Disaster recovery is one of the key considerations for data availability today. While a natural disaster is unexpected and unpredictable, a disaster recovery data center allows you to plan for and have control over what happens next. Despite the fact that all data will be affected at some point by outages due to weather, tectonic activity, or simple human error, many companies don’t prioritize disaster recovery solutions until it’s too late.
Why do enterprises seek disaster recovery data centers
We can try to calculate the cost of downtime from failing to create a disaster recovery plan, but the consequences extend beyond monetary loss. Service disruptions are often incredibly damaging to an organization’s brand reputation, and a loss of customer loyalty is incalculable.
Extended service disruptions can lead to long-term effects like a stock downturns or even increased costs from extended crisis management.
Does a disaster recovery data center create the possibility of 100% uptime?
Companies with data center deployments strive for or 99.999% uptime, or “the five nines,” that equates to about one hour of downtime a year. Disaster recovery data centers play a large role in achieving this ideal; while it doesn’t guarantee 100% uptime, it’s the most important step toward 100% that an organization can take.
This is because a good disaster recovery data center is built with resiliency in mind. From site selection to design engineering to cost-effectiveness, these data centers are meant to avoid or weather the natural disasters that primary data centers may be in the path of.
Not all disaster recovery data centers are created equal
When doing research for your choice of a disaster recovery data center, you’ll want to look for a few key components before committing. Your data center should provide all the same connectivity options and cloud on-ramps as whatever you’re using for your primary data center. This will prevent any loss of accessibility and functionality should a disaster redirect your IT load to the disaster recovery location.
Other considerations for your disaster recovery plan should include climate, geological stability, regional workforce, and cost-effectiveness.
Disaster recovery data centers represent a cost-effective option
While it may be your dream to create your own redundant site for a backup data center, the cost of purchasing, developing, building, powering, and operating a data center site for your business is extremely high. That’s why a colocation data center represents the best option for most disaster recovery plans. With the complex and expensive infrastructure taken care of for you, a colocation data center is the safest, most cost-effective component of your disaster recovery plan.
In the end, it’s best to have the peace of mind that comes from knowing that your organization is protected from protracted service outages. Don’t wait until a disaster comes to you before you respond. This is the sort of problem that you want to be proactive in solving. The good news? Sabey can be that solutions partner. Interested in seeing how? Schedule a tour today or contact an expert.
