Backup is Taking a Quantum Leap Forward; Interview with Quest Software Sr VP Walter Angerer Part I
In the last few years, Quest Software has gone from having a small footprint in the data protection space to owning some of the leading products in this space through its acquisitions of BakBone Software and Vizioncore. To lead the company into this next decade of data protection and data management, Quest recently tapped Walter Angerer, who previously worked at Symantec and helped bring its NetBackup appliances to market. Today, I begin an interview series with Walter where we open by discussing how backup is changing, and examine the quantum leaps forward that have occurred in how backup and recovery are done.
Jerome: Please tell DCIG's readers a little bit about your background, your experience and a little insight into how you got involved in the data protection.
Walter: I've been in the software space for almost 17 years. I actually didn't start my career in data protection. When I initially started working, it was over in Europe, working for Siemens power transmission and distribution systems.
Walter Angerer, Senior Vice President and General Manager
My training really started off more on the side of data systems, software controls, electric grids, power plants, and things like that. Eventually, I ended up in the U.S. through Siemens and decided to look for new opportunities. That's what got me into data protection.
Along the way, I got introduced to Symantec (it was Veritas at the time), and since its headquarters for NetBackup engineering was in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis - St Paul, MN), where I was working at the time, it seemed like a good fit. So I joined the team, and that's what officially got me into backup.
It was a funny transition for me. When I first started in backup, I thought to myself, "How difficult can it really be to copy data from one place to another?" Compared to controlling something like the national grid, it felt like backup should be easy.
Needless to say, I was in for a big surprise. I quickly learned how complicated backup and recovery can be, and seven years later, I can tell you it's now more challenging than it's ever been.
So I joined Symantec on the NetBackup engineering side of the business, and eventually came to lead the group that was focusing on hardware appliances and cloud solutions for NetBackup, Backup Exec and Enterprise Vault. My last two years with Symantec were primarily spent helping bring the NetBackup 5000 series appliances to market. I also worked on the launch of the Backup Exec.cloud offering and similar initiatives within the company.
Last year, I got introduced to Quest and became acquainted with the company's leadership team. In talking with them, I became excited about their commitment to data protection, especially as I learned more about the product offerings that Quest had in its portfolio.
Following the acquisition of BakBone, and the earlier acquisition of Vizioncore, Quest decided the time was right to build a new data protection business unit, and was looking for someone to head up management of the overall product portfolio and bring these new technologies together with some of the company's core application backup and recovery tools. That challenge is what brought me to Quest, and I have been here ever since.
Jerome: Obviously you have been around a while and have seen a lot of changes in the data protection space. What do you see going on in the data protection space now and how does that compare to how data protection was done even as recently as a few years ago?
Walter: If you go back 10 years, backup was very different. It was all physical environments, backups were generally going to tape, and the data volume was a fraction of what it is today.
Ten years ago, a terabyte used to be a large quantity of data. It was an amount people got excited about. Today, we're talking petabytes. It's definitely been an interesting ride the last couple of years seeing the explosive growth of data. According to some of the analyst reports, data is growing at a rate of 50 percent annually for some companies.
Another big change is obviously how dependent we've grown on our digital infrastructure and on the number of services we provide. I remember there were days where you could come to the office and the network would not even be up all the time - maybe it was up for half a day. Those days are long gone.
In terms of data protection, the need to restore data quickly for the organization has become much more important and much more complicated. Not too long ago, companies were classifying 10 percent of their total data as mission critical, but recent analyst reports suggest that they are now classifying 40 or 50 percent of the data they produce as mission critical. So it's quite different in terms of requirements and the environment we're looking to protect.
But really the biggest change is the quantum leap that occurred when we went away from tape and started introducing disks into the backup space. There was obviously a lot of excitement over that. Shortly thereafter, another quantum leap in backup occurred when virtualization hit. Virtualization in the data center has a greatly impacted what data protection products needed to provide, both in terms of capabilities and how customers expect to use backup software.
Finally, there was also a shift in storage. Ten years ago, SAN storage was king of the data center. Now, we're seeing a big swing toward networked attached storage, which brings its own set of challenges.
So when you put it all together, what I see is really a major change in terms of the problems that customers need to address, and the capabilities that they expect from a backup product. Environments that were once pretty stable are now highly demanding and complex. Because of this --- because of what's now occurring in these real-life customer environments --- there's a strong demand for vendors like Quest to take the lead and change the very design of backup software itself.
In Part II of this interview series, Walter and I will explore how backup software needs to evolve to address new requirements to manage recovery as well as the new challenges that Big Data is placing on data protection and recovery.
In Part III of this interview series, we look at how backup software is evolving in light of the new challenges that server virtualization creates, in order to become smarter, more agile and do a lot more than backup.
