The on-prem specialist announces it will make a belated entry into the cloud backup space, to allow existing partners to get both their on-prem and cloud products from a single vendor, and to expand their partner base among MSPs.

TORONTO – Today at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, StorageCraft announced its move into the cloud backup space with a new cloud-to-cloud solution. It will initially provide cloud backup and recovery for the Microsoft Office 365, Google Apps, Salesforce.com and Box applications.

“We are excited to be able to announce that we are entering a whole new space – backup and recovery for online applications,” said Brian Wistisen, StorageCraft’s Director of Product Marketing. “We’ve always been known for our on-prem capabilities, but this moves us into a new realm of cloud-to-cloud backup, with a very robust solution.”

While StorageCraft has had a cloud product previously, it only allowed their on-premise solution to be backed up into the cloud. The company is making an admittedly late entry into the cloud-to-cloud backup market, and Wistisen said that partner pressure was a key reason for the move.

“This is something that partners have been demanding we add to their portfolio of services,” he said. “They want to work with a single partner in both on-prem and cloud backup. Another driver is that we want to be known for protecting all assets. We recognize there are established players in the space. That means that we have to come to market with a solution that is extremely robust, and very competitive from a price standpoint.”

Even though the cloud backup market is a mature one, and largely commoditized, Wistisen said several market factors warrant StorageCraft’s entry into the space.

“Even though it is a mature market, it is still growing at a tremendous rate,” he said. “Many companies still haven’t moved to Office 365. In addition, because this is a volume-driven game, we will also be partnering ourselves with people who have been successful.

“We also have plans for additional applications which will differentiate us from other vendors,” Wistisen added. “This is a very flexible platform that will let us add additional online hosted applications.” In addition to the hosted apps, the roadmap includes a cloud to physical option.

“This is a very robust solution for the market, which is reliable and has more stability than some competitive products,” said Mandy Anger, Product Manager at StorageCraft. “One key feature with our cloud-to-cloud solution is that we recognize not all data is equal, so administrators can determine which is their most important data and prioritize accordingly.”

Anger said that they have another advantage in going out of the gate with both Office 365 and Google Apps for Work.

“Our applications package will meet the needs of the majority of MSPs we work with,” she said.

“We would not have jumped into this market if we had not believed we had products that could not only compete but excel, and could be a high value-add for resellers,” said Rob Walton, Product Marketing Manager at StorageCraft. “We’ve contemplated a lot how we can get partners to lead with us. We want to help them understand that while we can be an additional option for them, we can also be a preferable option, because of our features and functionality. We also feel the entire recovery suite from a single vendor will provide them with economies of scale.”

Today, StorageCraft has around 10,000 partners, but they think the new cloud offering will allow them to enhance that significantly.

“We have a strong corporate goal to increase the number of partners we are working with, and being able to provide a new technology and a new solution is a doorway to that,” Walton said. “Many of the MSPs in this space are new to us. We are looking to recruit a lot from them, and would love to see a strong multiple in the active MSPS we work with. We have also been taking a careful look at who these key partners in the space are. We are in the process of recruiting some of those key partners, which will assist in enhancing the credibility of the product in the marketplace, and will be announcing those when they are signed.”

StorageCraft is at the Microsoft WPC event, at Booth 328, to demo the solution to prospective partners.

“We will be working there at the event, letting people know we are now a player in this market,” Walton stated.

The product launch date will be released in the coming months.