Veeam Plots Growth with Free Windows Endpoint Backup Software and Cloud Extensions

Veeam today said it will offer a free Windows endpoint backup and recovery client. The move is a departure from its history of providing replication and backup and recovery software for virtual server environments However, company officials said the move is not a departure from focus, which will remain targeted on protection of server virtual machines, but rather a realization that most organizations are not entirely virtual.

The new Veeam Endpoint Backup software will run on Windows 7 and later OSes (though not Windows RT) to an internal or external (such as USB) disk or flash drive and will include a networked attached storage (NAS) share within the Veeam environment. The company will issue a beta in the coming weeks and the product is due to be officially released sometime next year. The surprise announcement came on the closing day of its inaugural customer and partner conference called VeeamON, held in Las Vegas.

Enterprise Strategy Group Analyst Jason Buffington, who follows the data protection market and has conducted research for Veeam, said offering endpoint client software was unexpected. "At first, I was a little surprised because it didn't seem congruent with that VM-centric approach to things," Buffington said. "But that's another great example of them adding a fringe utility. In this first release, while it's an endpoint solution, primarily, there's no reason you technically couldn't run it on a low-end Windows Server. I'm reasonably confident they are not going to go hog wild into the endpoint protection business. This is just their way to kind of test the code, test customers' willingness for it, as a way to vet that physical feature such that they have even a stronger stranglehold on that midsize org that's backing up everything except a few stragglers."

At a media briefing during the VeeamON conference, company officials emphasized that they remain focused on its core business of protecting server VMs as it plots its growth toward supporting various cloud environments as backup and disaster recovery targets. Doug Hazelman, Veeam vice president of product strategy, indicated that it could be used for various physical servers as well. Hazelman said that the company is largely looking to see how customers use the software, which can perform file-level recoveries. Furthermore he noted that the endpoint software doesn't require any of the company's software and vowed it would remain free as a standalone offering.

"We are not targeting this at an enterprise with 50,000 endpoints," Hazelman said. "We want to get it in the hands of the IT pros and typical Veeam customers and see how we can expand this product and see how we can grow it."

Indeed the VeeamON event was largely to launch a major new release of its flagship suite, to be called the Data Availability Suite v8. Many say Veeam is the fastest growing provider in its market since the company's launch in 2006. In his opening keynote address in the partner track, CEO Ratmir Timashev said that Veeam is on pace to post $500 million in booked revenue (non GAAP) and is aiming to double that to $1 billion by 2018.

In an interview following his keynote, Timashev said the company doesn't have near-term plans for an initial public offering (IPO) and insisted the company is not looking to be acquired. "We're not looking to sell the company," he said. "We believe we can grow. We have proven capabilities to find the next hot market and develop a brilliant product. And when you have this capability, you can continue growing, stay profitable and you don't need to sell."

Timashev added that Veeam can reach those fast-growth goals without deviating from its core mission of protecting virtual datacenters. Extending to a new network of cloud providers will be a key enabler, according to Timashev. The new Data Availability Suite v8, set for release next month (he didn't give an exact date),  will incorporate a new interface called Cloud Connect that will let customers choose from a growing network of partners who are building cloud-based and hosted backup and disaster recovery services.

The new v8 suite offers a bevy of other features including what it calls "Explorers" that can now protect Microsoft's Active Directory and SQL Server and provides extended support for Exchange Server and SharePoint. Also added is extended WAN acceleration introduced in the last release to cover replication and a feature called Backup IO, which adds intelligent load balancing.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/08/2014 at 11:30 AM