From CRN: Microsoft on Tuesday unveiled a series of updates to its Windows Azure public cloud, including new data backup and disaster recovery services, as well as expanded cloud development tools.
Microsoft's Windows Azure Backup Service, which stores data from Windows Servers in the Azure cloud for backup and recovery purposes, is now generally available, Scott Guthrie, Microsoft's corporate vice president of Windows Azure, said in a blog post.
"This release is now live in production, backed by an enterprise SLA [service-level agreement], supported by Microsoft Support, and is ready to use for production scenarios," Guthrie said in the blog post
Windows Azure Backup Service also backs up data from System Center Data Protection Manager and Windows Server Essentials and encrypts it onsite before sending it to the cloud, Guthrie said in the blog post.
Rand Morimoto, president of Convergent Computing, an Oakland, Calif.-based Microsoft partner, said cloud storage makes sense for many customers because it spares them the time and expense of backing up data and keeping track of it.
"Storage is the number one big ticket spending item right now as data is retained across pretty much every part of an organization," Morimoto said in an email. "We've had many of our customers move to cloud based storage for longer term archiving."
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