A while ago I was participating in a CrowdChat™ where John Furrier coined a term “Snaponomics” (#Snaponomics). This is an interesting topic. This term was generated during a CrowdChat on Copy Data Management with Catalogic Software (though many other thought leaders in the storage space were on the chat). The premise is that companies buy expensive storage arrays that have a number of ‘storage services’, including snapshotting capabilities, and aren’t utilizing these snapshots to solve real business challenges. Instead, IT buys more software and more hardware (to the tune of $44B each year, and growing) to create many additional copies of their data for things like backup/recovery, DR, test/dev and analytics.
The reality is that those snapshots could be used for all of those use cases and really have a big impact on the CapEx and OpEx companies are spending on all of the additional, redundant, solutions such as backup software, PBBAs, replication and archiving software.
The fault can’t really be put on the customers though. Snapshots aren’t really enough. In order to put the snapshots to work, it is important that the data be tied to the application, which is where the real value is. Challenge is, the tools the vendors provide don’t have the level of integration they need that tie the application to the data that is snapped.
The business need is that lines of business within a company need access to a ‘copy’ of production data, in as near real-time as possible, in order to do their job and drive the corporations competitive advantage, not to mention, they, as well as the business, needs to recover (to the application level) in the event of a failure or disaster. The challenge is, with traditional IT tools (backup, replication software and added storage devices), providing application consistent data to the line of business is a management headache, a very time consuming process and the data isn’t really that close to ‘real-time’ along with missed recovery time objectives.
Today snapshots, along with intelligent copy data management tools are the evolution of how business can (and should) take advantage of the storage services they are already paying for and leverage the snapshot data they create in an intelligent and efficient way. This is what businesses want, to do more with less.
By utilizing snapshots for multiple business solutions that require a copy of the production data, such as; recovery, DR, test/dev and analytics, without having to pay for multiple technology solutions (backup software, PBBAs, replication or archive software or additional storage hardware) companies can make a significant impact in the CapEx they spend on all of software and hardware and have a significant impact on the OpEx of managing all of these copies of data and troubleshooting each of these storage services when they don’t work right. In addition IT can provide near real-time data to the lines of business that need it.
The copy data management tools that your traditional storage vendors provide do fall a bit shy of being able to provide you with the best #Snaponomics.
Its time to help companies justify the prices they are paying for enterprises storage arrays by enabling them to be able to leverage the services and the data in them better. A true copy data management platform enables IT to take advantage of their existing storage infrastructure (without having to rip-n-replace anything), is a software overlay, agentless, and allows IT to create application consistent snapshots, in multiple locations (including the cloud) for multiple business solutions to serve every line of business need. This is #Snaponomics. For more information on where to find such as solution, I encourage you to visit Catalogic Software.