Protecting Technology Infrastructure:
The Importance of Secure Access and Continuity Solutions
An AMI-Partners Business Benchmarking White Paper
Sponsored by: HP Clay Miller Ryan Brock January 2014_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Introduction
Mid-market firms (companies with 100-1,000 employees) are increasingly relying on technology for their most critical business functions. They are investing in data intensive applications, such as ERP and CRM, in order to more efficiently run their operations. These mission critical applications are progressively being utilized by mobile workers and on a variety of mobile devices. With this significant growth in critical company data creation and access points, mid-market firms are also experiencing increases in security breaches and data loss events.
As a result, many firms are prioritizing security and business continuity solutions. This white paper investigates mid-market continuity solutions drivers, deployment stages, and benefits and requirements. Its goal is to help IT managers understand the need for continuity solutions, benchmark their continuity journey against their peers, and evaluate how the right continuity solutions can address those needs.
Key Highlights: The Case for Continuity Solutions
Top Overall IT Priority – 63% of mid-market firms are prioritizing on-premise back-up and disaster recovery as part of their strategic IT initiatives
Impact of Mobility – Nearly three-quarters of mid-market firms have employees accessing business process applications on an employee-owned and -managed mobile device
Occurrences of Security and Data Breaches – 73% of mid-market firms have experienced a data or security breach in the last 12 months, costing each business $8,650 on average
What is Continuity?
Ubiquitous, continuous and secure access to information – with
appropriate levels of backup and disaster recovery.
IT Strategies Deployed by the Mid-Market are Driving the Need for
Secure Access and Business Continuity Solutions
A look at mid-market firms’ top overall IT priorities reveals a high degree of strategic importance placed on secure access and continuity solutions. Mid-market firms are focusing on several key IT initiatives, including improving internet bandwidth and access, increasing usage of business applications, and enabling mobile environments populated by employee-owned and -managed smartphones and tablets. These mid-market firms recognize the security and storage implications of these solutions, and as a result nearly two-thirds of mid-market firms are also prioritizing on-premise back-up and disaster recovery.
Impact of Mobility: 87% of mid-market firms have a mobile workforce, and these companies have at least 35 employees, on average, who travel 4 to 5 days a month for business purposes. Mid-market firms have also been increasingly offering telecommuting options for their employees. In 2013, 41% of mid-market firms allowed employees to telecommute, up from 30% in 2011. Mobile and telecommuting staff increases the need for ubiquitous access to business applications.
Not only are applications being accessed by mobile workers, they are also increasingly being accessed by mobile devices within the company. Almost half of mid-market firms are using tablets for business purposes and nearly 90% are using smartphones. These devices are often owned and managed by employees but are used for business purposes (a policy often called “Bring Your Own Device”, or BYOD). Currently, three-quarters of mid-market firms have staff accessing business process applications on an employee-owned device.
30-40% of these firms have employees accessing mission critical applications such as CRM, ERP, or SCM solutions on their BYOD tablets and/or smartphones. However, less than a third of these firms have implemented security, such as mobile device management (MDM). Having mobile access to mission critical data from BYOD tablets and smartphones without proper policies or security solutions can have drastic effects on business continuity.
Data Loss/Security Breaches: Mid-market firms are also experiencing secure access and continuity threats beyond the mobile environment, such as hard drive failures and electronic attacks.
73% of mid-market firms have experienced a data loss issue such as loss of a device, hardware failure, or electronic attack in the past 12 months
.
These data loss events have caused system downtimes which often led to damaged reputations and loss of customers. In almost a quarter of these events, business critical data was permanently lost.
These events not only damaged productivity and reputation, they also came with a hefty price tag from direct losses and expenses incurred to restore data and information. In 2013, mid-market firms that experienced a security or data breach lost $8,650 on average, with some losing more than $25,000 due to an incident.
Mid-Market Journey through Business Continuity
In order to address these concerns, mid-market firms are deploying multiple types of data and storage solutions.
Some mid-market firms are increasingly looking to the cloud in order to deploy solutions, such as disk protection and de-duplication, storage/backup for virtualized applications and data, disaster recovery, and remote management of their networks. Cloud-specific solutions such as online PC and server storage and back-up, as well as online storage/back-up for virtual environments are also gaining popularity.
While the numbers above describe mid-market firms in aggregate, recent data has shown that these firms go through three stages of ensuring business continuity:
Starting Out: A company is just starting to put resources into on-premise storage and data management.
