VAST extends Veeam partnership, boosts support against ransomware

VAST Data, the data platform company for the AI-powered world, has announced support for the new Veeam Data Platform, extending the partnership between VAST and Veeam and empowering enterprise organisations to eliminate the threat of extended downtime following a ransomware attack.

VAST also announced that Universal Storage is now verified as Veeam Ready Object with Immutability, part of the Veeam Alliance Program, ensuring customers have a cyber-hardened platform with best-of-breed safeguards for all their critical data assets, the company states.

VAST's Universal Storage delivers exabyte-scale all-flash storage for wide-ranging applications, including backups and fast restores with Veeam.

According to the company, VAST restores business-critical data and applications up to 50x faster than legacy purpose-built backup appliances (PBBAs). It can meet stringent recovery time objectives (RTOs) by providing 8x more backup performance at 40% lower than legacy backup targets and object stores.

A joint VAST and Veeam customer that specialises in information and communications technology and business continuity, Plan B Limited New Zealand, says the combined VAST and Veeam solution allows them to create new products that disrupt the market.

Diego Nievas, Director of Product and Technology Innovation at Plan B says, "We strive to get our customers not only the best possible experience, but also the most comprehensive set of products and services that allow them to sleep at night and not worry about cyber attacks or anything that jeopardises their online and digital presence as well as operations. That is why we tightly partner with Veeam, who provides us with the best of breed technology for backup, recovery, and workload protection."

Nievas continues, "However, we don't stop there and we invest in the best backend technology that allows us to, out of the box, deliver on that peace of mind end-to-end. This means that, by partnering with VAST and Veeam combined, we can ring-fence our data with immutability that starts with the backup job creation and carries all the way through to the physical media. The value of de-risking our customers' businesses is immeasurably high."

According to the company, VAST's support for Veeam Data Platform provides the following benefits:

• Data immutability: With Universal Storage now qualified as Veeam-Ready Object with Immutability, customers gain additional comprehensive ransomware protection that prevents critical data from being altered or destroyed by any individual before its expiration date.
• Instant recovery and operations: In the event of an attack, customers can access all data directly from Universal Storage, keeping users online and productive.
• Scalability enhancements: Veeam Data Platform introduces scalable gateway servers to improve backup performance, complementing VAST's ability to scale performance and capacity independently to support even the most aggressive backup windows and recovery objectives.
• Direct-to-object backup: Admins can back up VMs directly to object storage using S3, increasing operational simplicity through the elimination of multiple storage tiers.
• Storage efficiency: VAST's advanced data reduction technologies deliver storage cost savings in addition to Veeam's built-in deduplication and compression.

Andreas Neufert, Vice President of Product Management, Alliances at Veeam, comments, "85% of organisations had at least one ransomware attack in 2022, according to the latest Veeam Data Protection Trends Report.

"The new Veeam Data Platform, which includes Veeam Backup & Replication (VBR) v12, is a single platform delivering more advanced data security, recovery, and hybrid cloud capabilities than ever before. With Veeam and VAST providing Modern Data Protection and recovery at scale, enterprises don't need to divert their valuable time and resources to recovery and can keep their business running."

George Axberg, Vice President of Data Protection at VAST Data, says, "It's universally understood that the primary data protection consideration in the ransomware age is how fast you can recover.

"That's why VAST is proud to partner with Veeam to provide customers with instant recovery and access to data following an attack. Modern Data Protection software paired with VAST's affordable all-flash target is a winning combination in the fight against ransomware, offering impacted organisations a clear path to business as usual."