STUDY: Vast Majority (84%) of SMBs Report That IT Downtime Would Result in Moderate to Catastrophic Loss

SUNNYVALE, CA--(Marketwired - Mar 22, 2016) - Small and mid-sized businesses report that they are increasingly focused on disaster recovery (DR) readiness, with as many as 84% of SMBs noting that several days of IT downtime would result in moderate to catastrophic costs and loss. To make sure that they are covered in the event of a disaster, more than half (53%) rely on more than one DR method to "hedge their bets" to ensure recoverability. These results are according to a new study by Zetta, a leading provider of high-performance cloud backup and disaster recovery solutions.

Cloud DR Adoption is Rapidly Growing
The findings demonstrate trends in the growing use of cloud-based recovery and business continuity solutions. In fact, more than one in three (37%) are using the cloud as part of their DR solution today, up from 26% last year. In addition, as many as 10% use only cloud-based solutions for DR, up from just 4% last year. And of those planning to add a new DR method in the next 12 months, more than half (57%) plan to add a cloud-based solution.  

"The cloud is transforming disaster recovery and business continuity strategies like never before," said Mike Grossman, CEO, Zetta. "New technology that dramatically increases the speed of recovery, while keeping costs low and reliability high, is making the cloud a very attractive option for SMBs that need to assure disaster recoverability in the same ways as their large competitors."

Still DR Preparedness Lags
Even while SMBs recognize the vital nature of their DR and business continuity strategy, they fail to monitor and ensure security of their DR solutions. One-third (33%) of the IT professionals surveyed reported that they rarely test their DR plan, while an astounding 62% only test their DR plan once a year or less. Even more surprising, as many as 13% of IT professionals admit that their organization doesn't have a technical disaster recovery strategy and another 14% report that they don't have offsite DR protection making them vulnerable to an onsite disaster.

Cost and Speed of Recovery are Most Important
When asked about the top three most important factors of a DR solution, cost was named 65% of the time. Cost was followed closely by speed of recovery (61%), reliability (60%) and simplicity (60%). Usability (54%) was identified more as a "nice to have," but not a top priority.

Other highlights the study found include:  

• Organizations use a varying mix of DR strategies. This includes:
  • On-premise and physical offsite (26%)
  • Physical offsite only (23%)
  • On-premise only (14%)
  • On premise, physical backup and cloud (14%)
  • Cloud only (10%)
  • On-premise and cloud (9%)
  • Physical offsite and cloud (4%)
    
    
• Virtual infrastructure dominates today's environments. When asked the amount of servers organizations have that are virtualized:
  • 46% have a mostly virtualized environment with a few remaining physical servers
  • 20% have an evenly split physical and virtual environment
  • 16% have a few virtual servers, but the majority of their environment is physical
  • 12% reported that all servers are physical
  • 6% are all virtual

"SMBs have made increasing investments into their virtual infrastructure to save on costs and resources, yet DR strategies to protect those virtualized workloads are still falling behind in comparison," added Grossman. "The cloud is delivering impressive new options for these organizations with a strong combination of reliability, recovery speed and attractive pricing. As a result, organizations are able to efficiently assure disaster preparedness to avoid the increasing fear of a catastrophic loss."

About the Zetta 2016 SMB Recovery Readiness Study
For the Zetta 2016 SMB Recovery Readiness Study, Zetta surveyed more than 300 IT professionals about their disaster recovery solution and IT environment. The survey was conducted online and included organizations in over 15 industries, ranging in size from less than 50 to more than 1,000 employees.

About Zetta
Zetta is an award-winning provider of high-performance cloud backup and disaster recovery solutions that are a worry-free choice for businesses and managed service providers. The Company's direct-to-cloud approach provides businesses a fast and reliable way to protect, access and quickly recover their business-critical data and systems -- both physical and virtual -- without the need for costly extra hardware. For more information, visit www.zetta.com.