Assured unveils Zerto DR service for VMware upheaval

Assured Data Protection has launched a new disaster recovery service built on Zerto software and aimed at organisations running VMware and other hypervisor platforms amid growing uncertainty over their long-term infrastructure strategy.

The service provider said the offering targets enterprises that run mixed virtualisation estates and want aggressive recovery point and recovery time objectives for critical applications, regardless of the underlying compute or storage hardware.

This uses Zerto's host-based replication technology. Assured said this extends its disaster recovery portfolio for customers that currently rely on VMware and other hypervisors but want to keep options open for future migrations.

Assured is positioning the service for organisations that are reviewing virtualisation plans following Broadcom's acquisition of VMware. Many customers are assessing rising licensing costs and changes in support arrangements and are considering alternative platforms such as Nutanix.

The company said the new service aims at organisations with between 12 and 36 months remaining on existing VMware contracts that want stronger disaster recovery before those agreements expire.

Launching this adds another managed service around Zerto technology, which is part of Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Zerto focuses on continuous data protection and short recovery windows for virtualised workloads.

The new Assured offering uses host-based replication for near-continuous data protection. It supports rapid failover of workloads without dependence on the customer's specific server or storage hardware.

Assured said customers can group applications by business criticality. The service then applies different recovery tiers by group so that the most important workloads receive the shortest RPOs and RTOs, while less critical systems use lower-cost tiers.

The company stated this model separates recovery design from hardware refresh cycles. It also separates disaster recovery planning from decisions on whether to renew or move away from VMware.

For organisations that decide to transition off VMware, the service includes a path towards Nutanix, including support for AHV. Assured said disaster recovery remains in place during such a move, which reduces disruption during hypervisor migrations.

The service sits alongside Assured's existing cyber resilience offering based on Rubrik technology. Customers can use Zerto-based disaster recovery for fast application recovery and Rubrik-based services for backup and immutable data protection.

Assured said this combination extends protection across cyber incidents, natural disasters and operational outages. It also sets different data protection policies for workloads with different recovery requirements.

Many organisations now run multiple hypervisors, a mix of on-premises and cloud infrastructure, and a variety of storage platforms. Assured said the Zerto-based service aims at these mixed environments, including VMware deployments, and keeps disaster recovery policies consistent across them.

Assured is based in the US and UK and focuses on managed services for data backup, disaster recovery and business continuity. It works with Rubrik, Nutanix and now Zerto across different parts of its portfolio.

The company's leadership said many VMware customers still want to keep existing virtualisation platforms in place for the duration of active contracts, but want more flexibility over the medium term.

"Many enterprises still have 12-36 months left on VMware contracts but need a robust DR solution now," said Tony Giannini, Vice President, Global Innovation, Assured Data Protection. "Our partnership with Zerto enables us to provide ultra-low RPOs and RTOs for critical applications, independent of hardware, and with the flexibility to transition to Nutanix whenever customers choose. Just as importantly, Assured can customize protection levels by application, so customers aren't paying highest-common-denominator prices across the board. This is the perfect compliment to our Rubrik Cyber-Resilience solutions to ensure an organization is resilient against cyber, natural, and other disasters."

Zerto-based service is designed to sit alongside Assured's Nutanix-focused disaster recovery services. Customers can use Zerto on VMware for applications that demand very short recovery windows. They can then use Rubrik for longer-term backup and retention of less time-sensitive systems.

Assured claims this combination allows organisations to align spending on recovery services with each application's business value. It also enables disaster recovery plans to evolve as customers adopt new platforms or move more workloads to cloud environments.

Zerto is part of Hewlett Packard Enterprise and works with cloud and managed service providers on disaster recovery offerings.

"Assured Data Protection shares our commitment to helping organizations achieve continuous availability and rapid recovery in any environment," said Michael Lebo, Global Zerto MSP Leader. "By combining HPE Zerto Software host-based replication technology with Assured's managed service expertise, customers gain a proven, scalable foundation for modern disaster recovery."

Assured said the Zerto-powered disaster recovery service is now available through its managed services channels and will feature in customer workshops on future hypervisor and data protection strategies.