Case Study

Keeping it simple with Simpana

Faced with backups grinding to a halt every time there was a problem with the existing system, Adea went in for Simpana and has benefited from reduced maintenance costs, faster and more reliable backups and improved support. By Renuka Vembu

With explosive volumes of data being generated by organizations, data storage, backup and recovery management tools are gaining prominence by the day. Being in the business of providing IT services and delivering SAP solutions to its host of clientele, encompassing industry verticals like retail, healthcare, telecommunications, technology and manufacturing, the need for data backup was visibly evident for Adea.

Clearing the glitch

Adea was initially using IBM Tivoli for its backup. With the increase in the volume of its operations, the solution fell short of the need to scale up to the company’s requisite demands. Also, they were using backup software earlier wherein the support from their channel partner was very poor, mainly because they weren’t sufficiently trained in handling the product. Adea had to get to the Australian contact every time they faced a problem, as the channel partner was their only Indian contact in case of contingencies. This made them re-consider their relation with the backup software vendor.

Ajay Jamble, Associate Manager IS, Adea, added, “We were in a stage where we had no backup taking place for almost a month; so we needed something that was quick, simple and global. Backups routinely came to a halt, incoming emails were stopped and each time there was a problem, it involved going through IBM’s support center in Australia, which proved to be a time consuming and expensive exercise. After we were through with the trial period with CommVault, we immediately decided we would go ahead with Simpana 7.0.”

CommVault’s best price, good support model and quick response time helped Adea to decide on the product. Also, the best aspect of adopting the Simpana Backup and Recovery services was the user not feeling the difference in performance during backup.

Unable to cope up with their existing backup system for about six months, and to steer clear of the risk and repercussions the non-adherence might cause, Adea had to venture out in search for newer and better options that could address their scalability concern. Reviewing the performance of solutions by vendors like CommVault, HP and Veritas, Adea finally settled for CommVault’s Simpana 7, with an investment of Rs 7 lakh. There were no investments in training as the team got adapted to the product quickly; the single console mode from CommVault was accepted by the team at Adea, and the graphical interface made it very easy for them to use the product.

The CommVault product was evaluated for a period of 45 days, and the assessment was based on the cost, simplicity of product, functionalities, support, and how quickly Adea employees could adapt to the product. Training their engineers and support staff was a smooth and unhindered process. Adea was also able to do a backup by themselves within the 30 day period of free training provided by CommVault, which was then extended to a 45 days phase.

Jamble stated, “A skilled CommVault engineer was based on site for a couple of days to introduce the product and demonstrate the product functionality. During this trial, the CommVault solution impressed Adea with its simple and manageable system that was able to provide full protection to the entire database and application data in our heterogeneous environment quickly and easily. Our team was very quickly able to get to grips with the user-friendly management interface and run detailed reports that could be easily customized. Trouble-shooting where required, no longer took days and the entire team felt comfortable using the system.”

License matters

There was a confusion on the licenses as technically CommVault was not able to get Sun servers (with Solaris) communicate with the backup server. Jamble said that they were not able to create or define a pool of discs, and had a specific requirement of data being saved to a specific disk which was not happening initially, but later CommVault were able to solve it. They purchased server licenses but as per their earlier discussion, they thought that their original license would suffice as it was compatible with all softwares, but later they realized this was not sufficient. They required four more licenses to which CommVault gave them the Key Codes and subsequently Adea’s problem was solved.

Benefits amassed

The advantages that Adea has accumulated out of the implementation of CommVault’s Simpana are multi-fold. As furnished by the company, here are some of effects of embarking on this new venture:

• Reduced maintenance cost: During their earlier backup solution that they were using, the company needed a specific separate resource just to manage and monitor the backups. But with the new implementation and CommVault’s simple management interface, this need has now been done away with. There is no longer the need of a dedicated resource for backups, thereby freeing up valuable resource and saving manpower costs.
• Faster and more reliable backups: “After six months of painful intermittent backups using IBM Tivoli, the Adea team has finally been able to break free with the CommVault Backup and Recovery running smoothly and managing to backup databases on SQL, Oracle and Exchange on both Windows and Unix environments without a hitch. Since implementing CommVault Backup and Recovery, we have been able to reduce the backup window to less than four hours, compared to IBM TSM’s backup window of five hours—a reduction of about 30%. Our employees now enjoy greater productivity as backups no longer slow down or halt their PCs, disrupting their work day,” said Jamble
• Improved support: Where Adea used to have to wait for days and weeks for a response from IBM’s support center in Australia, they can now receive support quickly and easily with a free, local support hotline that is manned by CommVault support staff based out of its India Development Center in Hyderabad. Jamble said that in the past four months they have been using CommVault, they have had only one technical problem, which was immediately addressed, and now is confident that any support issues will be addressed immediately and resolved quickly.

renuka.vembu@expressindia.com