Managed Backup Solutions (MBS) – is a term that is being used to describe a combination of solution and services that is outsourced to a specialised support provider, which consists of hardware, software, design, delivery, maintenance and management.
You may see other terms being used that may bring about confusion, such as, Managed Cloud Backup, Managed Backup Service or Backup as a Service (BaaS). Ultimately, the definition along with the differentiators need to be understood and listed out.
When commencing this journey for an MBS, an important area to focus on before the engagement is to ensure a set of service and solution requirements are listed out, along with a template response document for targeted providers to reply to. This is important, as all providers will have their own interpretation of how to deliver a response, making it challenging to compare the overall offerings. With a well-defined response template, it will be both useful to the providers and your internal resources in minimising the effort involved in deciphering each vendor formatted content and varying interpretations.
Another point about Managed Backup Solutions is that it is moving more towards consumption based charges. In saying this, the industry in terms of service providers supplying such a commercial construct are still immature. Either the monthly ongoing charge seems excessive currently, or there are upfront and/or minimums stipulated in terms – therefore not truly consumption based pricing. When a consumption model is offered, it’s still a worthwhile caveat to look out for if you’re looking to outsource your backup solution and services as a MBS.
With a recent industry scan of data protection solutions and services, it became apparent that there are both technological and service advancements to accommodate for the (hybrid) Cloud environments, or at least to have capabilities to meet the needs of business’ that are heading in this direction.
A pertinent place to start for the generation of requirements begins with a question: Do we truly understand what our business needs now and where it’s going in order to build requirements to support its needs? By sourcing the answers for business needs, you gain the anchoring foundations for decision making throughout changes to your IT solutions and services.
