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ESG Research shows strong interest in and adoption of server virtualization technology, particularly VMware. In fact, 70% of the current adopters surveyed by ESG said they were running VMware in their environments.1 The significant growth that server virtualization technology in general—and VMware in specific—is seeing is the result of a confluence of market, IT and business factors (e.g., product availability, IT need and business benefit). VMware is a classic case of being at the right place at the right time with the right technology and the right value proposition. By virtualizing server environments, organizations can reduce IT costs significantly, ease physical server-associated management challenges and improve overall service levels—including backup-and-recovery-related RTOs and RPOs. They can also greatly reduce the number backup software licenses they need to purchase and maintain, which has clear management and cost-saving benefits. Fewer backup agents mean fewer points of management/upgrade and less cost.
In spite of its tremendous promise, IT managers should understand that server virtualization can also lead to a net increase in storage capacity due to the virtual machine image files (vdmk files) and associated meta data that virtual server environments create and run. Also, the size of the storage volumes (or LUNs) allocated to physical servers are likely to increase, because physical servers are now running multiple virtual machines, all of which require their own capacity. As more data is generated, the backup volume increases, and more backup capacity is needed. This chain-reaction is causing server virtualization adopters to re-think their existing backup processes. ESG’s research shows that VMware implementations are actually driving deployment of disk-based backup systems. Twenty-three percent of survey respondents said that implementing server virtualization prompted them to invest in new disk-based backup systems. By becoming a VMware TAP program member, SEPATON puts itself—more specifically its VTL systems—in the position to addresses a real and growing end-user problem: protecting VMware environments. In doing so, it also uncovers a new market opportunity for its technology. ESG Research shows that organizations like VTL because it slips into the existing backup environments easily and allows organizations to leverage existing backup policies and processes; it is non-disruptive.
End-User Accounts: VTL and VMware
ESG recently had the opportunity to speak with two SEPATON customers—Kindred Healthcare and Sterling Testing—about their experiences protecting VMware environments pre- and post-VTL. Kindred Healthcare was an early adopter of VMware, deploying it about five years ago. Sterling Testing went “virtual” about two years ago. Both companies have sizeable VMware deployments today. Kindred Healthcare’s environment consists of some 58 physical servers and about 1,100 virtual machines. Sterling Testing’s environment is somewhat smaller, with about 20 physical servers running some 200 virtual machines. In terms of backup software, Kindred Healthcare is an IBM Tivoli Storage Manager shop; Sterling Testing runs EMC NetWorker.
While the two environments differ significantly in scale, both companies said backing up their virtual server environments became increasingly difficult as their VMware environments grew. Kindred Healthcare’s VMWare had outgrown the capabilities of its tape-based backup environment, which left valuable data exposed. It should be noted that Kindred Healthcare first deployed VTL to address recovery performance issues in its TSM environment. Backups were spread across thousands of tapes, making recovery a time-intensive—if not impossible—process. Similar to Kindred’s Sterling Testing’s environment had become very resource-intensive and static (or reactive) as capacities grew, making it difficult to meet data protection SLAs. Both companies looked to disk-based backup systems (in particular VTL) to ease these backup issues. VTL technology gave both companies the benefits of disk (e.g., improved backup and recovery performance, easier management and improved resource utilization), while allowing them to re-purpose their existing tape resources for DR purposes. Also, because VTL emulates tape, both companies were able to easily switch to disk (from tape) without making any significant changes to their existing backup policies or procedures. The dynamic allocation of performance and capacity of the VTL matches the dynamic nature of the VMware server environment.
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