Hunger Task Force, Non-Profit Food Bank in Wisconsin, Chooses Exablox

Exablox Corp. announced that Hunger Task Force (HTF), a non-profit food bank in Wisconsin, has chosen the OneBlox products for its all-in-one primary, backup and DR storage solution.

OneBlox’s CDP capabilities enable HTF to recover any data in seconds. The company is also using the appliance as a backup and recovery target with Unitrends, Inc. and for offsite storage replication for DR.

Previously, HTF was burdened with an aging Windows server infrastructure using internal storage that required forklift upgrades, provided poor version control and was plagued by performance and reliability issues that did not meet the high level of availability required to fulfill expectations. This impaired HTF’s business agility. With OneBlox, HTF employees have the capability to recover data on a granular level.

Additionally, the integration between Unitrends and OneBlox ensures the protection of all servers and mission critical applications, including those running on VMware infrastructure. Since deployment, HTF has eliminated the need for tape and HDD backups as well as the need for rotating backup media offsite to comply with DR and contingency policies.

Founded in 1974, HTF works to prevent hunger and malnutrition by providing food to people in need today and by promoting social policies to achieve a hunger-free community for tomorrow. The non-profit’s aging Windows server could not meet its business requirements. Time-consuming backups interrupted business and led to downtime for storage management tasks. Backups were unreliable and could not eliminate the 24-hour RPO HTF required. The company needed an enterprise-grade storage solution that could provide primary and backup storage and would enable it to add storage capacity at any time. HTF also needed offsite DR capable of providing a rapid RTO.

“With our Windows servers we were running into all kinds of data retention issues. For example, one of our logistics managers worked all day on a document, and when his computer crashed he lost everything,” said Gary Zajc, associate director, HTF. “With OneBlox, he could have just looked for the last saved version of the file and recovered it, a process that takes seconds. Now with OneBlox we have the flexibility to grow our storage as needed, which works well with our budget. Exablox’s off-site replication gives us incredible peace of mind, as our records make it possible for us to get the necessary political support to identify and send food to families in need.“

HTF replaced its Windows server with two OneBlox storage appliances, one for on-premise storage and the other to use as an off-site replication target. The on-premise appliance serves as a target for Unitrends Enterprise Backup (a Unitrends vSphere virtual appliance) to protect applications running in VMware; it also acts as primary storage for file-serving needs. The device has CDP locally, and all data is replicated off-site across a WAN for DR. This eliminates the use of tapes, which delays recovery times.

“We’re pleased to team with Exablox in providing HTF an enterprise backup solution for their virtual environment that provides not only backup but archiving, instant recovery, granular recovery while dramatically reducing the RTO and RPO, enabling HTF to meet their need for BC” said Dr. Mark Campbell, CSO, Unitrends. “At Unitrends, we believe in enabling our customers to ‘Play IT Safe’ – we are both proud and excited to be able to work together with Exablox to contribute in our small way to HTF’s mission.“

In the time since HTF has deployed its OneBlox devices, it has realized several business benefits. The company can add storage capacity, eliminating the need for forklift upgrades. End users can access any file at any time, and in the event of hardware failure or inadvertent deletion, OneBlox’s built-in CDP reduces recovery time from 20 hours to a few seconds. Additionally, OneSystem’s cloud-based service enables the management of both OneBlox from any browser, providing a higher level of storage services while reducing management time.

Exablox provides enterprise features without requiring an enterprise budget or storage expertise, making it a solution for non-profit organizations that need to store massive amounts of data. OneBlox delivers a flexible simple storage system that enables organizations to scale performance, availability and capacity non-disruptively and with zero configuration. With enterprise features like inline deduplication, CDP and encryption enabled by default, OneBlox protects organizations’ information. The company’s OneSystem is a secure, multi-tenant cloud-based management system that manages OneBlox. With these features, Exablox nearly eliminates the time required to manage storage.