InformationWeek 2014 Backup Technologies SurveyResearch Findings

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Plenty of technologies get more attention than backups, but not many are more important. When your main data center is under water, you can either recover or you can't.

Among the 437 respondents to our InformationWeek Backup Technologies Survey, all of whom screened in by indicating involvement with the selection, evaluation, or use of backup technologies, the No. 1 data protection challenge is the cost of backup systems and procedures. Other data points:

>> 59% back up directly to tape, down from 66% in 2013.

>> 54% expect to still be backing up direct to tape in 18 months.

>> 41% do not encrypt removable media.

>> 11% have three or more different backup applications in use.

Respondent breakdown: 18% have 5,000 or more employees; 12% are over 10,000. Education, consulting, and government are well-represented, and 40% are IT director/manager or IT executive management (C-level/VP level).

Want more? Visit InformationWeek Reports

Executive Summary

v© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Fewer got new backup applications in the last year

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Most use same backup system for physical/virtual servers

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

One backup application is most common

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Most use conventional software to back up virtual servers

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Most back up physical servers weekly or more

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Most back up virtual servers weekly or more

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Reasons some users aren’t backing up weekly

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How much are you using different backup technologies?

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Which backup technologies are you using at all?

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Which backup technologies will you use most in 18 months?

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Which backup technologies do you expect to use at all?

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Most respondents like their backup system

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Likelihood of successful disaster recovery

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How long data is stored on non-removable media

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How long data is stored on removable media

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Cloud storage gains ground

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Less than a third encrypt backup tapes

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Types of data restored most often

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How often data is restored

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Symantec makes gains for VM infrastructure backups

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Software used for VM backups

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Problems with data protection

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How often respondents test backups

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How respondents back up remote office data

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How much data respondents protect

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How many physical servers respondents protect

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

How many virtual servers respondents protect

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Survey respondents’ job titles

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Annual revenue of survey respondents’ employers

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Survey respondents’ industry

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Number of employees at survey respondents’ companies

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved

Survey Name InformationWeek 2014 Backup Technologies Survey

Survey Date May 2014

Region North America

Number of Respondents 437

Purpose To explore the state of data backups today and interest in emerging technologies.

Methodology InformationWeek surveyed business technology decision-makers at North American companies. The survey was conducted online, and respondents were recruited via an email invitation containing an embedded link to the survey. The email invitation was sent to qualified InformationWeek subscribers.

Want more? Visit InformationWeek Reports

Research Synopsis

© 2014 Property of UBM Tech; All Rights Reserved