EMC lashes out at 'desperate' Pure Storage after criticism

'They pooh-pooh [things] until they come out with it, and then it is the greatest thing ever,' claims EMC's XtremIO boss

EMC has hit back at claims made by Pure Storage that its latest flash release is confusing customers, branding Pure "desperate" and accusing it of "backpedalling".

At its Pure Accelerate event in San Francisco this week, Pure Storage made a series of feisty comments about competitors - accusing NetApp of being unclear in its flash strategy and saying EMC's latest VMAX All Flash products is "utterly confusing" for EMC customers.

Pure and EMC have a particularly fierce rivalry. The duo have been locked in a war of words for a number of years, legal proceedings are ongoing between the pair, and staff regularly move between the two.

At the time CRN first published Pure's comments, EMC declined to comment, but since then, Josh Goldstein, the boss of EMC's flash unit XtremIO, became available.

He told CRN that Pure's comments that EMC's VMAX All Flash launch is confusing customers are "ridiculous".

"The fact of the matter is... not one product serves the market from top to bottom and EMC has a portfolio which can address more parts of the market," he said.

"The reaction [to VMAX All Flash] has been really strong. EMC is going to have flash in all of our products. It's really no different in the sense that when we started off, we had disc in multiple products. Now that is going to turn into all flash. It is a natural progression and frankly, we will see others across the industry doing things in this way. Do customers have questions for us? Of course they do, but that's what our sales force will do - help them understand which products suit their needs. The initial question around these things can be answered very, very quickly."

At Pure Accelerate, Pure Storage unveiled the m10 flash array, which is aimed at the SME market, and its FlashBlade "cloud-scale flash platform" product which will be available in the second half of this year.

Goldstein was unimpressed with the launches.

"There is no new tech there... and it doesn't compete with XtremIO," he said. "To me, it is interesting because what I saw in this announcement was Pure more or less backpedalling on things they have said. Here's an example: they want to be an enterprise company, but they're coming out with small products, not bigger ones. They pooh-pooh [things] until they come out with it, and then it is the greatest thing ever.

"They like to call out EMC and get us all riled up, but you just need to look at who is winning in the all-flash market. XtremIO is, by a mile. That lead only extended last year. We are not too concerned and frankly, if you look at their announcement, there was no announcement there. The whole FlashBlade product is not a product for 2016. That's a sign of desperation to be honest with you, just to keep interest in their company."