Onva Digital News Release

Leading IT analyst firm validates that ExaGrid-Veeam integration can instantly recover VMs in minutes, thanks to ExaGrid’s unique landing zone technology

London, May 31, 2013 – ExaGrid Systems, Inc. (www.exagrid.com), the leader in scalable and cost-effective disk-based backup solutions with data deduplication, announced today that leading IT analyst firm Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) has validated the effective instant VM recovery capabilities of ExaGrid’s disk-based backup with deduplication system with Veeam Software’s virtual server data protection solution. The joint ExaGrid-Veeam configuration allows organisations to recover VMs in just minutes – speeds comparable to recovering from straight disk – thanks to ExaGrid’s unique landing zone architecture, according to the ESG Lab Review.

While instant virtual machine recovery works well with straight disk storage, it isn’t as effective with deduplicated backup targets, according to ESG. Competing disk backup appliances tha only maintain a deduplicated copy of data can take hours to reassemble or “rehydrate” the backup data. This makes the “instant” part of recovery “virtually impossible.” ESG noted, “In the case of a disaster, IT can restore data from a deduplicated backup, but the time required often exceeds today’s recovery time objectives (RTOs).”  The ESG report noted that many IT organisations face a dilemma when protecting virtual machines: They must choose between keeping users productive with instant restore capability after a failure or disaster involving a VM, and minimizing the use of storage capacity with deduplication.

However, the ESG review found that with ExaGrid and Veeam, “you can have the benefits of both instant restore and deduplication,” and that no tradeoff was necessary. ExaGrid’s high speed landing zone maintains a full copy of the latest Veeam backups in their original, non-deduplicated formats. This means that users can instantly recover and run a VM from the ExaGrid system in case the primary VM is unavailable, meeting their recovery time objective (RTO). Since the costs of IT downtime are substantial–a 2012 Aberdeen Group report that found the average cost of downtime to be $181,770/hour—the ExaGrid-Veeam solution that recovers VMs in just minutes can save organisations hundreds of thousands of dollars by avoiding lost productivity in the event of a system failure.

ESG is a leading IT research, analysis, and strategy firm. The May 2013 ESG Lab Review, authored by Lab Analyst Kerry Dolan and Senior Lab Analyst Vinny Choinski, reports the results of a hands-on test which executed Veeam Instant VM Recovery configured with ExaGrid’s disk-based backup with deduplication solution.

Following are key findings from the ESG Lab Review:

• “Acts like plain disk”: The ESG Lab tested the Instant VM Recovery capability of the ExaGrid and Veeam solution, using both the ExaGrid appliance and plain disk as the backup targets.
  • ESG’s test found that instant VM recovery from the plain disk target was completed in about 2 minutes, while instant VM recovery from the ExaGrid target was completed in 2:49.
  • ESG also measured throughput and response times for the ExaGrid-Veeam configuration, finding that ExaGrid outperformed plain disk in both throughput rates and I/O per second workload measurements.
  • Summarizing the tests, the report noted, “In ESG Lab testing, the ExaGrid landing zone enabled the appliance to act like plain disk, enabling instant restore in less than three minutes. Testing also demonstrated the increase in productive time provided by the combined solution, saving 37 minutes over standard restore. Finally, ESG Lab validated that throughput and response times were very good when accessing an instantly recovered VM on ExaGrid, enabling users to function at a high level despite the degraded state. The ExaGrid target delivered better throughput and faster response time than the plain disk target.”

• Ease of use and efficiency: ESG Lab tested both the ease of use and the time needed to set up the ExaGrid-Veeam solution for a new backup. Among the key findings:
  • “ESG Lab validated the ease and efficiency of deploying the ExaGrid/Veeam solution; the total time to configure both products and be ready to create backup jobs was three minutes and 40 seconds (3:40),” the report noted.

• “Tremendous capacity savings”: ESG Lab also validated the “tremendous capacity savings” available with Veeam’s client side deduplication combined with ExaGrid’s post-process deduplication.
  • “From an initial data set of 2.1TB, Veeam performed client-side deduplication at a rate of 1.5:1, sending only 1.4TB to the ExaGrid target over a simulated five-week backup. Additional ExaGrid post-process deduplication at 5.6:1 further reduced that 1.4TB, resulting in only 255GB of storage consumed, and a combined deduplication ratio of 8.4:1,” the report noted.

