News & Press Releases

Press Releases

2020.12.10

KADOKAWA Connected has Selected RSTOR Space, a High Performance Cloud Object Storage System, for “Niconico”, One of the Largest Video Community Services in Japan.

Ideal for High Performance Read/Write Requirements, RSTOR’s Cloud Object Storage Handles Billions of Objects without Data Transfer or Access Fees, Reduces Costs and Operational Effort by 90%.

TwoFive Corporation (headquartered in Chuo-ku, Tokyo, President Nobuhiro Suemasa) has announced that KADOKAWA Connected (headquartered in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, President Shigeo Kagami), a provider of ICT services for the KADOKAWA Group, has announced that it will migrate "Niconico", one of the largest video community services in Japan to RSTOR Space. TwoFive and Kadokawa Connected is pleased to announce that it has selected Space, a high performance S3 object storage service from RSTOR, California-based company, as its storage and backup target for file servers across the group of companies.

RSTOR’s Tokyo node was launched in September and KADOKAWA Connected will be the first user in Japan to use RSTOR Space for its content delivery service.

The Niconico service will pull content to be displayed on the site, including video and image files that number in the hundreds of millions of objects. Many cloud storage services not only charge for data storage, but also for the total egress data requested or downloaded, whereas RSTOR only charges for the amount of stored data and does not charge for the movement or egress of data when using the Space service. Initially contracting for 300TB, with only a flat rate for capacity and no additional unpredictable costs, KADOKAWA Connected estimates a cost savings of nearly 90% of the current on-premise system.

In addition, RSTOR Space, incorporates high-speed data transfer between replica data centers and customers using a proprietary network acceleration solution which increases performance, making it up to 30 times faster than other cloud storage services. RSTOR has optimized its platform to process large and small files with high efficiency. Whereas the current on-premise system fails when exceeding 100 million objects in a bucket or becomes inoperable due to mass deletion of large amounts of data, RSTOR has proven to be able to process both of these scenarios without issue.

Furthermore, RSTOR Space does not require five man-days of routine maintenance work every two months to maintain performance and stability, and the operational overhead is expected to be greatly reduced by eliminating the cost of dealing with hardware failures.

KADOKAWA Connected is a strategic subsidiary of the KADOKAWA Group that promotes DX (Digital Transformation) and plans to use RSTOR Space as a storage target for their file servers throughout their group companies.

Challenges and Adoption Points

The "Niconico" site, which stands out amongst the many online streaming video services, is provided by Dwango Inc. RSTOR was selected as part of Connected's ongoing commitment to developing new services and revamping the infrastructure to improve quality. Here are some of the challenges of traditional systems with Amazon S3 Glacier and on-premises storage, as well as some of the points evaluated in the adoption of RSTOR.

(1) Performance and Scalability

Object storage for the "Niconico" service contains necessary data for application development (pre-built binaries, logs, etc.), static content to be displayed on the site (JavaScript, CSS, etc.), and image files such as user icons. Current products and other companies' solutions that have been evaluated were mainly for archiving, and they didn't match the use case for our "Niconico" service, which requires high performance read and writes for all sized data. We have verified that RSTOR Space can meet or exceed the performance requirements.

(2) System Stability

The current on-premise system failed when nearly 100 million objects are uploaded to a single bucket, RSTOR Space performed without fault or error with the same number of objects in a single bucket. Also, the current on-premise system would become inoperable when attempting the bulk deletion of a large volumes of data, RSTOR Space was able to handle it without problems.

(3) Cost Benefits

RSTOR only charges for capacity, with no ingress or egress fees. The price per terabyte is similar to Amazon S3 Glacier, but for active storage, this will allow us to reduce our annual storage spend by 90% without sacrificing on quality.

(4) Reducing the operational load

The current system requires regular maintenance every two months to maintain its current performance, a task that takes five man-days, but RSTOR Space eliminates the operational cost, and significantly reduces the operational burden.

System Architecture

About KADOKAWA Connected, Inc.

KADOKAWA Connected was established in April 2019 as a strategic subsidiary of KADOKAWA Corporation. KADOKAWA Connected provides digital transformation (DX) advisory services, including infrastructure development and operation of services operated by the KADOKAWA Group, such as "Niconico", one of the largest video services in Japan, as well as ICT consulting and support for work style reform, and provides digital transformation (DX) advisory services based on real world experience. While providing large-scale infrastructure, network, and big data analytics as a service, we are also involved in the realization of enterprise DX and work with business partners who are at the forefront of their fields.

URL：https://kdx.co.jp/

About RSTOR, Inc.

RSTOR empowers customers with a true ‘software defined cloud’ built for the secure, performant edge. Built by a founding team steeped in innovation in enterprise infrastructure, RSTOR equips customers with a single, integrated platform that eliminates variable costs, vendor lock-in, and regionality, while offering the flexibility of using multiple cloud service providers without additional fees. In May 2020, the Asia Pacific headquarters was launched in Tokyo, Japan, headed by Stuart Folo.

URL：https://RSTOR.io/

* For more information on RSTOR, please take a look at the following product page

URL：https://www.twofive25.com/service/rstor.html

About TwoFive, Inc.

TwoFive, Inc. was established in 2014 by a group of mail system engineers with many years of experience in email system infrastructure for major ISPs, ASPs, and mobile operators. Our mission is to improve Japan's email environment by combining the best technologies and services from a vendor-neutral standpoint and providing consulting services in the design and construction of email systems, electronic security, and other areas, as well as providing a variety of reputational data.

URL：https://www.twofive25.com/

Press Inquiries

TwoFive Inc.

Tomoko Taniguchi TEL 080-2021-8067

info@twofive25.com

* For sales inquiries.

info@twofive25.com TEL：03-5704-9948

* The original text is uploaded below.

https://www.twofive25.com/news/press/pdf/20201210_rstor.pdf

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