In a recent Rackside Chat, ASA/Racklive’s SVP of Systems and Solutions, Ruban Kanapathippillai, spoke with Western Digital’s Director of Product Management, Mark Pastor, about how AI is transforming storage needs and how disaggregated infrastructure is enabling greater performance and scalability across industries.

Rethinking Storage for AI Workloads

AI workloads are fundamentally different from traditional enterprise applications. Each stage in training, inference, and generative output places distinct demands on infrastructure, especially when it comes to storage.

Training involves processing massive datasets, making high-capacity, cost-effective solutions like HDD-based JBODs ideal. Inference, on the other hand, requires fast, real-time responsiveness and benefits most from low-latency, high-IOPS flash storage. As for generative output, depending on the application, it often cycles back to long-term archival storage where capacity again becomes the priority.

To meet these varying needs, Western Digital offers a tailored portfolio like Ultrastar Data102 JBODs for scalable capacity, and OpenFlex for performance at scale. This balanced approach ensures that organizations can handle everything from data-heavy model training to ultra-responsive edge inference with the right storage in place.

Why Disaggregated Storage Is the Future

Traditional server designs often tie compute and storage together, limiting flexibility. As compute components like GPUs evolve rapidly, replacing full server stacks becomes costly and inefficient.

Western Digital’s solution is a disaggregated architecture, where storage and compute scale independently. The OpenFlex platform, using NVMe-over-Fabrics, delivers performance comparable to locally attached storage while remaining fully modular. This model enables faster refresh cycles for compute while preserving long-term investment in storage.

For organizations managing evolving AI workflows, this architecture offers both immediate performance gains and long-term adaptability.

Ensuring Compatibility with the OCCL

To simplify deployment and reduce integration challenges, Western Digital introduced the Open Composability Compatibility Lab (OCCL), a testing initiative that ensures third-party components like SSDs, DPUs, switches, and software tools perform seamlessly within its composable storage ecosystem.

This type of ecosystem validation is especially valuable as more enterprises shift toward open standards and modular infrastructure, where interoperability and flexibility are key to scaling effectively.

What’s Ahead in AI Infrastructure

Looking ahead, both ASA and Western Digital anticipate growing demand for modular, open, and shared infrastructure as AI workloads continue to scale. Modern storage systems must evolve to support this growth, without tying organizations to rigid architectures or rapid hardware refresh cycles.

Closing Thoughts

AI isn’t just changing the way businesses operate, it is transforming how infrastructure must be built. And storage is right at the center of that transformation.

Get in touch with our team at info@asacomputers.com or explore our full range of solutions at ASA Computers.