As Storage Switzerland frequently discusses, many enterprises are struggling to keep up with today’s backup demands. Copy data is growing exponentially, to comply with data privacy regulations such as the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), to support business initiatives such as analytics and DevOps, and to support service level agreements (SLAs) for up-to-the-minute recovery point objectives (RPOs) and instantaneous recovery time objectives (RTOs). At the same time, this data is distributed globally across a heterogeneous range of infrastructure resources, and must be accessible by any user, from any location.
Against this backdrop, paying for, implementing and managing on-premises backup hardware and software becomes cost prohibitive for many enterprises – especially against a backdrop of limited data center floorspace availability. At face value, the cloud is an alluring solution to these pain points, but storage managers should be careful to ensure that their cloud solution comes complete with enterprise-class capabilities. In this blog, we will explore the first capability: a turnkey, all-in-one solution.
Backup plays a role in the sophisticated data protection strategies that modern enterprises require to meet varying, application-specific SLAs without breaking the bank. For example, some applications require continuous availability and high levels of recovery performance, and as a result require premium technologies such as continuous replication. However, from a cost perspective, it does not make sense to store colder data on fastest-performing storage media, or to provide high availability to applications that can stand longer downtimes. While many cloud vendors may offer point capabilities including long-term archive, rapid recovery and non-disruptive data migration, storage managers do not have the time to implement and orchestrate a set of disparate tools. They require a comprehensive, pre-integrated solution so that they can spend more of their time focused on more strategic revenue-impacting initiatives for the business.
Along a similar vein, enterprise storage managers require a singular solution that can protect all data types across all of their resources, including physical and virtual on-premises infrastructure, cloud services and endpoints such as desktops, laptops, tablets and smartphones. At its core, the purpose of data protection is to ensure that the right data can be accessed by the user who needs it, from wherever they happen to be. This is a complex proposition to solve for, and one that storage managers should look to their cloud service provider to help solve.
To learn more about this and other requirements of an enterprise-class cloud backup solution (complete platform support; flexible recovery options; enterprise-class RPOs/RTOs; quality support), register now to attend Storage Switzerland’s on demand webinar in collaboration with Carbonite.
Senior Analyst, Krista Macomber produces analyst commentary and contributes to a range of client deliverables including white papers, webinars and videos for Storage Switzerland. She has a decade of experience covering all things storage, data center and cloud infrastructure, including: technology and vendor portfolio developments; customer buying behavior trends; and vendor ecosystems, go-to-market positioning, and business models. Her previous experience includes leading the IT infrastructure practice of analyst firm Technology Business Research, and leading market intelligence initiatives for media company TechTarget.
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