To download a copy of the ESG Lab Review, visit the ExaGrid website. For more information about the joint ExaGrid-Veeam solution, visit: www.exagrid.com/Products/Supported-Data-Backup-Applications/Veeam/

About Veeam Software
Veeam® Software develops innovative solutions for VMware backup, Hyper-V backup, and virtualisation management. Veeam Backup & Replication™ is Modern Data Protection – Built for Virtualisation™. Veeam ONE™ is a single solution for real-time monitoring, reporting and capacity planning for VMware, Hyper-V and Veeam Backup & Replication. TheVeeam Management Pack™ (MP) and Smart Plug-in™ (SPI) extend enterprise monitoring to VMware through Microsoft System Center and HP Operations Manager. Veeam also provides free virtualisation tools. Learn more by visiting http://www.veeam.com/.

About ExaGrid Systems, Inc.:
ExaGrid offers the only disk-based backup appliance with data deduplication purpose-built for backup that leverages a unique architecture optimised for performance, scalability and price. ExaGrid is the only solution that combines compute with capacity and a unique landing zone to permanently shorten backup windows, eliminate expensive forklift upgrades, achieve the fastest full system restores and tape copies, and rapidly restore files, VMs and objects in minutes. With offices and distribution worldwide, ExaGrid has more than 6,500 systems installed at more than 1,700 customers, and more than 320 published customer success stories.

For more information, contact ExaGrid at 800-868-6985 or visit www.exagrid.com. Visit “ExaGrid’s Eye on Deduplication” blog: http://blog.exagrid.com/.

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ExaGrid is a registered trademark of ExaGrid Systems, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective holders.

CEO Bill Andrews authors comprehensive book examining the opportunities and potential pitfalls of using the cloud for data backup and disaster recovery 

London – May 15, 2013 – ExaGrid Systems, Inc. (www.exagrid.com), the leader in scalable and cost-effective disk-based backup solutions with data deduplication, today published a comprehensive book offering IT professionals and CIOs straightforward and pragmatic guidance to help them evaluate various cloud offerings for data backup and disaster recovery. According to this new ExaGrid-published book, while the cloud offers many opportunities for companies to gain operational efficiencies, it is not necessarily a panacea for data backup and disaster recovery in all situations. Organisations need to carefully evaluate their data backup needs and requirements to ensure they can be met by various cloud scenarios.

Andrews, a 25-year veteran of high technology, and author of Straight Talk About Disk Backup with Deduplication, said the objective with the new cloud book is to help IT organisations understand the strengths and weaknesses of the cloud for data backup and disaster recovery. The book explains the key considerations for using the private, public, and hybrid cloud so the reader can understand when it makes the best sense to leverage various cloud solutions. The book also offers pros and cons of a variety of private, public, and hybrid scenarios.  In addition, the book includes suggestions and questions to ask vendors and cloud providers to help IT professionals decide where the cloud may logically fit in their environment to meet site-specific data backup and recovery needs.

The book is available for download by visiting the ExaGrid website.

Here is an example of a key take away from the book:

• Data size and recovery times are key factors in determining the best cloud-based solution. While the public cloud can be used for data backup by organisations with data sizes of under 500GB, for data sizes of 500GB or greater, either a private cloud or hybrid cloud model is the best approach in order to meet recovery time objectives (RTO) and recovery point objectives (RPO) for data backup. This conclusion is backed by a November 2012 Gartner report, “Is Cloud Backup Right for Your Servers?” in which Gartner determined that 50GB was the maximum backup or restore data size to fit a “reasonable window” for cloud backup and restores, given bandwidth and Internet/WAN latency.

The book is broken into seven chapters, including cloud model definitions and scenarios, detailed assessments of the public cloud fordata backup and disaster recovery scenarios, and pros and cons of seven different disaster recovery scenarios. It also includes a set of questions that IT organisations should ask vendors and cloud providers when evaluating a cloud-based solution.

ExaGrid also recently announced a partnership with ATScloud, the premier hybrid-cloud solution provider, which extends the core ExaGrid product’s disk backup with deduplication capabilities to enable disaster recovery in the cloud. For more information about the Secure BDRcloud solution, visit the www.exagrid.com.

