Beyond the Server Room: Why Off-Site IT Infrastructure Is Your Greatest Disaster Protection

Every company, small or large, depends mostly on its IT system in the fast-paced digital environment of today.  From client databases to accounting tools and email correspondence to internet sales, your data and tools are the lifeblood of your business.  But when calamity hits, what then?

We are not new to disturbances here in South Africa.  Although loadshedding causes regular headaches, we also have to contend with the growing hazard posed by severe weather patterns, ranging from the destructive floods in KwaZulu-Natal to the strong winter storms striking the Western Cape.  Should power outages, water damage, theft, or even fire jeopardise a physical server room or onsite IT equipment, your organisation could suffer greatly.

The Dangerous On-Site Server Room

Traditionally, many small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) have housed servers and IT equipment right within their office premises.  The first look at it seems practical.  Your data exists under your roof, literally.

 This convenience, nevertheless, comes with major weaknesses:

• A burst pipe, a localised fire, a power surge during a thunderstorm, or even a break-in can rapidly destroy your vital infrastructure and the data it stores.
• Fluctuating temperatures, humidity, dust, and even water can be detrimental to sensitive electronics.
• Extended power outages can render your on-site systems ineffective, even if you have a UPS or generator, as they gradually drain backup power.

Think about this: your IT is as inaccessible as your office is if a disaster or risk affects your building. Managing and maintaining physical servers calls for specialised knowledge, cooling systems, and frequent hardware upgrades – all of which add to your running costs.

Your best defence? The authority of off-site IT infrastructure

Here stepping “beyond the server room” becomes not only a wise but also a necessary action.  Mostly driven by cloud computing, off-site IT infrastructure moves your important data, apps, and processing capabilities to secure, offsite data centres. Consider it shifting the brains of your company to a highly secure, purpose-built fortification housed on the cloud.

Here’s why your best disaster protection is off-site IT infrastructure:

Reputable data centres, including those housing our solutions, are designed to resist far more than your average office building.  We have multiple power grids, large UPS systems, and industrial-grade generators that guarantee continuous uptime, even during extended loadshedding or grid failures, while advanced environmental controls guarantee constant temperature and humidity control, so shielding equipment from environmental damage.

24/7 surveillance, biometric access, and armed guards discourage theft and illegal entry; fire suppression systems are designed to quickly extinguish flames without destroying electronics.

Many cloud providers offer the option to replicate data across multiple geographically distinct data centres, thereby using geographic redundancy. Your data and services remain accessible from another even if an unparalleled tragedy strikes one area. Cloud solutions sometimes feature automated, regular backups, therefore guaranteeing your data is constantly current and accelerating recovery (RTO & RPO).  Should a crisis strike, recovery becomes a question of restoring from the cloud, significantly lowering your

Recovery Time Objective (RTO) – how quickly you can get back online – and enhancing your Recovery Point Objective (RPO) – how much data you might lose.

Maintaining production and supporting clients during a disaster depends on your team being able to access all required apps and data from any location with an internet connection when your office floods or is without power. Although not technically a disaster recovery advantage, the cloud’s intrinsic scalability means you only pay for the resources you use, therefore saving significant upfront hardware expenditures and continuous maintenance expenses linked with an on-site server room.  This lets you distribute funds to other vital departments of your company.

We’re aware of the particular difficulties South African companies have.  Our area of expertise is offering strong cloud solutions that guarantee not just off-site but also properly maintained and protected essential IT infrastructure. We enable you to move beyond the susceptible server room with cloud backup, managed cloud servers, or whole Microsoft 365 solutions using the cloud.  Our local knowledge allows us to provide solutions ranging from loadshedding to extreme weather events that are robust against the very disruptions you probably will encounter.

Wait not for tragedy to strike. The single best defence you can use to protect the future of your company is the proactive relocation of your IT infrastructure offsite.

Are you prepared to safeguard your company from unforeseen events in the future?

Get a no-obligation evaluation of your IT resilience from Contact Dotcloud now to see how our cloud solutions might guard your most important assets.