Five reasons your business might need Disaster Recovery as a Service

Natural disasters. Power outages. Cyber-attacks. All disastrous scenarios which can cause significant damage to businesses and their operations. And, to be frank, all situations we’d rather not think about. 

The catch? Disasters, whether natural or man-made, require the most carefully thought-out contingency plans of all. Having a disaster recovery (DR) plan in place is an essential safeguard to protect your business from the financial and reputational damage that can result from one of these catastrophic events. It also ensures you can continue operating and serve your customers, even in the face of a disaster. 

In short: a DR plan is there to get you out of trouble, as quickly as possible. 

The challenges of implementing a disaster recovery plan 

If you don’t already have a DR plan in place, you’re not alone. There are many reasons why some businesses haven’t dived into the world of DR, for example:  

• Lack of awareness: Often, businesses don’t know they need a DR plan or understand the potential consequences of not having one.  
• Limited resources: Smaller businesses might not have the time, money, or expertise to implement a comprehensive DR plan.  
• Misconceptions: Sometimes, we see misconceptions about DR preventing its uptake, such as beliefs that it’s too expensive or complex. 
• Lack of support: In some cases, businesses may not have the support of senior management or other stakeholders, which can make it difficult to make DR a reality.  

One way you can tackle these challenges is considering Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS).  

The Missing Link’s SmartCLOUD DRaaS is a cloud-based service creating an easy way for businesses to quickly restore their IT systems and data in the event of a disaster.  

Typically, DRaaS replicates an organisations IT infrastructure and data to a remote, secure location so it can be promoted to the production site if the primary IT systems are disrupted or destroyed. DR is different from backup in that we are only replicating the most current data. In the case of DR we are also providing the compute, networking, and configuration to run the replicated data in the case of a failover.  

I’ve outlined the top five reasons it might be right for your business below.  

1. Buying hardware for DR is expensive 

When you implement DR in-house, in most instances you’ll need to purchase an exact replica of your production hardware, only to hopefully never use it. At that price point, paying for hardware resources you rarely use, but need just in case, can be prohibitively expensive and unnecessary.  

Using the infrastructure of a DRaaS provider means you’ll only pay for certain costs like the Virtual Machine (VM) when it’s running. For example, our DRaaS is based off 5-minute incremental billing.  

2. Managing that second datacentre adds complexity to your job  

Managing a second datacentre involves designing networks, provisioning hardware, paying for rack space, power and cooling. You also need to consider the additional responsibilities of keeping the hardware, firmware and drivers up to date and installing security patches. 

DRaaS plans are flexible and can be adjusted to suit your preferred level of engagement. These plans range from end-to-end services, all the way through to hardware exclusive options where you self-manage your DR. 

To add to this complexity, networking and failover plans both play a large role in good DR policy. Understanding how your users will access their applications in a DR scenario is key. A DRaaS provider can support your IT team as they develop this plan.  

3. DR onboarding can be complex, costly and leave your team in the lurch 

Some DR solutions can be complex and require a significant amount of setup and configuration before they are ready to use. A DR solution that can be easily integrated with your existing systems and processes will greatly simplify the onboarding process. This is especially important for smaller businesses or organisations with limited IT resources, as a complicated onboarding process can be a major barrier to implementing a DR solution. 

Using a DRaaS solution built with integrated control and user-friendliness in mind can get you up and running with your DR solution quicker and with less effort. Plus, these benefits make it easier for your team to learn how to use the product and access it when needed – with no extra training required. This is especially important in times of crisis or disaster when employees may be under stress and need to access the DR solution quickly and easily. 

4. You don’t want to put all your eggs in one city 

Geo location redundancy is important for DR because with it, your IT systems and data are protected from events that could disrupt their primary location. By backing up in a remote location, you're better equipped to maintain business continuity. 

This isn’t always a possibility using your own infrastructure, but a managed service provider can help. Here at The Missing Link, we have data centres in both Sydney and Melbourne.  

Additionally, if you’re using cloud providers, it can be hard to understand where your workload is running. One way to help alleviate your organisation’s data risk profile is to be able to walk up to a rack and point to where your applications are running. 

5. Designing a DR plan is difficult; talk to the experts.  

You would have spent a lot of time and resources designing your production environment. Replicating that on to another platform can be cumbersome and just as time consuming as your production site.  

Consulting services can help you to create a blueprint for building your DR no matter where it will sit. A managed service provider will have extensive experience designing plans and working across diverse environments. They can bring an understanding of what works and what doesn’t to the table for your convenience. 

Employing specialists across multiple skills sets, The Missing Link can help in all areas of DR such as infrastructure design, firewall policy, network bandwidth requirements, and configuration services.  

Introducing The Missing Link’s DRaaS 

Our DRaaS is a reliable and cost-effective solution for disaster recovery. With our service, you can replicate your VMs onto our platform and only pay for the data they consume. With billing at 5-minute increments you’ll only pay for the VM to run when it’s powered on – and there’s no hidden fees such as ingress/egress costs. 

One of the key benefits of our DRaaS is the ability to run your Active Directory at a second site. And, with the option for self-managed or managed services, you can choose the best level of support for your needs. 

Our DRaaS also includes the ability to test failover scenarios, and you can take advantage of our service without any upfront costs because there’s no need to own additional hardware.  

Reach out today here to learn more about how our DRaaS can benefit your business.