Available first on Google Cloud: Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory

In-memory workloads continue to be the backbone of innovative data management use cases, but as demand increases, so does the need for even larger memory capacity. In July, we announced a partnership with Intel and SAP to offer GCP virtual machines supporting Intel® Optane DC™ persistent memory for SAP workloads. This was a significant step forward for customers that handle and store large amounts of data, and run in-memory databases such as SAP HANA.

Today, we’re excited to announce the alpha availability of virtual machines with 7TB of total memory utilizing Intel Optane DC persistent memory. With native 7TB virtual machines, GCP customers have the ability to scale up their workloads while benefiting from all the infrastructure capabilities and flexibility of Google Cloud, including on-demand provisioning, Live Migration and flexible scaling up and down.

Enterprise customers need increased scaling, reduced startup latency, and improved efficiency for their in-memory databases. Early customers have seen as much as a 12x improvement in SAP HANA startup times using Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory. And with lower total cost of ownership (TCO)  compared to DRAM-based VMs, GCP customers using this technology no longer have to balance operational efficiency against cost.

Google Cloud is the first public cloud provider to offer virtual machines using Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory, in addition to even larger Optane-based VM offerings to follow in 2019.  

These announcements are part of our larger commitment to providing  infrastructure and platform innovation through our deep engineering collaboration with Intel and SAP. GCP VMs with Optane memory are now available in limited quantities for interested customers—you can sign up here to be part of our alpha program.

To learn more about this partnership, visit our Intel and SAP partnership pages.