vector database. The release reflects a broader trend: vector databases are moving from standalone specialized systems to integrated components of the lakehouse architecture. Milvus 3.0 introduces a lake-native path for indexing vector data that lives in object storage and open table formats, including Parquet, Lance, Iceberg, and Vortex.
AWS added native vector search to DynamoDB, supporting up to 4,096 dimensions with single-digit millisecond latency. The update eliminates the need to maintain a separate vector database, lowering operational overhead and improving governance. This is consistent with the broader trend of embedding AI capabilities directly into operational data systems rather than requiring separate infrastructure.
Cloudera and Microsoft Named Leaders in Forrester Lakehouse Evaluation
Cloudera was named a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Data Lakehouses, Q3 2026, receiving the highest score for vision and roadmap. Microsoft Fabric was also named a Leader. Forrester's evaluation emphasized that trust is the foundation of an AI-ready lakehouse, open architectures are critical for long-term AI success, and AI enablement is the new competitive differentiator for lakehouse platforms.
Storage Hardware & Capacity
The Great NAND Squeeze: Shortage Through 2029
A Kearney analysis paints a sobering picture of the NAND market. NAND flash is being squeezed from two directions: data center storage demand is skyrocketing while capital is being pulled away from NAND to fund HBM and DRAM. Nearline hard-disk capacity is sold out, forcing demand onto flash.
The price signal is already dramatic. NAND contract prices rose more than 55% quarter-over-quarter in Q1 2026, with a further 70-75% increase expected in Q2. Enterprise SSD prices rose 5% in July and now stand at about 6.5 times their level a year earlier. Kingston has cited a 246% year-over-year increase in NAND wafer pricing. Industry NAND capital spending is essentially flat, rising only about 5% in 2026 to roughly $22 billion, against DRAM capex growth of about 14% toward $61 billion. The three integrated leaders—Micron, SK hynix, and Samsung—are deliberately limiting NAND investment and redirecting capital toward higher-margin HBM and DRAM. SanDisk CFO Luis Visoso noted that the company expects the global NAND market to exceed $300 billion in 2026, up roughly 3x year-over-year.
Kearney's baseline scenario shows enterprise QLC and TLC staying tight through 2030. Annual wafer demand growth of 8-12% between 2026 and 2029 will be met by wafer supply increasing only 2-4% annually. New capacity is being concentrated on the highest-value nodes—high-capacity QLC enterprise drives for AI data centers—while lower-value nodes have become the lowest priority.
CoreWeave Secures Enterprise SSD Capacity from Solidigm
CoreWeave signed a multi-year strategic agreement with Solidigm for priority access to enterprise SSD capacity. The agreement secures dedicated enterprise storage capacity to support customers scaling AI workloads. CoreWeave COO Sachin Jain framed it simply: "Storage is part of that promise." This is a supply-constrained play. As AI adoption accelerates and industry-wide storage supply tightens, priority allocation becomes a competitive advantage.
Storage Market Data at a Glance
| Metric | Value | Change |
|---|---|---|
| NAND Contract Prices (Q1 2026) | — | +55% QoQ |
| NAND Contract Prices (Q2 2026) | — | +70-75% QoQ |
| Enterprise SSD Prices (July 2026) | 6.5x Year-Ago Level | +5% MoM |
| Global NAND Market (2026 Forecast) | $300B+ | +200% YoY |
| NAND Industry CapEx (2026) | ~$22B | +5% |
| DRAM Industry CapEx (2026) | ~$61B | +14% |
Cloud Data
Wasabi and Megaport Extend the Neocloud Storage Layer
Wasabi announced a strategic partnership with Megaport to power the cloud object storage layer of Megaport Storage. The offering combines Wasabi's storage with Megaport's global private network. Megaport is expanding high-speed private connectivity to Wasabi's 16 global storage regions. The partnership builds on Megaport's acquisition of Latitude.sh for GPU-powered compute.
