Hitachi Data Systems is expected next week to roll out a high-end storage array that runs long-promised data pooling and replication software that will let users support multi-vendor storage systems from one interface.

Tagmastore, dubbed Lightning 3, is set to be unveiled at an event in New York. The company declined to comment on its plans.

Virtualization, or pooling of data on arrays from different vendors, has been a desire of customers who want to consolidate their storage platforms and manage them together.

While David Bratt, technology architect for H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Fla., has not had a chance to beta-test the new product, he is interested in it because it would solve many of his daily problems.

"Virtualization is a huge advantage for me for management purposes, as well as a cost savings, since I can attach more servers through a single Fibre Channel port," says Bratt, who manages a heterogeneous storage environment with a Hitachi 9570V and 9910V, direct-attached SCSI storage and IBM's proprietary Serial Storage Architecture system.

"Better storage utilization is also an outcome," Bratt says.

Analysts say Tagmastore will have several models, and will include virtualization software on a blade in a storage controller and have the capability to replicate information across unlimited distances to dissimilar storage arrays for disaster-recovery purposes. Hitachi will be the first major vendor to integrate heterogeneous rather than homogeneous virtualization and replication features onto a storage controller.

"The box is an über-array with significant amounts of cache and performance," says an analyst who asked not to be identified. "Not only will the Hitachi array be able to pool data from a variety of sources but it will be able to use a single replication and management technology to move data between different arrays."

The array, which will scale into the multi-petabyte range, will support Fibre Channel, IBM's mainframe connectivity ESCON/FICON technologies and iSCSI, which lets users attach storage-area networks (SAN) to an Ethernet network. The array is expected to combine network-attached and SAN data into one virtualized storage pool.

Analysts say the Hitachi announcement could give the company an important tool to battle competitors. According to Gartner, Hitachi external controller-based storage accounts for about 8% of the market, trailing EMC, which has a 21% market share, and HP, which has almost 19%. The product also addresses the need for a heterogeneous storage virtualization strategy.

"Vendors have done a disservice to the industry - we've had vendors trying to misconstrue basic [logical unit] and volume management as virtualization," says Stephanie Balaouras, senior analyst for The Yankee Group. "But true heterogeneous systems integration and the virtualization of replication and back-up technologies hasn't been there."