Home Company Profile: Nasuni

Company Profile: Nasuni

by Mark Kidd

Nasuni is a storage vendor built around its core cloud-based NAS technology, local Filer appliances, and the company's proprietary UniFS global file system. In the time since Nasuni requested a patent on UniFS in November 2013, the company has expanded its access to cloud storage infrastructure as well as its on-premises Filer appliance offerings, which provide local access for content stored in Nasuni-managed cloud storage.


Nasuni is a storage vendor built around its core cloud-based NAS technology, local Filer appliances, and the company's proprietary UniFS global file system. In the time since Nasuni requested a patent on UniFS in November 2013, the company has expanded its access to cloud storage infrastructure as well as its on-premises Filer appliance offerings, which provide local access for content stored in Nasuni-managed cloud storage.

Nasuni NF-440 Filer

In founding Nasuni, Andres Rodriguez, President and CEO of Nasuni, brought together a management team that incorporates several collaborators from Rodriguez’s previous ventures including Archivas, Hitachi Data Systems, and Abuzz. Andres also previously served as the CTO of the New York Times with responsibility for digital strategy at NYTimes.com and Boston.com including digital content archiving and preservation.

Nasuni combines on-premises storage hardware with cloud-based primary storage infrastructure by using UniFS and centralized management. UniFS separates files from the underlying storage resources like a hypervisor does with virtual machines, while UniFS' caching algorithm keeps frequently-accessed data available on the local network via a filer appliance. Nasuni filers can be deployed as hardware appliances or virtual appliances. Nasuni also provides mobile applications for transparent mobile access to files and a desktop synchronization application. UniFS also provides two key services: Global file sharing, enabling users to access data on the fileshare anywhere in the world at local speeds, and a Global File Lock that allow collaboration anywhere while keeping a “locked” copy of the most up to date file in the cloud. 

Filers provide access to Nasuni storage via CIFS/SMB, NFS or FTP as well as iSCSI block storage. The model and quantity of Filers that are used for a particular deployment can be scaled based on the workload in order to provide processing power and caching space appropriate for the situation. Filers are leased from Nasuni as part of the company’s model for handling periodic hardware refreshes as well as changes to the customer’s geographic and performance requirements.

Nasuni storage is managed through a Management Console that provides consolidated management for the enterprise’s storage across all offices and geographies. The Nasuni Management Console integrates with Nasuni Operations Center to provide support with direct ties to the customer’s storage infrastructure for telemetry and proactive monitoring.

Nasuni Homepage

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