overview
Spiegel Verlag is a German publishing group known for its leading weekly news magazine, Der Spiegel. Founded in 1947, the magazine is recognized for its investigative journalism and independent reporting. Der Spiegel is not only the most cited German medium, but with a weekly circulation of 84,000 copies, it is also the largest publication in Europe of its kind.
Our digital assets are only critical for a few days, so an active archive storage strategy gives us the best balance between accessibility and cost for the long term. BlackPearl NAS satisfies our needs at a low cost per gigabyte, and can expand incrementally as our content grows and scale to adapt to business changes.
The Challenge
Week after week, more than 14 million people choose to engage with the content developed by the Spiegel group. Because their flagship publication, Der Spiegel, is published on a weekly basis, digital assets are only critical for a few days. The group wanted to implement an active archive strategy to protect videos and editorial content by creating a third copy of their digital assets in a user-accessible storage repository. They began a search for a new, affordable system that offered capacity, scalability and accessibility at a low cost per gigabyte.
The Solution
Spiegel Verlag implemented a Spectra BlackPearl® NAS Solution with Versity Storage Manager. Versity’s software moves videos and editorial content into the BlackPearl NAS, effectively extending the user’s file system. The BlackPearl NAS can scale incrementally in capacity and performance to accommodate growing content and changing access requirements. The Spectra solution currently protects 550TB and will easily satisfy their expected growth rate. Another important aspect of the solution was support. Spiegel Verlag’s storage environment required local language support. Spectra’s partnership with StorTrec, a Germany-based support partner, helped seal the deal, enabling Spectra to uphold the high-quality service standards that make its worldwide support offering a true customer advantage.
Environment Snapshot
- Spectra BlackPearl 4U NAS with one expansion node
- Seventy 12TB STA Disk Drives
- 840TB total capacity
- Versity Storage Manager
