Dutch MSP nCoActive Prefers Dell AppAssure

Dutch MSP nCoActive B.V.
didn’t have the time or resources to babysit the backups they performed each
day. But for some time CEO Erwin van Workum and his staff didn’t have a
choice.

"As a service provider, we want to get
information the moment something goes wrong with a customer backup instead of finding
out about it afterwards" van Workum says.

The company’s Symantec Backup Exec software backups failed frequently, forcing him and
his staff to spend hours checking log files to piece together valid backups.
But when he selected Dell AppAssure‘s
backup, replication and recovery software for VMware backup, Windows Server
backup, Exchange backup, and SQL Server backup van Workum’s fears were put to
rest.

Based in Reeuwijk, The Netherlands, nCoActive BV focuses on backup/recovery
and DR solutions for end users.

"If something happens, we need to be able
to proactively respond and fix the issue as soon as possible," explains van
Workum. "Backup Exec was costing us too
much time and money. Staff had to spend on things you don’t want to see happen,
we were dealing with serious inefficiencies. On top of it all, I was scared of
the fact we could lose data for days or weeks. That was the most important
thing for me."

Finally, a business partner told van
Workum about Dell AppAssure and now his fears have disappeared.

Confidence in replication and recovery while nCoActive wasn’t
actively looking for another recovery solution, they were open to finding a
better way to offer VMware ESX backup protection for their clients, and they found
it in Dell AppAssure.

"From the moment we implemented Live
AppAssure and virtual standby options, we no longer had ANY issues," says
van Workum.

"Furthermore, the fact that a
backup is created via intervals per volume and standby options provides us
freedom in moving servers and restoring data without losing access to data for
long. All clients delete entire folders from a file server or mail from an
Exchange environment at one point or another," van Workum continues. "Dell AppAssure gives us quick single-item
restores for different kinds of systems, along with virtual standby options for
recovering entire environments."

• Van Workum uses all the features that AppAssure offers, including live recovery
  technology, to deliver data protection to its customers:
  Recovery in minutes from any server failure local and offsite backup and
  recovery
• Offsite HA and DR services
• Individual recovery of files, Exchange and
  SharePoint items, or entire servers in minutes

Van Workum uses AppAssure’s
virtual machine and virtual server backup and DR capabilities to leverage his
VMware ESX backup environment. He can create standby servers and migrate from
physical to virtual servers. Replication features
move client data to nCoActive’s own datacenter for emergency preparedness.

AppAssure Guarantees SLAs
The AppAssure/nCoActive
partnership promises to revolutionize the way the Netherlands protects its data.
For instance nCoActive has already been able to offer far more aggressive and
competitive SLAs to clients. Recovery times average five minutes for live data
restores and less than two hours for server restores to virtual standbys.
Moreover nCoActive can deliver storage space savings of over 50% via file
compression and data deduplication. In addition, van Workum points out that AppAssure is the only DR software solution on the market that can perform
application-aware recoveries, providing full Windows application protection
that’s automated and continuous. And there’s the added security that comes from
provisioning a virtual hot standby machine for offsite recovery in case of a
local server failure.

AppAssure has also helped nCoActive move beyond an offering a
backup service to become a customer partner for data and server
recovery.

"No software vendor offered a VMware ESX
backup solution that really worked until Dell AppAssure"‘ says van Workum. "And not only that, Dell AppAssure has the
best support desk you can find. Over five years we never had a bad experience
and the response is perfect!"