Cloudian and LucidLink announced a new partnership to provide scalable file and object storage and on-demand access to distributed workloads across an enterprise’s IT environment.

LucidLink’s Filespaces is a cloud-native file service software that tackles the challenge of accessing files over distance.

Acting as an accelerant to Cloudian’s object storage system, LucidLink’s Filespaces can deliver data at speeds comparable to on-premises systems and provides users the ability to access off-premises files without the associated latency issues that come with first copying a file locally.

“We noted how many end-users were taking a look at object storage, and it was for all the right reasons,” said LucidLink’s CEO and co-founder Peter Thompson. “They were interested in the low-cost, the elasticity, the ability to have it grow on demand, which made management and consumption easier, as well as the durability associated with that. So we decided to build our service ballistic link service on top of object storage.”

The magic is in the built-in streaming file system on top of object storage that seamlessly integrates with any application, on any OS, in the cloud or on the edge, he added.

Once installed on a server, the user points the local Filespaces file system at a remote cloud object store. That file is then split into a metadata plane, synchronized onto the device, and presented on the device as a file system, as if it were local, and streamed on-demand.

It’s the same concept that streaming television services provide. However, “instead of just streaming a video, like Netflix does, we could stream both reads and writes for you to give the user the ability to edit a video, for example. And we wouldn't have to download the entire video to do so,” said Thompson.

When it comes to object storage, Cloudian is one of the leaders in the space. “We kept running into customers who were using Cloudian object storage that wanted to run high performance file applications on it,” and as one of the most compliant when it comes to S3 API, “We felt that this is good for the customer. This is good for us. And this is good for Cloudian,” said Thompson.

Even before the LucidLink announcement, Cloudian’s summer has been punctuated with new partnerships.

In June, the object storage provider announced its partnership with VMware to facilitate a native S3-compatible object storage service for more than 4,000 VMware cloud providers.

Cloudian rounded out the month of June teaming up with  Seagate Technology to develop a new storage product, Cloudian HyperStore Xtrem, that combines Cloudian’s S3-based object storage software with Seagate’s hardware.

And with software built specifically for object storage, LucidLink is a natural fit for the Cloudian partnership-posse.

“LucidLink offers a file solution focused on high-performance file access. With caching at remote sites, its innovative technology delivers latencies similar to a local NAS device and is an ideal example of how the  S3-compatible ecosystem is growing to meet various data services needs via both public and private cloud storage,” wrote Sanjay Jagad, senior director of products and solutions at Cloudian in an email. “Cloudian actively seeks to develop the S3-API ecosystem and is proud to work with LucidLink to further drive this market.”