Starchive and Seagate: Revolutionizing Digital Storage for the Media World

In their pursuit of revolutionizing digital storage, Starchive faced challenges scaling their migration of vast data volumes for clients. Seagate’s advanced technology and solutions enabled Starchive to efficiently move vast amounts of data to the cloud, from dozens of terabytes to petabytes. This collaboration streamlined content management and expanded Starchive’s capacity to serve larger clients. Together, they’re redefining the landscape of media and digital storage solutions and capabilities. 

• Efficient Data Transition. With Seagate's innovative technology, Starchive successfully moved massive data volumes, comprised of multiple terabytes, to the cloud effortlessly. These streamlined solutions addressed urgent client needs.
• Event Content Management. Starchive revolutionizes content management for major events and festivals by leveraging Seagate’s hard drive solutions. Content generated in remote locations can now be more quickly uploaded to the cloud, eliminating tedious post-event manual uploads.
• Serving at Scale. The partnership’s enhanced scale empowered Starchive to cater to bigger clients, marking significant business growth for the organization.
• Co-Innovation and Growth. Aligning with Seagate, a leader in storage solutions, Starchive experienced a blend of entrepreneurial spirit and technological prowess. This collaboration solidified trust among Starchive’s clients and fostered opportunities for co-innovation and expanded service capabilities.

Starchive (www.starchive.io) is a forward-thinking digital asset company that has set out to revolutionize how content creators or all types and scale store and leverage their creative work. Recognizing the challenges creators face in today’s digital age, the company provides a comprehensive and user-friendly platform for managing, preserving, and monetizing their digital assets. Starchive’s solution is designed to simplify this complex process by offering a unified, cloud-based active storage solution with an innovative customizable data model that unlocks latent value in the media.

Built with the nuances of the creative process in mind, Starchive goes beyond a mere storage solution. Instead, it offers a central solution that seamlessly integrates with the creative workflow, allowing creators and content owners to store their works and better understand and leverage their content’s potential. The solution also provides features that enhance searchability, facilitate collaboration, and provide immediate streaming access to stored content to desktops and devices.

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Starchive’s core objective is to empower content owners to take control of their digital assets, making it easier to access, share, and monetize their work. The organization is deeply focused on redefining the cloud storage landscape for the visual economy and media and entertainment. The company aspires to provide next-gen cloud storage solutions that are purpose-built for the demands of media and competitively priced against giants like Google Drive, Dropbox, and iCloud.

A standout aspect of Starchive’s vision is its emphasis on unbridled accessibility. Leaders underscore the importance of preview and playback on any device no matter the size or type of the original, unlike many others in the space, which, despite being cost-effective, limit instant previewable content access. This uncompromised accessibility is pivotal, especially now, when users want to better understand, manage, find, retrieve, and share their stored data instantly. 

The organization aims to foster a culture of unhindered content sharing and streaming. The leaders aim to facilitate this without burdening users with the complexities of moving files and data every time they want to publish. The company’s ambitions are rooted in offering affordable, performance-oriented active cloud storage solutions that champion flexibility and user-friendliness and adapts to any type of media, no matter the size or format. 

As Starchive co-founder Richard Averitt stated, “We really needed to unlock people’s ability to have sharing and accessibility and streaming capabilities that frontline storage provides without having to be stressed over cost and added workload.”

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Several distinct challenges marked Starchive’s journey toward redefining digital asset management. The sheer volume of digital content presents a formidable hurdle. With exabytes of data and a significant portion still in analog forms like film and tape, the transition from analog to digital emerges as a central concern. The company sees itself facilitating this transition over the next few decades, ensuring that media in older formats aren’t left behind in the digital age.

The challenge of scalability is equally pressing. Even small teams handle vast amounts of data, underscoring the need for efficient and scalable storage solutions. A core business driver for Starchive is its ability to store data once and stream it anywhere via embed codes and API access. An additional aim is to avoid egress fees associated with major cloud providers. Knowing there are no in and out costs allows the company to offer a preditable price model. The prohibitive costs of accessing the public internet from platforms like Amazon illustrate the economic constraints many face. Contrary to this, Starchive’s vision promotes a “no egress model,” aiming to provide more accessible and cost-effective solutions for digital assets. 

As co-founder Peter Agelasto stated, “It is so expensive to leverage the public Internet from Amazon that it pretty much nixes a lot of interesting business and publishing ideas that you could do once you’ve got your assets into the cloud.”

Incorporating new technologies, such as new APIs and object layers, presents both opportunities and challenges. While these tools enhance file management and sharing, they also necessitate continuous adaptation and learning. Starchive grappled with the complexities of vast content volumes, technological integration, and economic implications. At the same time, its commitment to a user-centric approach shines through, promising a more inclusive and affordable future for digital asset management.

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In their quest to redefine the digital storage landscape, Starchive required a partner that matched their ambition. When leadership engaged with Seagate and their Lyve Cloud platform, they recognized it was an evolutionary step forward in storage technology. But it wasn’t just about technology; Starchive found in Seagate a like-minded ally, resonating with their drive for excellence and innovation.

Despite the hurdles, Starchives’ commitment to their vision never wavered. They sought a solution that offered high availability without compromising cost or efficiency. Their perseverance led them to Seagate, a known stalwart in the storage industry, which surprisingly showcased an entrepreneurial spirit. This alignment bolstered Starchive’s mission, providing them with the necessary technological muscle and expertise. 

Starchive’s trust in Seagate’s hardware quality, especially after challenges with previous vendors, was a testament to Starchive’s discerning approach to partnerships. They weren’t looking for just any collaborator; they wanted a partner that shared their commitment to innovation and quality. In Seagate, the company found more than a collaborator; they found a co-innovator eager to craft the next generation of  solutions for the media and entertainment industry, as well as the fast-evolving new visual economy

As Averitt expressed, “What we didn’t expect to find from a company that we thought of as sort of the old guard in the storage ecosystem is that there would be an entrepreneurial spirit in the team that helps us serve our client needs better.” 

With Seagate by its side, Starchive is poised to lead the way, championing a new era in digital storage solutions.

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Starchive’s collaboration with Seagate helped it address the critical challenges faced by its clients and propelled the company to serve them at a scale previously unattainable. Seagate’s scale empowered Starchive to pitch larger clients. This capacity expansion was a monumental shift for Starchive, transitioning from managing hundreds of terabytes to handling individual clients with petabytes of data. The company’s collaboration with the Seagate brand, well-known in the media and entertainment industry, has been met with enthusiasm from their Grammy Award-winning customers, who recognize and trust Seagate’s legacy in drive technology.

One significant challenge was managing vast data by clients, like a well-known Chicago Classical music FM radio station, who had an enormous number of terabytes stored on LTO drives. These drives were filling up, and the urgency to transition this data to the cloud was paramount. As a small team, Starchive felt the weight of this challenge, but Seagate’s technological offerings and hard drive solutions allow them to offer an efficient and seamless solution. This synergy enables Starchive to assist clients in maximizing the value of their content in the cloud.

Starchive’s clientele includes major, nationally-known music and entertainment festivals, which can generate terabytes of content daily. Managing this magnitude of content, especially in remote locations, is a daunting task. Seagate’s innovation solutions, like drop-shipping Lyve Mobile hard drives to event locations, transforms this process. Content could be more easily uploaded to the cloud without the previously tedious task of manual uploads back at the office. This was transformational for Starchive, allowing them to serve clients more efficiently and at a larger scale.

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