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Cloud service providers still require a lot of raw computing power to provide IT virtualisation. And yet, as the 'Welcome' comment in this Newsletter argues, the cloud is a lot greener than many alternatives. Apart from delivering the kind of service to customers that wins them even more business, these providers have a clear objective - to make a healthy profit. While many in-house data centres are not run at maximum efficiency - indeed they can be grossly profligate when it comes to the energy they consume - cloud service providers will endeavour to use the most power-efficient hardware possible to keep their costs as low as possible. In the process, they minimise their environmental impact and the environment benefits.

Then there are the benefits to be accrued from not having a whole mass of companies housing their own often inefficient hardware systems. Cloud servers, on the other hand, consolidate computing resources into effective and efficient data centres.

TURNING TO IOMARTCLOUD
Ultima Business Solutions is one company that has recognised the benefits of taking the 'cloud' route. A leading UK provider of IT infrastructure solutions and managed support services with the mission of making information technology an invaluable asset for organisations of all sizes and disciplines across the private and public sectors, it was formed in 1990.

Since then, Ultima has invested heavily in developing the technical skills and experience required to deliver and support complex, robust, secure, scalable, connected and available IT infrastructures. The company employs some 300 full-time staff across its head office in Reading, which also houses a 24x7x365 Technical Support Centre, plus a satellite sales office in central London.

Ultima leverages iomartcloud for its Cloud Backup and Recovery as a Service solution. It turned to iomartcloud after more and more customers began asking about the cloud backup solutions it could offer as a service. Ultima had previous success with traditional back up services and adopted some cloud backup platforms, but never found a flexible and tailored service that fit with both customer and their own demands. iomartcloud provides its partners with cloud services that can be managed centrally through an innovative portal.

COMPELLING MATCH
Danny Fisher, managed services client manager for Ultima, explains: "We needed to find a new backup partner, because we felt the up-front commercial commitment model we had been using no longer suited our requirements. The partner-focused model that iomart offered was a compelling match for Ultima."

Next generation intelligent data backup and recovery is vital to protect organisations' critical data in a simple unified solution. iomartcloud's offering is based on EMC Avamar backup technology. There are several benefits to this. Backup times are reduced, because each item of data is backed up once, meaning that during the backup window only delta changes are transmitted. The technology also means you can do granular and full backups of data, with the ability to restore individual files or full systems.

Fisher continues: "It was vital that the solution we chose not only worked for us, but more importantly it worked for our customers. We already knew that EMC Avamar technology was widely considered one of the best backup technologies on the market. That, tied in with the easy-to-use partner control panel; the data centre network based in the UK, and a dynamic support and account management model, meant it was an easy decision to go with iomartcloud."

Switching Ultima's cloud backup solution offering to iomartcloud was relatively easy. Integrating the controls and support model to iomart's 24/7/365 technical support centre was straightforward. The ease of use for the portal and the partner training was thorough and well received by the Ultima team.

REAPING THE BENEFITS
Fisher says the benefits were quick to follow. "We already have a strong pipeline, with most of our clients discussing these solutions and saying they are impressed with the offering. Being able to support the contracts in-house makes us much more commercially competitive to our closest rivals in the market place. Our clients and sales account teams have embraced the move to iomartcloud in a very positive way."

More and more organisations are turning to the cloud to support their business-critical backup and recovery needs. iomartcloud's backup service allows Ultima to provide its customers with a simple to use and easy to deploy enterprise class managed service, ensuring that backup and recovery goals are achieved.

Fisher concludes: "After an extensive evaluation of several Cloud Backup providers and based on reliability, scalability and recovery times, we came to the conclusion that iomartcloud was the best fit for Ultima. They have a solid offering, market-leading products delivering the service with EMC and Avamar, a passion for customer support and a personal approach."