More than three centuries ago, Benjamin Franklin said that “An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of medicine.” The verdict is still valid today, only that, in the updated recipe, the “gram of prevention” has been replaced by Disaster Recovery solutions.
Increasing reliance on IT is forcing organizations to take a new approach to how they manage risk. Today, more than ever, Disaster Recovery solutions are essential for companies that do not want to take unnecessary risks and aim for a quick recovery with the resumption of activity in optimal parameters, in the event of an incident.
It’s true that for many companies, planning for the unknown is difficult, and budgets to prevent potential risks are hard to come by. On the other hand, arguments like “It just won’t happen to us!” are very expensive in the long run. Lack of a disaster recovery plan can expose you to high recovery costs, missed business opportunities, reputational damage and lost customers.
Here are some common scenarios at the local level, which, in the absence of effective Disaster Recovery solutions, can have serious consequences for your company.
Natural disasters do happen
When the phrase “Disaster Recovery” comes up in a conversation, most people automatically think of earthquakes, cyclones, floods and other calamities of such magnitude. Recently, Romania has also experienced such natural phenomena. On a smaller scale, that’s true, but the disruptive effects are real.
For example, earthquakes have increased in frequency in Romania this year, appearing in areas previously considered to have low seismic risk. In this context, the question arises as to how many of the local companies that have invested in servers or storage equipment also have racks with earthquake protection systems.
The torrential downpours of the last few months affected not only rural areas, but also cities with developed infrastructures, but which were put out of operation due to large accumulations of water. And in many cases the trees felled by the storms that appeared out of the blue interrupted the electricity supply, a phenomenon that put organizations that do not have electrical back-up solutions to a difficult test. On the other hand, few of those that have dedicated UPSs test them periodically to check their performance.
And the heatwaves, namely the temperature records recently reached in Romania, have created critical problems. Especially in large urban agglomerations, where the cooling equipment of the server rooms was overloaded. Again, few of them are equipped with HVAC equipment dedicated to these environments, capable of providing the recommended operating temperature.
Cars aren’t perfect, but people make mistakes too
However, there are also disasters that are less visible in the media, but whose effects are just as great.
For example, last year, according to the data of the General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations, in Romania there was a 41% increase in this type of fires, with over 30,000 cases being reported nationwide. In this context, very few companies that operate their own Data Rooms also have fire extinguishing installations suitable for protecting IT equipment, such as, for example, those with inert gas. The vast majority of them are equipped with classic fire extinguishers and hydrants, totally contraindicated for electronic circuits.
On the other hand, the “cars” are not perfect either. Even though technology has advanced at an extremely fast pace, no one is immune to hard disk failures, “sudden deaths” of SSDs, problems with networking equipment, etc. According to the annual study carried out by the Uptime Institute, in 2022 IT equipment generated approximately 36% of unplanned downtime. In such situations, and especially in the case of old equipment, the maintenance and support contracts concluded with suppliers do not cover the real needs of many companies. Let’s take a concrete example, that of servers used beyond the optimal age of 5 years. In such cases, the costs of managing those machines increase by 148%, according to the IDC analysis “Why Upgrade Your Server Infrastructure Now?”. At the same time, after the 5-year threshold, the risk of unplanned downtime increases by 20% annually.
Besides, people make mistakes too. According to the cited source, human errors are responsible for almost two-thirds of unplanned outages. Specifically, network equipment configuration errors generated 45% of downtime cases last year, and in the case of IT and software systems the percentage is 64%! The problem is serious because the shortage of qualified personnel in this field is constantly increasing, with many companies practically having nowhere to hire people in the positions they need. Which leads to the overloading of internal IT teams and thus under-sized, considering the accelerated pace of digital transformation of business processes.
It’s not complicated or expensive to have Disaster Recovery
Disruptive events – of whatever nature – cannot be fully prevented. But they can be mitigated and kept under control with a realistic disaster recovery plan and with the help of high-performance Disaster Recovery solutions.
Very few companies can afford to invest in purchasing and implementing a fully redundant IT infrastructure. Even fewer have qualified personnel who can ensure operation, maintenance and quick intervention in case of unplanned downtime.
However, the need to ensure the continuity of business processes is critical for any organization. That is why more and more companies are turning to the services of Disaster Recovery service providers, such as M24. Our offer, based on experience accumulated in more than 20 years of operating data centers, globally, is specially designed to be flexible and accessible to any type of company.
Our solutions are for all budgets and provide everything from backup and full replication of systems and applications, to data restoration and business process resumption in guaranteed time. We also ensure regular monitoring, verification and testing of the Disaster Recovery solutions we provide, as well as resilient connectivity and cloud mobility.
By calling on M247 Disaster Recovery solutions, you have the guarantee that the risks generated by disasters can be kept under control and that you can resume your activity in the shortest possible time.
For more details about what a Disaster Recovery plan entails in the M247 vision, read also the material “Are your business continuity and disaster recovery strategies aligned?”
