NetApp Astra Simplifies and Automates Application Data Management for Kubernetes

NetApp, Inc. announced the availability of Astra (formerly known as Project Astra), a managed application-aware data management service built for Kubernetes workloads.

It allows organizations to protect, recover, and move applications deployed on Kubernetes with no software to download, install, manage, or upgrade, thus enabling them to focus on developing and scaling their applications-not on managing infrastructure.

“Backup, cloning, DR, data lifecycle operations, data optimization, compliance, and security are all critical to any organization,” said Eric Han, VP, product management, public cloud services. “Taken together, these challenges increase complexity. That’s directly at odds with Kubernetes’ goal of simpler, faster and more flexible application development and deployment – a vision that NetApp Astra will help to realize.“

“I applaud NetApp’s goal of providing application-aware data management for Kubernetes,” said Rushi NS, chief architect, SAP SE. “Astra will make it dramatically easier to manage, protect, and move data-rich Kubernetes workloads across public clouds and on-premises. I look forward to collaborating with NetApp as they continue to develop Astra.“

Astra dashboard

With Astra, the company extends its data management services into the Kubernetes ecosystem, helping organizations manage cloud native applications and legacy workloads with capabilities including:

Data protection with snapshots. Teams can take snapshots for local data protection. If the data is accidentally deleted or corrupted, the applications and associated data can be reverted to a previously recorded snapshot in the same Kubernetes cluster.
Disaster/data recovery with remote backups. Teams can also take a full application-aware backup of an application and state. The backup can be used to restore the application with its data to a different Kubernetes cluster in the same or a different region to address data recovery use cases.
Simplified application portability and migration with active clones. Entire applications, along with their data, can be moved from one Kubernetes cluster to another, no matter where the clusters are located.