The pattern is clear: AI infrastructure is disaggregating. Organizations are combining best-of-breed services rather than relying on a single cloud provider. This creates opportunities for specialized storage vendors but also increases integration complexity.
Cloud Storage Pricing Comparison
As of July 2026, storing a gigabyte of hot data costs about $0.023 on AWS S3 Standard, $0.018 to $0.023 on Azure Blob Hot, and $0.020 on Google Cloud Storage Standard. AWS S3 leads on features and ecosystem depth; Azure excels for hybrid setups; Google Cloud wins on pricing transparency. Amazon S3 holds an overwhelming 76.1% market share, followed by Google Cloud Storage with 14.5% and DigitalOcean Spaces with 5.9%.
Data Protection & Resilience
Object First Bookings Jump 148% on Ransomware Demand
Object First reported 148% year-on-year bookings growth in Q2, reflecting surging demand for immutable backup storage. Bookings in EMEA rose 205% from a year earlier. The growth is driven by a fundamental shift in how organizations think about data protection. Immutable backup storage has moved "from best practice to a security requirement". Backup repositories are targeted in 96% of ransomware attacks. Organizations can no longer afford to treat backup as an afterthought. Object First was also voted Enterprise Backup Hardware Vendor of the Year and Ransomware Company of the Year at the 2026 Storage Awards.
Commvault Report: 34% of ANZ Ransomware Victims Still Pay
Commvault's State of Data Resilience ANZ 2026 report found that 34% of organizations in Australia and New Zealand that experienced a ransomware attack paid the ransom. Among those that paid, 36% still did not recover their data. The finding underscores a persistent failure in recovery preparedness.
Oracle Adds Immutable Backups to OCI Block Storage
Oracle added immutable backup support to OCI Block Storage, with retention periods ranging from one day to 200 years. The capability gives customers flexibility for operational recovery and regulated data.
Rubrik and Wipro Launch Enterprise Resilience as a Service
Rubrik and Wipro partnered to launch Enterprise Resilience as a Service (ERaaS), an AI-powered, consulting-led solution. The service combines Rubrik's cyber resilience technology with Wipro's consulting capabilities to help enterprises prevent, withstand, and recover from cyber and operational disruptions.
Capital & Competition
NetApp Acquires JetStream Software
NetApp acquired JetStream Software, a leader in VMware disaster recovery and migration. The acquisition strengthens NetApp's portfolio with recovery and mobility capabilities. NetApp will be able to protect VMware environments running on nearly any storage platform and enable recovery onto NetApp's own storage offerings, including Azure NetApp Files.
HPE Cuts Alletra MP Block Storage Prices
HPE cut storage prices on select "high-volume" Alletra MP block storage SKUs and lowered deal escalation pricing from $1 million to $500,000. This is a clear signal that competition in enterprise block storage is intensifying, with vendors using price to defend market share despite rising memory prices and shipment delays plaguing the industry.
Three Data Signals
Signal 1: The Storage Bottleneck Is Moving from Capacity to Supply
The Kearney analysis makes clear that the NAND shortage is structural, not cyclical. With capital redirected to HBM and DRAM, no major greenfield NAND fab is scheduled to add meaningful bits before 2027-2028. Enterprises that need enterprise SSD capacity—especially for AI workloads—should be planning for tight supply through 2029. CoreWeave's agreement with Solidigm is a template for how large AI infrastructure providers will secure capacity.
What to watch: NAND contract pricing trends, enterprise SSD availability, new fab announcements, and capacity allocation strategies among major storage vendors.
Signal 2: Storage Is Becoming Part of the AI Software Stack
NVIDIA's open-sourcing of cuFile and launch of Storage-Next represent a fundamental shift. Storage is no longer a separate infrastructure layer that GPUs access through CPUs. It is becoming integrated into the AI software stack, with GPUs initiating storage requests directly. This changes the competitive dynamics: storage vendors must now interoperate with NVIDIA's stack or risk losing relevance.
What to watch: Storage vendor announcements of cuFile compatibility, Storage-Next coalition expansion, and the emergence of GPU-initiated I/O as a standard feature in enterprise storage systems.
