Logicalis Unveils Assessment Guide to Cloud-Based Storage

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Technology professionals are embracing the cloud with an increased vigor due in large part to the inherent cost savings the cloud offers with regard to storage. For those still on the fencepost, Logicalis, an international IT solutions and managed services provider, today announced a step-by-step guide for assessing and implementing a cloud-based storage solution.

“The amount of data companies need to store today is growing at an astounding rate,” says Victor Dermott, solution architect, cloud computing, for Logicalis. “So too is the cost to manage and maintain a secure, compliant environment. That’s why cloud-based storage as a service is becoming so attractive to CIOs and CFOs alike; reducing significant capital expenses for storage hardware and software as well as the associated management costs for maintaining these huge storehouses of data to a much smaller recurrent monthly operational cost makes both financial and technological sense.”…

To help IT pros who have moved past the “if” stage and entered the “how” stage of their cloud storage examination, Logicalis has prepared a step-by-step guide to cloud storage that outlines the key questions and stages IT managers will face along the way.

Step-By-Step Guide to Cloud Storage

1. Assess. IT pros considering a storage as a service solution need to examine their current backup infrastructure before making any changes, asking themselves key questions that include:

How much they want to spend, and do they prefer an up-front capital expense or a recurring monthly operational expense?
How many users do they need to serve?
What type of data will be stored in the cloud?
How much data will there be and how will that data get to the cloud?
What are the organization’s recovery time requirements and availability objectives?
What bandwidth requirements exist?
Does the company need to retain multiple copies of its data?

2. Plan. After establishing an “ideal,” begin the search for a suitable provider by considering:

A potential provider’s offerings:

o Is their storage on site, off site, or a hybrid solution?

o How will the cloud be accessed: NFS, API or hardware appliance?

o Who provides end-user support, the cloud provider or the client?

o Where are the provider’s data centers located; are they in the same state and country as the client organization?

The availability SLAs of the cloud provider and whether or not they meet the client company’s requirements.
What security procedures and precautions are in place for the environment – do they support HIPPA, SOX or PCI compliance regulations?
What administrative functions are the storage provider’s responsibility vs. the client’s?
How will existing data be migrated to the cloud environment?

3. Deploy. Once a potential provider has been carefully vetted, the next step includes selecting the solution from that provider that most closely matches the company’s needs. Consider a proof-of-concept trial, and if all goes well, create a contractual relationship with the cloud provider that meets the client organization’s business requirements with explicit SLAs that spell out the agreement in detail.

4. Validate. Finally, monitor the cloud provider’s performance and compliance on an ongoing basis. This may require maintaining a storage administrator in house, but that person should be able to spend significantly less time overseeing the business’ storage functions now that a cloud provider is involved.

“Understand that the actual execution of the business’ cloud storage implementation and deployment strategies will be dependent on the new solution provider,” Dermott says, “so be sure to select a partner with this in mind.”

Visit Logicalis’ web site to learn more about storage in the cloud.

Check out Logicalis’ dedicated microsite to learn more about public, private and hybrid cloud computing solutions.