We are pleased to welcome Leil Storage as a first-time exhibitor at ISC 2026. Founded in 2022 and headquartered in Tallinn, Estonia, the company develops high-capacity, energy-efficient storage systems designed for enterprises and research facilities facing exponential data growth.
At the core of its platform is Host-Managed Shingled Magnetic Recording (HM-SMR) technology, a high-density HDD architecture widely used by hyperscalers. Unlike conventional drives, HM-SMR is optimized for sequential data patterns, enabling greater areal density and lowering cost per terabyte. Leil complements this hardware approach with an intelligent software layer that manages how and where data is written, aligning workloads with the physical characteristics of the drives.
This software-defined architecture reduces write amplification, optimizes data placement, and selectively powers down idle disks. According to the company, for suitable workloads, this can deliver energy savings of up to 70% compared to traditional always-on storage systems. The result is lower operational expenditure, reduced cooling requirements, and a smaller environmental footprint.
The Leil platform is aimed at a variety of challenging storage environments, including HPC, AI pipelines, research data repositories, media archives, and large-scale backup, all of which place a premium on sequential throughput, capacity density, and cost efficiency. The platform’s modular design allows organizations to scale capacity incrementally, avoiding forklift upgrades, while maintaining performance across petabyte-scale deployments.
Leil’s distributed file system, SaunaFS, is currently being used to support HPC infrastructure at Assam Agricultural University in India. In addition, the platform integrates with several backup and data protection stacks, including Veeam, Acronis, Veritas Technologies (including Veritas NetBackup), and Rubrik, making it relevant for large-scale enterprise and research deployments.
In November last year, Leil secured €1.5 million in seed funding. Recently, Leil’s HDD-native storage management solution was recognized with the StorageNewsletter Special Jury Prize, highlighting industry acknowledgment of its approach to high-density storage. The award also underscores growing recognition of software-driven HDD architectures as a viable alternative for large-scale data environments.
At ISC 2026, you can expect to see how HDD-native, software-driven systems can help organizations balance accelerating data growth, budget constraints, and sustainability targets. For attendees evaluating next-generation storage architectures, Leil presents a viable alternative for modern data-intensive environments. Visit them at Booth #M30.