About ExaGrid Systems, Inc.:
ExaGrid offers the only disk-based backup appliance with data deduplication purpose-built for backup that leverages a unique architecture optimised for performance, scalability and price. ExaGrid is the only solution that combines compute with capacity and a unique landing zone to permanently shorten backup windows, eliminate expensive forklift upgrades, achieve the fastest full system restores and tape copies, and rapidly restore files, VMs and objects in minutes. With offices and distribution worldwide, ExaGrid has more than 6,500 systems installed at more than 1,700 customers, and more than 320 published customer success stories.

For more information, contact ExaGrid at 800-868-6985 or visit www.exagrid.com. Visit “ExaGrid’s Eye on Deduplication” blog: http://blog.exagrid.com/.

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ExaGrid is a registered trademark of ExaGrid Systems, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective holders.

ExaGrid’s scalable, cost effective disk backup solution with deduplication makes the grade for higher education campuses

 London — May 9, 2013— ExaGrid Systems, Inc. (www.exagrid.com) the leader in scalable and cost-effective disk-based backup solutions with data deduplication, today announced that higher education institutions are increasingly choosing ExaGrid’s disk-based backup appliances with deduplication to gain faster backups and restores and seamless scalability as data grows.

As a result of implementing ExaGrid, IT departments at a growing number of prestigious colleges and universities have reduced backup times by up to 90%, improved offsite disaster recovery capabilities, reduced or eliminated tape backup, and dramatically sped up their restores of files, objects, and virtual machines – while also avoiding costly “forklift upgrades” associated with other approaches that do not scale easily.

Higher education institutions are choosing ExaGrid’s disk backup with deduplication to meet their backup and recovery needs in large part because of ExaGrid’s unique approach to disk backup, which combines compute with capacity as data grows in a “scale-out” architecture along with a landing zone for rapid restores. Other disk backup solutions that expand in a “scale-up” architecture by adding just disk capacity without adding compute resources result in downstream problems including ever-expanding backup windows and expensive forklift upgrades. These other solutions also only store deduplicated data, resulting in slow system restores and tape copies, and slow recoveries of files, VMs and objects that take hours versus minutes. ExaGrid is the only solution that permanently shortens backup windows without expensive forklift upgrades, and also enables the fastest full system restores and rapid restore of files, VMs and objects in as fast as minutes.

The higher education institutions that have turned to ExaGrid to solve their backup challenges include:

• Keene State College: The Keene State College IT department selected ExaGrid to meet its need for shorter backup windows and greater backup reliability. After implementing the ExaGrid system, the team was able to reduce the backup time for the college’s main file server by 95%, from 20 hours to just 45 minutes.

• Furman University: Furman University turned to ExaGrid’s appliances to replace its aging tape library. ExaGrid offered the university a faster, more reliable backup solution that reduced the amount of time spent managing tape backups. Since implementing the ExaGrid disk backup with deduplication solution, Furman’s IT team reported a dramatic reduction in backup data by 22:1 and a 75% reduction in nightly backup times – from as much as six hours to about 90 minutes.

• Plymouth State University: The Plymouth State University IT department needed to move away from tape, and chose disk-based backup to make their data protection processes faster and more reliable. ExaGrid was an ideal choice as the appliance worked with the university’s existing backup application and made switching from tape easy. Since installation, the university has cut its backup windows in half and achieved data deduplication ratios as high as 20:1 with 30 days of retention.

• Sarah Lawrence College: Sarah Lawrence College’s IT team knew that it wanted to move away from tape, and even considered backing up to primary disk in a co-location facility. The team chose ExaGrid’s disk backup with deduplication as a way to reduce backup data volumes and the high projected cost of disk space, power draw, and rack space in the co-location facility. Since backing up to ExaGrid, the IT department has seen the college’s backup window reduced from between 24-36 hours per week to 10-12 hours.

About ExaGrid Systems, Inc.:
ExaGrid offers the only disk-based backup appliance with data deduplication purpose-built for backup that leverages a unique architecture optimised for performance, scalability and price. ExaGrid is the only solution that combines compute with capacity and a unique landing zone to permanently shorten backup windows, eliminate expensive forklift upgrades, achieve the fastest full system restores and tape copies, and rapidly restore files, VMs and objects in minutes. With offices and distribution worldwide, ExaGrid has more than 6,500 systems installed at more than 1,700 customers, and more than 320 published customer success stories.

For more information, contact ExaGrid at 800-868-6985 or visit www.exagrid.com. Visit “ExaGrid’s Eye on Deduplication” blog: http://blog.exagrid.com/.

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ExaGrid is a registered trademark of ExaGrid Systems, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective holders.