Boston, Massachusetts-based start up Storage Networks Inc, which launched itself on the market back in April as the first company to offer outsourced storage, yesterday formalized its offerings into three services and laid out a methodology for companies wanting to adopt any or all of them.
Storage Networks’ basic offering, DataPacs, comprises standard outsourced storage, either of a particular application (or applications) or a company’s entire data storage needs. It says that the exact offering will vary according to customers’ specific needs. For example, one business might need 500 Gigabytes worth of storage, and another might need twice that, said Ruya Atac, director of service marketing. Atac said the level of customization makes it difficult to give exact pricing, adding that a typical 500 Gigabytes would cost around $50,000.
BackPacs, the next stage up, is Storage Networks’ back-up and recovery offering. Storage Networks will offer the service in conjunction with DataPacs, or customers can opt to store their own data on site and just outsource the back-up component. Backed-up data can be stored on site, at the customer’s own premises, and managed by Storage Networks, or at one of its remote datacenters, depending on what the company requires.
The third offering, SafePacs, is designed for those companies that want complete storage peace of mind, says Atac. Here, Storage Networks will leverage its partnership with Comdisco Inc, announced last month, to offer business continuity and disaster recovery services on top of its own outsourced storage offerings. Comdisco has a series of worldwide business continuity facilities that are fully equipped with desks, telephones, fax machines and everything a business would need, including staff, to continue its operations in the event its premises become unusable, as a result of a natural disaster or IT breakdown. In addition, Comdisco provides the network infrastructure to connect the stored data, from StorageNetworks premises, to Comdisco’s datacenters.
Atac said Storage Networks is wrapping its three services packages around its new AIM – assessment, implementation and manage – methodology. Under the first part, assessment, Storage Networks will offer consultancy services to customers, who may or not not wish to go on and use the company’s outsourced storage offerings. It could be that they only need us for advice but then decide to set up and run their storage on their own, said Atac. For companies choosing to outsource, the next stage is implementation. But here again they have a choice, Atac said, they can either choose for us to implement the storage solution on their site or for us to run it for them remotely. The last stage is only for customers that want to go the latter route, handing over their entire storage infrastructure to Storage Networks for remote management.
There’s actually nothing new in these announcements per se – Storage Networks has done a good job of outlining its strategy and offerings before – but this is the first time the company has formalized those offerings into three formal services, Atac said. It was more customer driven than anything, she said, adding that the company has already managed to sign up 45 customers, five of whom have already opted for the full outsourced services while the remaining 40 are still in implementation phase discussions. She added that the company was due to roll out six new datacenters in Denver, Seattle, Dallas, Philadelphia and Washington.
