Ever had that moment where you’ve experienced system failure or made an error, then held your breath while you check if your data is backed up? It is in that instance that the importance of backups becomes perfectly clear. Success means you can carry on with barely a hiccup, while failure might result in an embarrassing and costly incident.
Hopefully we’re preaching to the choir here, and everyone involved in business leadership recognises the importance of backups. Yet in a changing business IT environment, more traditional backup options can prove cumbersome and costly, unsuited to the hybrid cloud world.
Not surprisingly, cloud is an attractive option for backups. Data is replicated off-site and for a modest budget, any organisation can have access to enterprise-level solutions. That promise isn’t without its challenges. Most of these revolve around lack of clarity.
Some confusion isn’t exactly surprising when you’re dealing with a complex environment with on-premise and many clouds, with some business units acquiring applications without routing it through the IT department. Then there are the common myths and misunderstandings about what is backed up and where. No assumptions should be made here – everything from Office 365 to legacy apps must be backed up safely, but nobody should assume that happens automatically.
On the plus side, there are some new tools that put clarity back in your hands. Secure backup experts Veeam have updated their Backup and Replication software, with newly released version 9.5 giving full visibility and safe backup of everything from on-premise to multi-cloud. They’ve also tackled some common frustrations by prioritising the key essentials such as Microsoft Exchange and SharePoint, as well as transaction-level restore of popular databases like SQL Server and Oracle.
This level of new technology tackles another key issue of the day; with new mandatory data breach reporting legislation in Australia and a host of other countries, protecting information about your customers and employees should rank high on any business agenda. Failure to comply comes with a range of outcomes including punitive fines, and lost reputation can be hard to regain. With that in mind, the value of fast, secure cloud backup shouldn’t be under-estimated.
Clarity has a side effect in terms of cost. Strong visibility reduces wasted capacity and prevents overspend. After all, whichever of the many cloud providers you opt for, your business deserves to get its money’s worth.
Time to pull your backups into line or want to investigate the newest version of a trusted favourite? Contact Area9’s friendly backup experts today.