Such is the nature of technology and business today that predicting storage requirements in line with upcoming projects, new developments, clients or teams is not always easy – or even possible. A flexible, secure, cost-effective managed storage service becomes a viable solution.

Further, due to recent technology developments and the lower cost of cloud infrastructure – plus the plethora of managed cloud services now available – the mass migration of SMBs to a managed storage solution now seems more of an inevitability.

IBM estimates that storage requirements are doubling every year. At the same time, Gartner posits that the cost of managing data can be as much as 300–500% the cost of buying it. When you consider that the leading cause of exploding data volume is email, and acknowledge that the demand for backup and disaster recovery solutions is a universal one, the facts draw a clear picture of storage management being every bit a challenge for both mainstream SMBs and giants alike.

Many organizations are finding the budget and resource requirements involved in building in-house storage facilities for their servers are prohibitive when compared to alternative network storage strategies such as Network Attached Storage (NAS) and Storage Area Network (SAN) solutions, which result in lower management and infrastructure costs.

BENEFITS OF MANAGED STORAGE

• 24X7X365 availability of data
• Flexibility – instantly scalable up or down according to need
• Low to no infrastructure and capital investment costs
• Security – data protected by latest version of leading security software
• Backup and disaster/data recovery protocols ensure business continuity
• Optimized desktop and network performance
• Even monthly payment plans make budget planning easier
• More business insights gained by easy access to more data

The overwhelming advantage of a storage management services are the affordable cost of entry and the scalability of services to accurately meet needs that can change on a dime or over time.