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MiWay ensures data availability with Redstor

Direct short-term insurer MiWay depends on Redstor to support data backup and recovery of over 25TB of critical data.


Johannesburg, 05 Sep 2016
Louis van Wyk, Head of IT Infrastructure at MiWay.
Louis van Wyk, Head of IT Infrastructure at MiWay.

Leading short-term insurer MiWay, with a history of successfully using the data backup and recovery solution acquired by Redstor, has confirmed it will continue to depend on Redstor to support the company as it grows and diversifies its service offering to insurance and financial services customers.

About MiWay

Fact sheet
Solution: Redstor
Industry: Insurance
Provider: Redstor
User: MiWay

MiWay is a direct short-term insurer and financial services company, offering customers a range of short-term insurance products, including motor, household, homeowners, business insurance, as well as liability cover.

MiWay's phenomenal growth in the local market depends heavily on its value proposition and service excellence, which depends in part on its ability to deliver services quickly and reliably via mobile and online channels, as well as its ability to retrieve customer information instantly.

Problem description

In 2011, MiWay had an incident which resulted in the insurer having to restore data from backups. Fortunately, it was using the Attix5 solution at the time and downtime was minimal. Attix5 was later acquired by Redstor in September 2015. With the implementation having proved itself, MiWay opted to continue depending on Redstor as the company grew and diversified its solutions portfolio.

The MiWay backup requirements currently include 25TB of data spread on 27 servers spread across Bloemfontein, Durban and Johannesburg.

"Currently, we have in excess of 70 million client files in the form of e-mails, PDFs and other documents. This is in addition to more than one million voice recordings we need to keep on file due to regulatory compliance. We therefore needed to be sure that Redstor would be able to continue supporting our high-volume backup and recovery requirements," says Louis van Wyk, Head of IT Infrastructure at MiWay. "The software has been updated on an ongoing basis and has been able to grow with the organisation," he says. "Redstor is definitely the right solution for our requirements.

"Over the years, we have seen the development of a very close working relationship between the two organisations. In terms of the Redstor and Attix5 value proposition, MiWay has complete trust in the solution and the approach," says Van Wyk.

Solution

Duan Botha, Senior Technical Services Engineer at Redstor, says: "Redstor is able to facilitate the backup of all the MiWay data very efficiently and can restore on a per-file basis in virtually real-time."

MiWay has strict legislative regulations to comply with around its data and backup needs. It therefore has to have the peace of mind that its disaster recovery solution is built around a reliable backup platform.

"Redstor has been able to meet the very specific demands of the insurer. The fact that the solution has been entrenched inside the organisation for so long is testament to its reliability and ability to cater for the unique requirements of MiWay," adds Botha.

Result

Van Wyk adds that MiWay has been able to dramatically reduce the backup window using the latest Backup Pro agent. "Being able to perform these backups fasters, has enabled us to reduce risk by meeting our disaster recovery requirements. In addition, the managed services approach of Redstor means we can remain focused on our business while they manage our backups from their side to further improve the efficiency of our operations, "says van Wyk.

He believes that the long-lasting relationship built up over eight years has seen Redstor become a trusted partner that knows exactly how to meet the specific needs of the insurer.

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Redstor

Founded in the UK in 1998, Redstor is a well-respected and trusted global provider of cloud backup and disaster recovery software and services.

Redstor's focus is on partner-enabled cloud backup as a service (BaaS), delivering these services either through its own storage platforms around the world, or by supplying its Backup Pro software to power its partners' own service platforms.

Redstor-powered services are currently available through hundreds of partners worldwide. As an ISO 27001 and ISO 9001 certified organisation, Redstor combines technical excellence with proven processes to deliver innovative, flexible and secure cloud services that reduce risks and cost to end-users.

Editorial contacts

Gloria Malan
Rubicomm
gloria@rubicomm.co.za