The Purposes Of Enterprise Backup Solution

An enterprise backup solution offers the ability to back up computer data on a regularly scheduled basis. Today, computer data are essential for business operations. Gone are the days when an effective data storage system consisted of file cabinets full of paper. While many businesses still use this archaic method, they are finding it more difficult to compete in the market where their competitors have adopted computer systems and the convenience of electronic data storage, backup and retrieval as a normal part of operations.

In a manual file-cabinet storage and retrieval system, if the data change daily, just the costs involved in storage of paper-based data, let alone backing it up and then manually updating it daily become cumbersome. Both the accuracy and dependability of current data are immediately suspected.

If essential company data does not change daily, or even weekly, perhaps the enterprise can exist with a paper-based system, but it will eventually fail to compete in the marketplace. A paper-based system is not only suspect for accuracy and dependability, it is more slowly updated, it is virtually never backed up, it is potentially more slowly accessed, and it is at much greater risk to be destroyed in a natural or man-made disaster.

Backup of critical enterprise data has two essential purposes:

1. It allows the enterprise to recover data that has been lost by corruption of the original files, accidental deletion of them, or loss by natural or man-made disaster.

2. It allows the enterprise to access data created at an earlier time.

The benefit of the first purpose should be obvious. If data are at risk of corruption or loss, their backup prior to opportunity for corruption or loss is essential to protect their integrity. For this reason, it is best if the enterprise backup solution is physically located off site. Otherwise, the backup is as at risk of loss by disaster even if the system is protected against accidental deletion or corruption.

The benefit of the second, to access data from an earlier time, may seem vague, but it has its real-world applications. An enterprise computer system’s original data files are going to be maintained on a current basis so that a snapshot of current operations can be accessed at any time. It will represent only the most current data.

However, the need to see trends week by week, quarter by quarter, annually, or over longer periods of time is essential to create a history of growth (or decline) and to realistically forecast future performance, particularly relative to ongoing enterprise operational demands of human and material resources. Only by access of historic data by quick and efficient means will allow such scope of trends.

It may also be essential to see historic data for legal purposes should a matter of litigation occur. For purposes of establishment of origin of intellectual property, a dependable enterprise backup solution is essential. The purposes of an enterprise backup solution are essential to the successful ongoing operation of the enterprise.