News in the Channel - issue #44

BACKUP AS A SERVICE

a hands-off, worry-free solution. “To help build trust, MSPs should also address customer concerns and any disadvantages head-on. They should acknowledge that clients are trading direct control over the backup infrastructure for the peace of mind of a fully managed service, and that this does mean trusting a third party with data encryption keys. Furthermore, because an internet connection is required, slow bandwidth can delay backup windows and increase recovery times, potentially exceeding their recovery time objective. “From a budgeting perspective, the ongoing subscription (or pay-as-you-go) model presents a predictable operational expense that eliminates large, upfront costs, ensuring the client’s backup budget scales predictably alongside their business growth.” Anton adds that MSPs can also educate customers on how costs tie to storage capacity, backup frequency and data transfer. “MSPs should be upfront about potential fees for ingress and egress and highlight that data centre locations and availability zones offer robust regional redundancy,” he says. Stew says resellers should lead with recovery, not storage. “Most customers already believe they’re backed up, so a conversation about capacity or retention settings rarely lands,” he explains. “A more useful approach is to ask a few practical questions. When did you last test a full restore? How long would it take to get critical systems running again after a ransomware attack? How would you know your backup data hadn’t been compromised too? Those questions quickly show the gap between having backups and being able to recover.” Stew adds that it’s also worth addressing a common misconception about SaaS platforms. “Many organisations assume providers such as Microsoft or Google are responsible for protecting their data, when in practice

Contributors

Dan Allenby

costs,” says Alex. “They should ask whether restores are tested, how quickly operations can resume, whether backups are immutable and air-gapped, and whether protection remains available if the primary cloud environment is compromised. They should also highlight backup’s emerging role as a trusted data layer, helping customers establish the authenticity, integrity and provenance of information used by AI.” Anton Shelepchuk, VP of worldwide sales at NAKIVO, says that when introducing BaaS to clients, MSPs should take a balanced approach, highlighting key benefits, while being transparent about addressing its operational requirements and cloud infrastructure realities. “This includes covering the basics of BaaS: highly scalable cloud storage and a relatively easy configuration that gets backups running in minutes,” he adds. “That data is stored offsite, protecting it from local disasters, yet remaining securely accessible from anywhere. “When advising on BaaS advantages, MSPs should advise customers that they can offload their backup management responsibilities to a secure cloud ecosystem where the BaaS vendor acts as the specialist handling infrastructure maintenance – such as patching and monitoring. This enables MSPs to deliver

rebura.com

Stefan Voss

n-able.com

Anton Shelepchuk

nakivo.com

45 CONTINUED