The smaller business model has suffered a bit lately. They seek enterprise class, flash-based storage, yet they don’t have the sheer volume of data, nor can they afford to price out a larger array, with fewer discs. Again, along comes Pure storage, releasing the All Flash Array//M10. This is a smaller device, supporting 15Tb of all flash storage, block based, with the full suite of management tools that come with all Pure devices, yet it comes at a price point that it truly tolerable to the small to mid tier market. At 15Tb, with a year of support, this is priced at $50,000.

Part of the magic here is that the device is also fully upgradeable to a model //m20, //m50, or //m70.

To me, the pricepoint was probably the biggest part of the announcement. Prior to this, a device of this level of size and power was only possible if you built it yourself, and then you’d lack all the special nature of what makes a pure array pure.

In addition to that, one additional announcement that raised some excitement in the room was a converged solution called the “FlashStack.” This collaboration with Cisco combines the M Series storage array with Cisco UCS in a Cisco Certified solution geared initially to the VDI world, though certainly not limited to it. These are highly optimized and have both VMWare and HyperV facility. Price point of the FlashStack mini, the smaller one, paired with the M10 is sub100K and will be shipping likely by June 2016.

My take on this Pure //Accelerate show is very positive. Their partner ecosystem, their amazing staff, the intelligence in how they approached the stealth build of the FlashStack and the obviously well thought out approach to their market space add up to a bright future for this up and coming powerhouse.