Signal 3: The Lakehouse Architecture Is Maturing
IBM's Netezza Nexus, Cloudera's Forrester leadership, Zilliz's Milvus 3.0, and AWS's DynamoDB vector search all point to the same trend: the lakehouse is becoming the default enterprise data architecture. Open table formats like Iceberg are winning. The question is no longer whether to adopt a lakehouse architecture but how to govern and access data across multiple engines without creating data sprawl.
What to watch: Lakehouse catalog adoption, multi-engine interoperability, and the emergence of agentic AI workloads as a driver of lakehouse architecture decisions.
THE CODEW TAKE
Is AI turning storage and data management into a strategic infrastructure layer—and which companies are positioned to capture that value?
Two forces are converging. First, AI workloads are generating unprecedented demand for storage capacity, bandwidth, and low-latency access. Second, supply is constrained by capital allocation decisions that favor HBM and DRAM over NAND. The result is a structural shortage that will persist through 2029.
This creates a clear strategic imperative: control of the data layer is becoming as valuable as control of compute.
NVIDIA understands this, which is why it is open-sourcing cuFile and defining how storage should operate in AI environments. Wasabi and VDURA understand this, which is why they are building tiered AI storage architectures that address both performance and economics. CoreWeave understands this, which is why it secured priority SSD capacity through a multi-year agreement.
For enterprise buyers, the implications are straightforward:
- Storage capacity planning is now a strategic function. Supply constraints mean that waiting until the last minute to procure enterprise SSD capacity will result in higher prices and longer lead times.
- Tiered AI storage architectures are no longer optional. Keeping inactive data on expensive performance storage is economically unsustainable. Solutions like VDURA-Wasabi that automate tiering will become standard.
- Data governance and cataloging are critical. As data moves across multiple engines and environments, consistent governance becomes essential. IBM's Netezza Nexus addresses this need.
- Data protection is cybersecurity. With backup repositories targeted in 96% of ransomware attacks, immutable backup storage is moving from best practice to requirement.
The companies that gain structural leverage in this environment will be those that control critical layers of the data infrastructure stack—whether through hardware capacity (Solidigm, Micron), software standards (NVIDIA), cloud economics (Wasabi), or data governance (IBM, Cloudera).
The data layer is no longer passive. It is the new battleground.
Source Attribution
- NVIDIA — cuFile Open-Sourcing and Storage-Next Initiative Announcement (FMS 2026)
- Kearney — "The Great Storage Squeeze" Analysis (August 11, 2026)
- VDURA and Wasabi — Technology Alliance Announcement (August 4, 2026)
- Wasabi and Megaport — Partnership Announcement (August 12, 2026)
- CoreWeave and Solidigm — Multi-Year SSD Supply Agreement (August 5, 2026)
- Graid Technology — 100 Million IOPS Achievement (August 4, 2026)
- IBM — Netezza Nexus Announcement (August 10, 2026)
- Zilliz — Milvus 3.0 Release (August 6, 2026)
- AWS — DynamoDB Native Vector Search (August 5, 2026)
- Cloudera — Forrester Wave™: Data Lakehouses Leader (August 3, 2026)
- Object First — Q2 2026 Bookings Growth (August 5, 2026)
- Commvault — State of Data Resilience ANZ 2026 Report (August 12, 2026)
- Oracle — OCI Block Storage Immutable Backups (August 12, 2026)
- Rubrik and Wipro — Enterprise Resilience as a Service (August 6, 2026)
- NetApp — JetStream Software Acquisition (August 6, 2026)
- HPE — Alletra MP Block Storage Price Cuts (August 5, 2026)
- Meta — Storage Rebuild for AI Dataset Loading (August 1, 2026)
- TrendForce — NAND Contract Pricing Data
- StorageReview — Enterprise SSD Pricing Analysis
- Blocks and Files — Storage Industry Coverage
Reviewed by Erwin Castro
on
Friday, August 14, 2026
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