Ambitious virtualisation vendor Veeam Software is offering its resellers the opportunity to educate businesses on the benefits of virtual backup, by tempting them with a half price discount.

The vendor, which provides management tools for VMware virtual datacentre environments, has made the discount available on its Veeam Backup and Replication 3.0 release.

Customers using competing products for VMware ESX and ESXi backup, replication and recovery can replace these products with Veeam's Backup and Replication at 50 per cent off the retail price.

Collin Fisher, regional director for northern EMEA at Veeam, said: “This is a great way to start conversations with customers about the importance of virtual backup. Traditionally, customers have invested in a virtual environment but are still using their physical tools for backup.

“A physical backup tool in a virtual infrastructure may not be the best option, so this offer allows customers to upgrade and manage that environment in a better way. Shockingly, some customers, mostly in the SME space, are failing to back up at all.”

Fisher said the 50 per cent discount applies to the product, licences and a full-year support maintenance agreement.

Key features of Veeam’s Backup and Replication include support for ESX, ESXi and the ESXi free edition, and fast file-level recovery from image-level backups for Windows and Linux.

George Sidoris, Veeam vice president of worldwide sales, said: “Before Veeam Backup and Replication was introduced in 2008, there were not a lot of options for ESX backup and replication.

“With this special limited-time offer, we want to provide relief to customers who may have spent their budget on older products and are now dissatisfied with them.”

The promotion is available to Veeam resellers worldwide and runs until 15 June.