Building Momentum: Additional offsite and/or online storage are installed and solutions are implemented to ensure continuous access to business applications.
Business Expansion: Applications are virtualized to ensure ubiquitous access to information, VDI is deployed to lock down environments, and redundant storage systems are backing-up all data with disaster recovery systems and protocols in place.
Where are you in your Continuity Jouney?
Mid-market firms in the starting out phase may be storing some data on client machines and servers, but few have dedicated storage solutions or set policies in place in case of data loss. These companies have been focusing on other priority business issues such as reducing OPEX and expanding sales to make up for lackluster growth. These firms are at the greatest risk for a security breach or data loss event, and will continue to be at risk until they expand their continuity solutions.
Star
ting
Out
- Profile: A firm in this stage may be storing some data on physical drives, but there are no additional storage, backup or recovery solutions or a policy in place in case of loss of data
-On average only using a single data storage hardware, software, or service solution, with as many as 30% not using any
Build
ing
Moment
um
-Profile: These firms have storage systems in place and are starting to look at adding additional software and services such as online back-up and disaster recovery -2-3 data storage solutions in place, with ~30% using cloud services -50-55% plan to supplement with additional storage solutions/services
Bus
ine
ss
Ex
p
ansi
on
-Profile: These firms have reudant storage, are using or planning to use advanced systems such as disaster recovery, and have taken clear measures to minimize downtime
-On average has at least 3 data storage/solutions in place
-78% planning to add more storage solutions -Nearly 70% using disaster recovery
Once a firm enters the business expansion phase, it generally has at least three different on-premise and/or cloud continuity solutions and services in place and has implemented, or is planning to implement, disaster recovery solutions. These firms are trying to manage ubiquitous access to information, while at the same time minimizing any potential data loss or downtime. Furthermore, these firms are looking to integrate their on-premise and cloud solutions into a true hybrid deployment.
Key Benefits Required of Continuity Solutions
As mid-market firms evaluate potential continuity solutions, they are looking at several key criteria.
Rather than simply backing up their data at the end of the day and only accessing it when they need it, mid-market firms instead prefer solutions that dynamically and constantly back-up and
employee-owned and -managed devices, as well as mobile and telecommuting employees, and these firms need to ensure that their mobile data is as secure as it is available.
Efficiency is also important, with 87% of mid-market firms looking for continuity solutions that also help them manage their network, server, and storage infrastructure. These firms are looking for solutions that help manage and back-up their entire infrastructure.
Conclusion: Solutions that Fit the Bill
Mid-market firms also have more specific criteria when comparing different continuity solutions. Specifically, these firms are looking for business continuity solutions that can address storage/backup needs in their virtual environments, provide disaster recovery, and support VDI.
Mid-market firms have increasingly been deploying VDI solutions in order to create locked-down environments for different business groups, and these firms need continuity solutions that support these VDI environments. These firms are also increasingly looking at solutions to help provide storage and back-up services for their PCs, servers, and virtual applications.
HP’s Just Right IT solutions for servers, storage, networking, and services provide continuity solutions for businesses at all stages of their continuity journey. HP offers a variety of bundles that are fully customizable by Channel Partners.
HP’s ServeIT provides end-to-end solutions designed to help lay the foundation for running business applications, and providing ubiquitous and secure access. Simply StoreIT backs up and protects data, with several pre-configured bundles available. HP’s NetworkIT enables partners to better manage mobile device and user access for mid-market firms with limited resources. And ServiceIT provides cloud, technology, financial, and education services.
Even more specific to continuity are HP’s Secure Access and Continuity solutions, which address the virtualization, mobility/BYOD, and remote access needs of mid-market companies. HP StoreOnce provides the storage and security needed for a mid-market firm, and can be paired with other HP solutions to back-up specific environments. For example, HP StoreOnce paired with HP StoreEver provides scalable, long-term storage for the virtual environments demanded by mid-market firms. HP StoreOnce Virtual Storage Appliance (VSA) provides the storage and security necessary to allow remote workers to access mission critical data on the company’s servers. This solution can be paired with HP Intelligent Management Center (IMC) Smart Connect WLAN solution in order to streamline and automate wired and wireless device onboarding, provisioning and management. By working with channel to customize bundles, IT managers can purchase HP continuity solutions that will provide the security and storage necessary for their company’s specific IT environment.
