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The Cure for Backup Anxiety: HPE Datacenter Care with Backup Analysis Services

By Jordan Lewy

Worldwide Manager, HPE Pointnext Support Services

Thereโ€™s a nagging worry lurking in the minds of many IT leaders: โ€œCan our backup and recovery systems and processes really do what we need them to do? If we have an outage, can we count on them to get us back up fast enough and without major glitches or loss of data?โ€

At many organizations, thereโ€™s more than a sneaking suspicion that the answer may be no. And thatโ€™s a real concern. Weโ€™ve all seen the headlines about data loss from natural disasters, the rising threat of ransomware, the new compliance demands around data protection (GDPR is just one of them). But equally worrisome is the reality that backup processes can easily slip behind the blistering pace of change in the core infrastructure. You may have had excellent backup and recovery readiness at some time in the recent past, but in a world of DevOps, hybrid cloud and continuous delivery, that can change before you know it.

Business priorities and strategies are changing faster these days, too. Making sure that the backup strategy stays in sync calls for a level of ITSM thatโ€™s just too demanding for many IT shops. The task tends to get pushed back, with other business initiatives coming first.HPE datacenter care backup analysis.jpg

3 reasons to exploit your strength at the core

Businesses are asking service providers to help them assess and optimize their backup and recovery processes and moving away from a DIY approach. Companies vary greatly in the level of help theyโ€™re looking for, of course. Some may just need a quick review of their backup environment to make sure they can hit their SLAs. Others may want help in designing or redesigning the entire backup and recovery strategy. But whatever your level of need, we at HPE strongly believe that if youโ€™re going to invest in an analysis of your backup processes and systems, you should do it in a way thatโ€™s tightly integrated with your core support services.

HPE Pointnext is making it easy for companies to do exactly that with HPE Datacenter Care with Backup Analysis Services. It delivers three robust analysis services to help current and new HPE Datacenter Care customers optimize their backup readiness. Iโ€™ll describe those services in a moment, but first let me give you three good reasons why it makes all kinds of sense to choose an approach that integrates with your data center support experience.

1. You get an environment-wide view. You need to be sure that your production environment, compute and storage, is in sync with your secondary storage capabilities. In an HPE environment, for example, that means not just ensuring that HPE 3PAR StoreServ Storage arrays are performing really well, but also that theyโ€™re correctly synched up with your HPE StoreOnce Data Protection Backup Appliances. A solution that builds on and expands your data center support experience can give you a clear line of sight across all of your environments.

2. You can combine specific knowledge of your organization and global expertise. You obviously need highly experienced backup specialists to perform the assessments, bring in sophisticated analysis tools, and ask the right questions for this deep area of IT science. But itโ€™s just as important to leverage specific knowledge of your business and your data center. That's where the relationship with your HPE account team comes in. Our customers tell us that their relationship with the HPE Account Support Manager (ASM) is one of the features of HPE Datacenter Care they value most. HPE Datacenter Care with Backup Analysis Services leverages the strength of that relationship by combining insights from your ASM with the knowledge of the experts in our global center of expertise.

3. Itโ€™s easy to run regular checkups. Backup analysis is not a once-and done kind of thing. Itโ€™s something youโ€™ll want to do on a regular basis, just like your yearly physical. You don't want to wait until something goes wrong and then have to deal with an unpleasant surprise. HPE Datacenter Care is generally a multiyear contract with regularly scheduled deliverables. You already have health check reviews, operational reviews, incident reviews. Investing in regular backup and recovery reviews is a logical and convenient way to make sure that your secondary environment is up to the demands youโ€™re placing on it.

3 kinds of peace of mind

HPE Datacenter Care with Backup Analysis Services delivers three advisory services to help you optimize your data backup and recovery processes, covering all industry leading backup software solutions, to improve uptime and prevent data loss. Your ASM can help you choose and purchase the services that best address your concerns, and can help you schedule delivery.

1. Backup Efficiency Analysis. Think of this service as something similar to a quick medical check-up, or like a quick multi-point inspection for your car. Choose the Backup Efficiency Analysis when you think your environment is basically in good shape, but you just want to have an expert double check that youโ€™re meeting your SLAs, your backup software is up to snuff, and you can rely on the general health and performance of your backup systems. It helps you ensure that youโ€™re meeting data protection and compliance requirements, and it identifies and highlights potential risks and gaps for further review.

2. Backup Impact Analysis. To use a car metaphor again, this is like when you have a check engine light. You know somethingโ€™s wrong, but you need help to understand the cause. Maybe you missed a service level โ€“ your backup is supposed to take three hours and now it's consistently taking five. Or you had an outage, there was some data loss, and your recovery points were nowhere near your SLA. The Backup Impact Analysis service helps you understand the root cause of known issues and stabilize your backup environment by highlighting areas for improvement, streamlining processes and procedures, and optimizing systems. It provides a detailed analysis of your backup environment, validating your ability to meet your recovery objectives.

3. Business Impact Analysis. Companies often need assistance to define or revise their business priorities and service levels for backup. You may be considering a systematic approach to backup for the first time. You may be growing fast, and a series of mergers and acquisitions has complicated your systems. Or you may be a large organization with an extensive IT footprint; with the rise of DevOps and orchestration software, things are often so automated that itโ€™s easy to lose track of whatโ€™s running where.

The Business Impact Analysis helps you answer the high-level questions like: Which applications are the most important to the business? How long should it take to back everything up: one minute? Five minutes? Two days? Where are the backup resources for my workloads? This service enables you to evaluate and prioritize your critical business and IT processes and determine your ability to meet business recovery objectives. It helps you define the correct recovery priorities and establish key operational metrics such as backup SLAs, while reducing risk and improving recoverability.

No more nagging

To learn more about HPE Datacenter Care with Backup Analysis Services, chat with your ASM. As I mentioned, each of these services is delivered by HPE backup specialists in collaboration with your ASM, who brings to the table a detailed knowledge of your IT environment and support strategy. We recommended choosing a combination of services and scheduling them regularly to help you keep up-to-date and prepared for emergencies. Repeating a Backup Efficiency Analysis periodically, for example, will help you identify trends in resource utilization and proactively detect anomalies that could cause problems over time. That could mean an end to that nagging worry about recovery readiness, and one more weight off your shoulders.

Learn more about HPE Operational Services here.

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About the Author:Jordan Lewy.jpg Jordan Lewy is a Worldwide Manager for HPE Pointnext Support Services. In this role, his goal is to transform HPEโ€™s customer support experience using HPE InfoSight, which in turn drives their business outcomes and enables their digital transformation journey.

Jordan brings to his position a well-established background in information technology and professional services, where he has worked for over 20 years. Prior to taking on his current role he held other positions in HPE including leadership for HPEโ€™s Storage Support services, Installation and Technical services and HPEโ€™s Customer Technical Training business.

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