IBM to purchase StoredIQ

IBM reports it will acquire privately held StoredIQ. IBM says the acquisition will enhance its strategy to help clients derive value from big data and respond more efficiently to litigation and regulations, dispose of information that has outlived its purpose and lower data storage costs.

IBM says its Information Lifecycle Governance suite improves information economics by helping companies lower the total cost of managing data while increasing the value derived from it by:

• eliminating unnecessary cost and risk with defensible disposal of unneeded data,
• enabling businesses to realize the full value of information as it ages,
• aligning cost to the value of information, and
• reducing information risk by automating privacy, e-discovery and regulatory policies.

StoredIQ software provides scalable analysis and governance of disparate and distributed e-mail as well as file shares and collaboration sites. That includes the ability to discover, analyze, monitor, retain, collect, de-duplicate and dispose of data. In addition, StoredIQ can rapidly analyze high volumes of unstructured data and automatically dispose of files and e-mails in compliance with regulatory requirements, says IBM.

IBM reports the addition of StoredIQ to its governance suite will give organizations more effective governance of the vast majority of data, including efficient electronic discovery and its timely disposal, to eliminate unnecessary data that consumes infrastructure and elevates risk. As a result, business leaders can access and analyze big data to gain insights for better decision-making.

The acquisition of StoredIQ is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the first quarter of 2013. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.