IFF Research Implements Full Backup and Disaster Recovery Strategy with Acronis vmProtect 7

SCHAFFHAUSEN, Switzerland, 13 March 2012 - IFF Research, one of the largest independent research companies in the UK, has announced that it has deployed Acronis® vmProtect 7™ to achieve a fully comprehensive backup and disaster recovery strategy across its Virtual Machines (VM).

Established in 1965, IFF Research conducts in-depth strategic research for a wide variety of private and public sector clients in the UK. Faced with growing amounts of data, the company recently virtualised 90% of its IT infrastructure to help cut costs. With IFF Research's critical database tools, including IBM's Dimension and SPSS®, now running in a VMware virtual environment, the company needed a backup and recovery solution to safeguard all of its collated and analysed data. In addition it also needed to protect the company's emails, accounting and HR data which were all residing on the virtual machines.

Having already deployed Acronis® Backup & Recovery™ 11 Advanced Server to protect its physical IT infrastructure, IFF Research opted for Acronis' fast and simple to use Acronis vmProtect 7, for VMware® vSphere™ servers using ESX hypervisors to complete its backup and recovery strategy. With the ability to carry out agent-less backups of virtual machines with Acronis vmProtect 7, installation took less than an hour as there was no need to install the software on each VM.

By deploying Acronis vmProtect 7, IFF research can carry out agent-less scheduled daily incremental backups, and weekly full system backups, which take a full image of the virtual machines, including the applications and operating system. IFF Research also take full advantage of the industry-standard 256-encryption that Acronis vmProtect 7 offers in as part of its efforts to comply with the Data Protection Act and keep backed up data secure.

The web-based interface from Acronis simplifies management and enables even non-technical staff to easily access and carry out file-level recovery to restore data as quickly as possible. A full system restore carried out at IFF Research's hosted service provider site can be carried out within four hours and take as little as two hours to get back up and running again after an onsite disaster.

Simon Hulbert, IT Manager at IFF Research said: "Acronis vmProtect 7 is intuitive and effective. It provides all the backup tools we need for our virtual environment making my job easier. It also gives us the peace of mind that we require that our data is always protected, and that we are meeting all of the crucial data protection regulations. Our database applications and the data held within them is business critical and Acronis vmProtect 7 coupled with Acronis Backup & Recovery 11 provides us with a fully integrated solid backup and recovery plan."

Established in 1965, IFF Research conducts high quality strategic research for a wide variety of private and public sector clients. IFF Research designs and delivers research tailored precisely to each organisations needs. Its specialist sectors are: - learning & skills - employment & benefits - branding, marketing & communication - business, enterprise, environment and the third sector - financial services - regulation. For additional information, please visit: http://www.iffresearch.com/index.php?id=home