Archiving and backup storage-as-a-service vendor Iron Mountain Digital has signed VAR Integralis as its first European customer for its Virtual File Store service.

The recently launched service is an enterprises-class, cloud-based data-archiving solution, designed to reduce the costs of storing and managing inactive data.

Integralis is combining Iron Mountain Digital’s Connected Backup for PC, Connected Backup for Server with the vendor’s LiveVault server backup and recovery solution.

Iain Douglas, IT director at Integralis said: “Integralis has experienced exponential growth in internal data generation and is storing 3.5 terabytes of data on its system. We have worked with Iron Mountain Digital over the past two years to help us manage this growth, and solutions such as Iron Mountain’s automated, online LiveVault server backup solution have helped us to ensure that more control and flexibility of access to data has been achieved for our IT department.”

“By piloting and now taking on the Virtual File Store service, we have not only been able to maintain high levels of flexibility and accessibility to our data, but also to make cost efficiencies as our inactive data can now be stored in the cloud. This service complements our mixture of server and tape-based backup perfectly and has allowed us to gain a lot more control over our information.”

Integralis currently uses the Virtual File Store solution to store inactive data and Iron Mountain’s LiveVault server backup and recovery solution to protect its active operational data.

The reseller anticipates a 30 per cent reduction in storage spend in the future. “We use three other services from Iron Mountain Digital and now with the addition of Virtual File Store, it’s the missing link in their portfolio,” added Douglas.

Richard Ellis, manager of the UK and Ireland’s direct and channel business at Iron Mountain Digital said: “After an audit, Integralis had 20 per cent of its records marked as ‘inactive’ which was a huge area where cost savings could be made.

“The Virtual File Store solution allows Integralis to store vital yet inactive records safely and still have on-demand access to them while reducing costs.”