By Darshik Jariwala - December, 30th 2014

RaaS is one of the cloud computing services and it stands for Recovery as a Service. It is sometimes also referred to as DRaaS, short for Disaster Recovery as a Service. We are generally only aware about the most commonly known Cloud based services like IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service), PaaS ( Platform as a Service ) and SaaS (Software as a Service ).

How does RaaS work?

RaaS is one of the most important factors for any small to medium scale company as they are intended and expected to run effectively and incessantly, especially when it serves lacs of customers. It is imperative that the customers receive uninterrupted services in face of any unfortunate event. Or atleast an interruption which lasts for a very brief period of time, failing which the company may stand to lose huge number of customers to their competitors. The unfortunate event could be anything from a naturally occurring catastrophe like earthquakes and flood to man-made such as Hacking. It is basically an event which may also result in losing all the data and shutting down the company for a while. This is where RaaS helps them to overcome these problems and provide disaster recovery services.

RaaS should not be confused with cloud based backup services. RaaS does much more than simply protecting the data. RaaS helps a company ensure its business continuity should an organization face any disruption in their services due to disasters. This is done by replicating the company’s infrastructure and applications. RaaS springs in to action in the event of disaster to minimize the downtime and disruption and also speed up the recovery process.

Now since RaaS is a cloud based services, it is natural that the infrastructure, applications and the data will be managed in the cloud. However, there are various RaaS Models which help the organizations figure out which RaaS model is best suited for their business model. There are 3 types of RaaS models:

1. To Cloud RaaS

In this model, the primary applications and data is stored in the organization’s privately managed data center whereas the cloud based services are used as Backup or Recovery option.

2. From Cloud RaaS

The Cloud RaaS model does the opposite of “To Cloud RaaS” model, where the primary data and applications used by the company are stored in the cloud and the Backup and Recovery data are stored in their privately managed data center.

2. In Cloud RaaS

In this particular model, the company’s Recovery and Backup as well as its primary services are managed in the cloud.

More than the naturally occurring disasters, more and more companies today face threats from man made disasters such as hackers or disgruntled employees who intend to cause harm to the company by disrupting their services. Such events not only affect a company’s finances but also its integrity. RaaS is like an insurance policy. Although a lot of money needs to be invested in to it each year, should a day arise when a company needs disaster recovery services, money may be the least important aspect an organization would be worried about.

Related : Top 5 Benefits of using RaaS as your Disaster Recovery service

Here is a small video by Rob Carter from Windstream, the Director of Managed Services and Cloud Solutions explaining Disaster Recovery as a Service.

 

Photo Credit – Marvin Nauman/Wikimedia Commons