Still storing your data in offsite storage vaults?

One of the traditional services still used in IT and Data Management functions is the physical offsite storage of legacy tapes. Legacy tapes hold data that is recognized as necessary information, being either sourced from production or corporate activities and stored on backup tape captured during specific points in time. For many years, physical offsite archive storage of backup tapes for ”record keeping” was a viable solution for organizations.

Fast forward to today and the landscape has changed. Offsite storage for backup tapes is no longer the optimal storage location when organizations are looking to achieve their compliance and regulatory requirements. This practice has created many orphaned data collections and the data becomes increasingly difficult to restore due to tape degradation and equipment obsolescence.

By 2025, it’s estimated that 463 exabytes of data will be created each day globally – that’s the equivalent of 212,765,957 DVDs per day!^

Another perspective is that a single exabyte is equal to about one-fifth of the words people have ever spoken!

In our hyper-connected world, companies are embracing the benefits of cloud storage as the preferred option and are working their way to migrating their data and systems to the cloud. However, for some organizations, migrating legacy backup tapes to the cloud can be hard thinking, resource-intensive, and overwhelming. Some tape collections span into millions – that’s right, millions – and are scattered across the globe in storage facilities. The result is the organization’s legacy data is disconnected from current data information architecture, is capital intensive to maintain, difficult to access (taking up to several hours, days or even weeks), and is at constant risk of being lost forever due to storage on deteriorating aging technology that was not intended for decades of storage.

Data is one of the most important assets for any company and its correct (or incorrect) management will have a material impact on an organization’s performance if not managed appropriately.

Migrating legacy data from offsite storage vaults to the cloud is essential. For some organizations, the data presents lucrative revenue opportunities, particularly those in the Oil & Gas sector and Media & Entertainment, Health & Life Sciences. For others like Corporates and Financial Institutions, it can efficiently aid compliance requirements and reduce risk exposure.

Access and Control

The ease of access and control of data is a foundation for all businesses; no industry is immune; data is the lifeblood of organizations. Tape-to-cloud migration allows you transform your tape archive into a single seamless data repository of legacy and current data which allows organizations to evaluate their data and put in place the appropriate management and control systems that work towards achieving performance and cost objectives.

Not all data is valuable, and not all data is created equal. To determine where you sit on this spectrum, you first need access and control of your data.

Some considerations in the case of tape to cloud migration

  1. The potential cost savings as you move from CapEx to OpEx, data tiering storage, enhanced management, and storage requirements avoiding over or under-provisioning of storage.
  2. The business and IT benefits go well beyond the cost equation including applying cutting-edge analytics tools, cross-team and/or department collaboration of production data; identifying new revenue streams, reducing workflows, etc.
  3. The opportunity cost of not having access to and control of data has the potential to slow organizational progress.
  4. It will eventually happen – tape to cloud migration is no longer a matter of ‘should we begin?’, but ‘when do we begin?’. With the high volume of data being consumed and stored and the variety of applications of cutting-edge analytical tools, more and more organizations are leveraging historical data to drive performance, innovation programs, and drive competitive advantage.

Where to from here?

Tape Ark’s cross-industry expertise offers organizations an efficient, reliable, and cost-effective approach through high volume tape-to-cloud migration services that allow you to easily access and backup your most important tape data to your preferred cloud platform.

Through the use of Tape ‘Ark’s scalable technology stack, and in conjunction with our cloud platform partners technology, legacy tapes can seamlessly be migrated to the cloud en-masse – safely, rapidly, and securely.

As #DataDrivenMavericks, Tape Ark is dedicated to a world in the cloud, where we remove needless courier vans from our streets, as well as emissions from air conditioning and gas suppression systems into our environment. We desire to give clients control of their data and make it instantly and economically accessible to them from anywhere in the world and whenever they require it.

To find out more about how you can access your legacy tape with our unique tape to cloud migration technology, contact the team at Tape Ark today on (08) 6245 0362.

^Source: Venture Capitalist
Source for exabyte reference: Data Table