Today's IT-dependent businesses have to keep pace with huge advances in technology, which have escalated the costs of downtime. They also have to deal with the risk of adverse impact from unforeseen events, natural or manmade disasters that could interrupt or disrupt the business.

 

This is why it is so essential for companies to have a disaster recovery strategy in place, to minimize the impact of a disaster and to recover from a disaster quickly. It's not just mission-critical data that is affected, but the software, hardware and systems essential for it to run on. A disaster recovery plan or business continuity plan (DRP/BCP) or business process contingency plan (BPCP) describes how an organization is to deal with potential disasters.

The high cost of downtime
Disasters can have crippling effects on a business. For example, fires permanently close 44% of the affected businesses. According to a study by Cummings, Haag & McCubbrey, 2005, 43% of companies that had a major loss of computerized records never reopen, 51% close within two years, and only 6% will survive long term.

With their reliance on business-critical data, global businesses don't take a chance. They factor in disaster recovery as part of their overall business strategy. Remote back-up facilities for their operations are distributed at different locations in different parts of the world.

Backup and preventive strategies
While considering possible emergency situations, the complexity of the task can be determined by studying the situation in advance and documenting the requirements for disaster recovery.

 

What are the requirements to keep the business up and running? These could include some or all or of the following:

Switching to an alternative business process
Insurance coverage
IT systems back-up and recovery
Premises and essential equipment back-up and recovery
Customer service back-up and recovery
Administration and operations back-up and recovery
Information and documentation back-up and recovery

Companies use the following technologies to protect their data:
Data replication – synchronous or asynchronous replication – or a combination of both. The objective is to limit data loss and aid data recovery through continuous, real-time replication keeping replicas up-to-date at all times. The ideal solution also provides automatic failover for instantaneous data and application availability and protection against data corruption. Remote backup maintains data offsite, in a different location from the original data.

Continuous backup will ensure that all data operations (writes, deletes, copies, etc.) are captured and recorded to a journal at all times. Users interested in the highest data integrity and recovery speeds would prefer this option as this ensures that recovery is practically instantaneous.

The focus is on business continuity
Disaster recovery has a focus on business continuity – that is, keeping a business running as smoothly as possible with minimum interruptions to service.

Business continuity planning (BCP is a part of an organization's risk management, which involves crisis management and disaster recovery planning.

 

BCP is a methodology used to create a plan spelling out how an organization will resume critical functions within a preset time after a disaster or disruption. The development of a BCP manual goes through five main phases:

1. Analysis
2. Solution design
3. Implementation
4. Testing and organization acceptance
5. Maintenance activities

 

SBS-Techs provide different levels of site protection against site failure to suit specific business continuity requirements.

When a business cannot tolerate any downtime in the functioning of its operations, this is the best option. SBS-Techs have established business continuity through strategic tie-ups with worlds leading hosting providers to provide disaster recovery services. They offer end-to-end business continuity services from prevention and preparedness to response and recovery. The Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Plan covers IT, physical site, data recovery and back-up.