This panel at NVIDIA GCT '26 examines high-density storage, disaggregated architectures and artificial intelligence, AI infrastructure. Hosted by John Furrier of SiliconANGLE Media Inc., co-founder and co-chief executive officer, CEO, the discussion assembles industry leaders to explore how storage shapes modern AI stacks and data center architecture. Andy Pernsteiner of VAST Data, field chief technology officer, CTO; Ace Stryker of Solidigm, director of AI and ecosystem marketing; and Brennen Smith of Runpod, chief technology officer, CTO, examine storage density, energy efficiency, SSD innovation and the role of software in enabling high-density commodity hardware to meet demanding AI workloads.
The panel addresses disaggregation, global scale and developer-driven use cases. Speakers evaluate SSD developments such as Solidigm’s 122TB SSD and technologies such as KVCache, Parquet, Engram and DeepSeek-R1, and they consider implications for unified fabrics and AI cloud deployments.
Key takeaways highlight measurable business and technical impact. Smith reports that pairing GPUs with high-quality storage increases Runpod margins by 12% and they attribute the improvement to optimized storage performance and reduced data movement. Pernsteiner emphasizes that storage is central to artificial intelligence and that software enables high-density commodity hardware to deliver performance while reducing power consumption and rack footprint, and they underscore the importance of software-defined approaches in disaggregated architectures. Stryker highlights Solidigm’s density roadmap and they discuss implications for energy usage, rack space utilization and fabric consolidation.
Watch the full panel for detailed technical insights and practical guidance for architects, storage engineers and AI infrastructure teams.
-R1
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This panel at NVIDIA GCT '26 examines high-density storage, disaggregated architectures and artificial intelligence, AI infrastructure. Hosted by John Furrier of SiliconANGLE Media Inc., co-founder and co-chief executive officer, CEO, the discussion assembles industry leaders to explore how storage shapes modern AI stacks and data center architecture. Andy Pernsteiner of VAST Data, field chief technology officer, CTO; Ace Stryker of Solidigm, director of AI and ecosystem marketing; and Brennen Smith of Runpod, chief technology officer, CTO, examine storage density, energy efficiency, SSD innovation and the role of software in enabling high-density commodity hardware to meet demanding AI workloads.
The panel addresses disaggregation, global scale and developer-driven use cases. Speakers evaluate SSD developments such as Solidigm’s 122TB SSD and technologies such as KVCache, Parquet, Engram and DeepSeek-R1, and they consider implications for unified fabrics and AI cloud deployments.
Key takeaways highlight measurable business and technical impact. Smith reports that pairing GPUs with high-quality storage increases Runpod margins by 12% and they attribute the improvement to optimized storage performance and reduced data movement. Pernsteiner emphasizes that storage is central to artificial intelligence and that software enables high-density commodity hardware to deliver performance while reducing power consumption and rack footprint, and they underscore the importance of software-defined approaches in disaggregated architectures. Stryker highlights Solidigm’s density roadmap and they discuss implications for energy usage, rack space utilization and fabric consolidation.
Watch the full panel for detailed technical insights and practical guidance for architects, storage engineers and AI infrastructure teams.
-R1
In this interview from the Nvidia GTC AI Conference and Expo, Andy Pernsteiner, field chief technology officer of VAST Data, joins Ace Stryker, director of AI ecosystems marketing at Solidigm, and Brennen Smith, chief technology officer of Runpod, to talk with theCUBE's John Furrier about why high-density storage has moved from afterthought to the critical enabler of AI infrastructure at scale. Smith reveals that pairing GPUs with VAST storage increases Runpod's margins by 12%, a repeatable result that proves GPUs generate more revenue when backed by fast, sc...Read more
