Part I of II
Susan, an employee of a major insurance company, clicked on her email at work to open a cute home video her friend Debbie sent. That 20mb video file was then stored in her email and, at the end of the day, was diligently backed up by her company’s data storage solution.
Just one year later after daily backups of Susan’s email, that one video now takes up 7300 MB of space!
Incredible Data Growth
The incredible growth in the amount of electronic data generated for both business and personal use has resulted in higher costs for data storage and backup. Several factors have lead to these spiraling cost increases, including storage of larger files such as video and audio, multiple backups of the same files, and enforcement of industry compliance regulations. How often is your company backing up duplicate data over the course of a year?
With the exponential increase in the storage of email, video, mp3 files and other large sized files, business storage needs have grown accordingly. In addition to backing up business information, company computers often end up as the de facto backup for personal music, videos and email, resulting in additional backup storage costs for businesses.
Currently, 75% of documents are stored in email. In 2008 alone, more than 210 billion emails were sent.1 Backing up the same email attachments sent to different people in the same organization results in increased storage requirements, costs and time for backups.
The Contribution from Regulations
Government regulations such as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, Sarbanes Oxley (SOX) and industry compliance regulations such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) have also increasingly contributed to higher levels of data retention and stricter requirements to keep data secure and private. For example, according to HIPAA, healthcare providers must comply with the confidentiality, integrity and availability of individuals’ health information. They are also in the midst of implementing electronic medical records (EMR). While EMR may increase efficiency and lower processing costs, it will also lead to higher data storage requirements. In the financial arena, your mortgage information, credit card activities, investment information and other private financial data protected by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act add to the stricter privacy controls and data storage and backup requirements.
As the requirements for more information analysis and access to data increase, larger amounts of historical data will be required. According to IDC, in 2006, 161 Exabytes of data were stored, “3 million times the amount of information contained in all the books ever written”. In 2010, more than 988 Exabytes are expected to be stored.2 Inflexible backup systems compound the problem by backing-up the same data daily resulting in the need for ever greater increasing amounts of storage.
Grappling with Costs
As companies grapple with the rising costs and complexities of data storage and backup, a variety of options are available to reign in and more effectively manage the costs and improve efficiencies. Companies looking for ways to reduce their backup costs are increasingly turning to more modern and efficient data management solutions that utilized disk-based technology and online backup. How much money could you be saving by implementing the right storage and backup solution? This white paper outlines 7 ways that new backup solutions can help control costs.
7 Ways to Control Costs
Using outdated backup methods or limiting your company to tape storage and backup will increase your costs, rather than reduce them. Instead, look for a solution that provides the flexibility and technology that will help you maximize cost savings. Implementing the following cost management techniques may help optimize your storage and backup strategy
Susan, an employee of a major insurance company, clicked on her email at work to open a cute home video her friend Debbie sent. That 20mb video file was then stored in her email and, at the end of the day, was diligently backed up by her company’s data storage solution.
Just one year later after daily backups of Susan’s email, that one video now takes up 7300 MB of space!
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