In Part IV of this interview series, we explore whether or not virtualization only backup software solutions can survive long term.
In Part V of this interview series, Quest Software lays out its future plans for vRanger and NetVault Backup.
Jerome: Please tell DCIG's readers a little bit about your background, your experience and a little insight into how you got involved in the data protection.
Walter: I've been in the software space for almost 17 years. I actually didn't start my career in data protection. When I initially started working, it was over in Europe, working for Siemens power transmission and distribution systems.
Walter Angerer, Senior Vice President and General ManagerQuest Software Data Protection
My training really started off more on the side of data systems, software controls, electric grids, power plants, and things like that. Eventually, I ended up in the U.S. through Siemens and decided to look for new opportunities. That's what got me into data protection.
Along the way, I got introduced to Symantec (it was Veritas at the time), and since its headquarters for NetBackup engineering was in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis - St Paul, MN), where I was working at the time, it seemed like a good fit. So I joined the team, and that's what officially got me into backup.
It was a funny transition for me. When I first started in backup, I thought to myself, "How difficult can it really be to copy data from one place to another?" Compared to controlling something like the national grid, it felt like backup should be easy.
Needless to say, I was in for a big surprise. I quickly learned how complicated backup and recovery can be, and seven years later, I can tell you it's now more challenging than it's ever been.
So I joined Symantec on the NetBackup engineering side of the business, and eventually came to lead the group that was focusing on hardware appliances and cloud solutions for NetBackup, Backup Exec and Enterprise Vault. My last two years with Symantec were primarily spent helping bring the NetBackup 5000 series appliances to market. I also worked on the launch of the Backup Exec.cloud offering and similar initiatives within the company.
Last year, I got introduced to Quest and became acquainted with the company's leadership team. In talking with them, I became excited about their commitment to data protection, especially as I learned more about the product offerings that Quest had in its portfolio.
Following the acquisition of BakBone, and the earlier acquisition of Vizioncore, Quest decided the time was right to build a new data protection business unit, and was looking for someone to head up management of the overall product portfolio and bring these new technologies together with some of the company's core application backup and recovery tools. That challenge is what brought me to Quest, and I have been here ever since.
Jerome: Obviously you have been around a while and have seen a lot of changes in the data protection space. What do you see going on in the data protection space now and how does that compare to how data protection was done even as recently as a few years ago?
Walter: If you go back 10 years, backup was very different. It was all physical environments, backups were generally going to tape, and the data volume was a fraction of what it is today.
Ten years ago, a terabyte used to be a large quantity of data. It was an amount people got excited about. Today, we're talking petabytes. It's definitely been an interesting ride the last couple of years seeing the explosive growth of data. According to some of the analyst reports, data is growing at a rate of 50 percent annually for some companies.
Another big change is obviously how dependent we've grown on our digital infrastructure and on the number of services we provide. I remember there were days where you could come to the office and the network would not even be up all the time - maybe it was up for half a day. Those days are long gone.
In terms of data protection, the need to restore data quickly for the organization has become much more important and much more complicated. Not too long ago, companies were classifying 10 percent of their total data as mission critical, but recent analyst reports suggest that they are now classifying 40 or 50 percent of the data they produce as mission critical. So it's quite different in terms of requirements and the environment we're looking to protect.
But really the biggest change is the quantum leap that occurred when we went away from tape and started introducing disks into the backup space. There was obviously a lot of excitement over that. Shortly thereafter, another quantum leap in backup occurred when virtualization hit. Virtualization in the data center has a greatly impacted what data protection products needed to provide, both in terms of capabilities and how customers expect to use backup software.
Finally, there was also a shift in storage. Ten years ago, SAN storage was king of the data center. Now, we're seeing a big swing toward networked attached storage, which brings its own set of challenges.
So when you put it all together, what I see is really a major change in terms of the problems that customers need to address, and the capabilities that they expect from a backup product. Environments that were once pretty stable are now highly demanding and complex. Because of this --- because of what's now occurring in these real-life customer environments --- there's a strong demand for vendors like Quest to take the lead and change the very design of backup software itself.
In Part II of this interview series, Walter and I will explore how backup software needs to evolve to address new requirements to manage recovery as well as the new challenges that Big Data is placing on data protection and recovery.
In Part III of this interview series, we look at how backup software is evolving in light of the new challenges that server virtualization creates, in order to become smarter, more agile and do a lot more than backup.
In Part IV of this interview series, we explore whether or not virtualization only backup software solutions can survive long term.
In Part V of this interview series, Quest Software lays out its future plans for vRanger and NetVault Backup.
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Great Article! And how the whole data structure has changed and grown and continues to do so at an alarming speed is frightening and exciting.