Californian firm WanDisco has introduced an edge-to-cloud system that can activate IoT data at scale.

Data from connected devices are trapped at the edge, limiting the value they can create for enterprises. WanDisco’s edge-to-cloud offering makes it possible for exabytes of edge data to be efficiently transferred for use in any cloud environment. It directly connects IoT data storage with cloud-based AI, machine learning and analytics applications, allowing every sensor-generated data point to add business value and be monetised.

The volume of connected devices worldwide is projected to reach 24.6 billion by 2025, with each device generating a non-stop flow of data to its nearest edge data centre. Moving these data to the cloud is the only way for companies with thousands of edge centres to analyse sensor data collectively, a long and tedious process that can take multiple years and cost millions of dollars.

“Making sense of all your IoT data is the business opportunity of a generation,” said David Richards, CEO of WanDisco. “It’s what will turn companies in sectors like manufacturing, telecommunications, energy and utilities, healthcare and automotive into data companies. But with sensors in nearly everything, 78% of data executives claim that data growth is outpacing analysis. They get trapped at the edge, and trapped data mean trapped revenue. Edge to cloud is fast-tracking those data, at scale, to exactly where they need to be to make an impact.”

The edge-to-cloud offering scales to handle the largest IoT datasets in the world. A multinational manufacturing company serving the transportation industry is using this to activate exabytes of vehicle sensor data. It moves multiple petabytes of data per day, or over an exabyte of data per year. To put this into perspective, all the words ever spoken by mankind are estimated to be equal to five exabytes.

The offering can automate the movement of IoT and file data at scale across edge systems, data centres and public clouds. It can scale horizontally to handle any data size, and take advantage of network bandwidth. There is the freedom of choice to move data to any public cloud, take advantage of multiple clouds, and avoid vendor lock-in.

The system is built on WanDisco’s data activation platform that enables the continuous migration of data across edge systems, on-premises data centres and public cloud environments with speed and scale.