Seagate (STX) has added a new partner to its software-defined storage ecosystem for Big Data and the cloud. This week, Scality announced integration between its "software-only" storage solution, called RING, and Seagate's Kinetic Open Storage platform.

The new solution delivers storage that is fully software-based—or, more precisely, completely abstracts storage nodes from physical infrastructure. Behind the scenes, it is powered by hardware that delivers storage in the neighborhood of 2.8PB per server rack, with disk drives connected via Ethernet interfaces that make complete software-based storage abstraction possible.

The platform is aimed at large-scale cloud service providers, financial services and media customers, according to Seagate and Scality. The partners view this type of solution as crucial for driving continued growth IT infrastructure growth as data loads grow ever larger and more and more data moves to the cloud.

Kaustubh Das, vice president of Seagate Cloud and Advanced Storage, said in a statement, "Storage capacity continues to shift to the cloud. Global data center IP traffic is projected to exceed 7.7 zettabytes by the end of 2017 creating additional challenges for supporting and managing data. Software-defined storage has the potential to revolutionize the data center and we are pleased to be working with Scality, a global leader in object-based storage solutions, to help realize the potential of the Seagate Kinetic Open Storage platform."

The Scality RING-Seagate Kinetic Open Storage platform remains in the testing stage, according to the companies, and is on display this week at World Hosting Days.