Abilene Christian University Selected Actifio

Abilene Christian University relies on strategic uses of technology across all of its academic programs making advanced IT capabilities essential to the university’s mission.

When faced with the challenge of transforming a legacy tape backup environment, they turned to Actifio, Inc. for reliable disk-based backup and DR with improved scope, speed and simplicity.

“Actifio has become much more than a vendor to us,” said Arthur Brant, director of enterprise infrastructure, Abilene Christian University. “They’re a partner. They’ve taken on an active and invaluable advisory role as we consider moving backup or DR to the cloud. Actifio has enabled us to pivot from traditional tape backups, reduce our overall backup licensing costs, and expand our disaster preparedness by integrating the cloud as a backup target.“

The university is a private, non-profit university founded in 1906, and committed to transformative, energized learning. Supported by a faculty of Christian scholars, it prepares undergraduate and graduate students for service and leadership throughout the world. By partnering with Actifio for the transition from tape, it has expanded coverage to include not only backup, DR, and deduplication, but have also prepared for future expansion to cloud-based services.

Technology is integrated across the diverse curriculum to prepare students for a media-rich future. As a result, the university’s IT organization acts as an advanced support function for both administrative and academic requirements. Significant infrastructure is maintained in a regularly refreshed on-campus virtualized environment. It was time to modernize an aging backup system.

By implementing Actifio, the university has realized a streamlined process where files are restored in minutes instead of days. System administrators have improved control. Support is easy, communications are regular and open. A full-time backup administrator is no longer needed, and license expenses are 20% lower.