EMC has entered the storage Software as a Service (SaaS) space with the introduction of a hosted data backup service for Windows and the launch of a mysterious infrastructure to support it ... but Australian and New Zealand customers will have to wait until "late 2008" before the service is available locally, according to a representative of EMC's PR company.
The service relies on a new version of the Mozy backup service the company acquired from Berkeley Data Systems in October 2007. The new product, Mozy Enterprise, is intended for large numbers of Windows workstations or small servers, but not for enterprise data backup. Mozy Enterprise allows administrators to push out Mozy software agents to hundreds or thousands of clients using deployment tools, such as Microsoft's Systems Management Server (SMS).
EMC has also baked in enterprise-level security features from RSA with Mozy Enterprise, including authentication, integration with Active Directory and key management services. Berkeley's existing Mozy Pro product also includes encryption, but not key management, centralized deployment options or data "seeding."
Under the data seeding option, Mozy Enterprise customers can buy a 2 TB USB drive from EMC at cost for the first -- and usually largest -- backup, and ship it back instead of trying to upload data over a broadband Internet connection. Data for large restores can also be sent out by EMC the same way.
EMC's secret Fortress
Mozy Enterprise is the first application EMC offers as a service. There will be more, according to Roy Sanford, vice president of marketing and alliances for EMC's new SaaS division. EMC has also opened a new partner program for service providers that want to offer Mozy and has signed on Verizon Business as its first partner. To support the SaaS push, EMC has revealed a new infrastructure called Fortress, but it is keeping the details under wraps.
Sanford said Fortress is an architecture comprised of hardware and software. He said it's all EMC-owned IP, "a blending of Berkeley Data Systems, EMC and off-the-shelf components." Fortress has been in stealth for the last year, and Sanford described it as a "highly scalable infrastructure for the service provider market," including a "service provider operating system" that allows it to support massive numbers of concurrent users.
Industry sources said Fortress is the clustered storage hardware and software - code-named Hulk and Maui -- EMC talked about at an Innovation Day in November. However, Sanford wouldn't say which EMC products make up Fortress, adding, "We will consider Hulk and Maui when those products become available."
Whither Avamar?
With Mozy Enterprise, EMC has beaten enterprise backup rival Symantec to delivering a hosted data backup offering for the enterprise. But analysts also point out that the introduction of Mozy Enterprise also further complicates EMC's already overstuffed data protection portfolio. "EMC's backup technologies are addressing multiple audiences--it's not always clear what fits with which target customer," according to Enterprise Storage Group analyst Lauren Whitehouse.
Mac client on the way
According to University of San Francisco information security officer Walter Petruska, the University is in the midst of rolling out Mozy Pro to about 1,000 laptops and desktops, and five departmental servers. Petruska said he will evaluate the Enterprise version, but is focused on finishing its Pro deployment. "Once we get this rolled out, we are very interested in upgrading," Petruska said. "With 1,000 workstations, managing our backups will be a lot easier because of the Active Directory integration."
Petruska said the most exciting feature of Mozy has not actually been released yet: a Mozy Pro Mac client. The university has been beta testing the Mozy Home Mac client, which is now on version 0.9, since early last year.
"We went on the hunt for a single solution which provided both PC and Mac backup, and Mozy popped up," he said. "We went from there." Other data backup SaaS vendors said they were working on Mac clients, but wouldn't release even alpha code at the time, Petruska said.
If a Mac client is released for Mozy, it could be part of a long-awaited answer to questions about the fate of EMC Retrospect, which has been languishing since last year. However, there are indications that Retrospect could still resurface. "Retrospect is still alive and well," Whitehouse said. "They've hired back some engineers that left when the product group was streamlined. Retrospect is the backup software in the homebase/lifeline consumer product too."
Searchstorage.com.au will update this story with additional local input as soon as it becomes available
