What do you guys think about this article?
Source: Gartner Research
As the amount of storage being backed up continues to grow =
exponentially and
tight budgets increase the importance of improving staff productivity =
and
utilization rates, the following trends have become obvious: the move =
to
enterprisewide backup/restore solutions; the ubiquitous deployment of
replication technology; the deployment of SAN-attached tape and disk; =
and a
renewed interest in HSM technologies that manage data growth and =
circumvent
the architectural limits of Exchange. Comments on companies in each of =
the
four quadrants follow.
Leaders Quadrant: Veritas Software, IBM/Tivoli, Legato Systems and
Hewlett-Packard (HP) are delivering products with broad server, tape =
and
storage support, and with software agent support for popular ISV =
packages
such as Oracle, Exchange, Notes, SAP and SQL Server. These products =
also
offer consolidated administration, scalability, deployment flexibility =
and
HSM options to improve storage utilization rates and staff =
productivity.
Veritas and Tivoli are the current market leaders, delivering highly
scalable solutions with good to excellent support.
Veritas continues to lead the market with its NetBackup product, =
capturing
enterprise backup leadership in 2000 based on new license revenue. =
Backup
Exec is positioned as a workgroup product. Veritas leads in integration =
with
all of the key storage array vendors' replication technologies, and the
company offers the related data protection options that customers may
require for a complete data management solution, including e-mail =
attachment
archiving, HSM and Internet backup products.
Veritas' competitors have made significant strides in filling the =
technology
gap and, with improved execution, could still change their positioning =
in
this quadrant, especially when Veritas' high pricing is an issue. IBM =
Tivoli
Storage Manager (TSM) still benefits from the large IBM sales force and
partner community, although the delivery of new functionality has been =
late.
Legato launched NetWorker v.6.01, which provides a new indexing =
architecture
that has apparently addressed many of the code quality issues that =
caused
customer dissatisfaction with earlier releases. The company has =
aggressively
worked to move customers to the new release and has improved its =
customer
satisfaction ratings. The new company management team has delivered =
modest,
but steady, revenue growth, stabilizing the financial picture, but =
leaving
improved marketing as the next challenge. NetWorker supports the Change
Journal feature in Windows 2000 to improve the performance of =
incremental
backups and minimize CPU utilization, the GEMS Console is now available =
for
global management of NetWorker servers, and media management =
functionality
has been strengthened through the acquisition and increased integration =
of
AlphaStor technology from SCH Technologies.
HP continues to successfully sell Omniback II into its installed base.
Scalability and code quality problems that affected earlier versions of
Omniback II appear to have been addressed with Omniback II v.4.0, =
although
it must still be market-validated. The product is getting good =
ease-of-use
and reporting rankings, now supports NDMP v.2, and offers a new
instant-recovery capability to manage recovery from split-mirror =
images.
Challengers Quadrant: To be in the Challengers quadrant, a vendor must =
not
only have vision, but also the ability to become a significant player =
in the
market. Vendors in this quadrant should be able to move eventually into =
the
Leaders quadrant if they deliver on both vision and execution.
EMC's EMC Data Manager (EDM) backup solution has seen strong growth, =
with an
increased company sales focus, as EMC organizes for a stronger role as =
a
storage software provider outside of the Symmetrix environment. =
One-third of
the product's customer base does not have Symmetrix in the backup
environment today, and 46 percent of the customers purchased the =
software
only, not the hardware/software solution package (although a Symmetrix =
disk
is required for staging of backup on the backup server). EDM is being
integrated into the suite of EMC software management solutions, with =
the
first and tightest integration being with the new EMC ControlCenter
Replication Manager product announced October 2001.
Computer Associates International (CA) has recently introduced its
BrightStor Enterprise Backup solution, which has the look and feel of
BrightStor ARCserve backup, a product that the company now positions as =
a
workgroup solution. BrightStor reads and writes tapes that are
ARCserve-compatible. This suggests an early focus on retaining ARCserve
customers moving into enterprise-class solutions and on improving =
support
capabilities, which have been a weakness in the past. The company is =
also
looking to move the installed base of Alexandria and UniCenter Advanced
Storage Option customers to the new BrightStor backup product. The =
product
is new and without references at this time, but the vision looks good =
and CA
has the resources to bring to bear on this market.
Visionaries Quadrant: Both SyncSort with Backup Express and CommVault =
with
Galaxy have strong product architectures, solid NDMP support, and about =
the
same new license revenue volume, which remains too small to move them =
into
the Challengers or Leaders quadrant at this point, but both are gaining
increased attention in the customer and vendor communities.
SyncSort has increased its investment in marketing, advertising and
strategic-partner development, and this is beginning to pay off in =
greater
market visibility, which must now be turned into more customers and a =
larger
revenue stream. The company benefits from the profitable sort business,
which can now fund the increased move into the backup market.
CommVault Galaxy gained a lot of attention in the market when first =
released
because of its Exchange agent, which supports individual message- and
mailbox-level restores without making multiple copies of each message.
Similarly, its Notes agent supports document-level restores. Other =
vendors
now have "good enough" functionality in the message restore area or are
promising it in the near term. Unlike SyncSort, CommVault has had to =
seek
funding and has attracted some powerhouse investors, Microsoft being an
obvious example, but it has yet to turn these relationships into =
significant
revenue growth.
Both vendors have strong products that they need to continue to =
improve, but
growing the channel will be even more important for them if they wish =
to
move into the Challengers quadrant.
Niche Players Quadrant: Vendors in this quadrant have credible =
technology
and have some visibility in the marketplace, as measured by Gartner =
client
inquires.
Atempo (aka Quadratec), with Time Navigator, is looking to move from =
being a
European supplier (it is based in France) to more of a worldwide =
player. The
company has opened offices in California and captured the contract for
developing the NDMP agent to be included with Compaq Computer's =
StorageWorks
NAS Executor servers. Compaq resells Time Navigator in Asia/Pacific. =
Atempo
is looking to focus development on features that will make the product =
more
appealing to customers running IT as a service, and it has delivered =
some
features to that end, such as support for secure access through =
firewalls
where necessary and role-based access controls.
BakBone first released the NetVault product to the U.S. market in 2000, =
but
it was based on technology selling in Europe and Japan prior to that. =
The
product is currently the only one listed that supports NDMP v.4. =
Finding
partners, finding channels and gaining market visibility remain =
challenges
that are always more difficult to address than technology.
Tantia Technologies' (aka Harbor) Network Storage Manager's (NSM's) =
market
penetration has been limited by its focus on mainframes, although the
company recently released a Windows NT/2000 version of the product. The
company offers a solid product for mainframe customers looking to back =
up
open-systems servers. The new Windows solution should offer Tantia the
opportunity to sell deeper into that base. Selling outside the =
mainframe
environment will challenge the company to develop new channels.
Kvedja/Regards
Petur Eythorsson
Taeknimadur/Technician
IBM Certified Specialist - AIX
Tivoli Storage Manager Certified Professional
Microsoft Certified System Engineer
peddi AT itn DOT is
Nyherji Hf Simi TEL: +354-569-7700
Borgartun 37 105 Iceland
URL: http://www.nyherji.is
|
