Zmanda puts Knoppix, Oracle D/b on its plate next

Pratima Harigunani

PUNE: Open source backup and recovery solutions major Zmanda has, among other things, Knoppix Live and Oracle Database as the next development pillars that it is working towards in a big way.

This would be in addition to expanding event-organiser features in ZRM, a backup and recovery solution for MySQL server.

Work on Knoppix will enable users to recover data in case of a complete machine error and restore the same on a new environment altogether. CEO Chander Kant shared, “We are working with Knoppix to make the experience, which is already available, seamless. Presenting it in a product form is an important part.” Knoppix is a live distribution that can be used in a bare metal recovery situation for recovery of variety of Windows and Linux systems. “We are also looking at the replication business,” he added.

Besides Knoppix, the company that so far has offered capabilities for MySQL database through ZRM (Zmanda Recovery Manager), plans to extend its forte by lapping up Oracle pie too. Earlier, it was reported that Zmanda is integrating Amanda with Oracle's Recovery Manager (RMAN) utility.

“Work on Oracle database is on the highest priority. Live Oracle back-up is a hot area for us. Our strategy is to cover the entire spectrum of back up in open source terrain. But interestingly, requests for proprietary back ups have prodded us in the direction of Windows too,” Kant commented.

The new developments could come up as new products altogether or as part of the umbrella flagships of Zmanda, i.e., Amanda and ZRM for MySQL. “It’s a good umbrella to scale up but we are constantly looking at other models.”

In addition, the company is about to expand the Event Organizer feature as part of enriching ZRM. “This function helps users visualize and enjoy event-based retrieval. Retrieval can happen at every point of time and is granular-cum-visual. Security provision, analysis and insight would be strong additions that we are eyeing next,” revealed VP, K K George. The new development output is expected in market anytime but a definite timeframe is still not disclosed. “We work according to a cycle of a release every quarter,” George added.

The company has rolled out two products- the enterprise-class open format backup for Microsoft Windows under Amanda Enterprise and Zmanda Management Console for MySQL Backup that adds GUI tools to the product. “This has quadrupled our rate of customer acquisitions and has helped us epically in the enterprise segment,” told Kant. Both these products have been completely developed out of its Pune center that will be scaled up to 50 people in about 12 to 18 months.. Amanda (Advanced Maryland Automatic Network Disk Archiver) and Zmanda Recovery Manager are the main product lines of the company with a ratio of 70:30 in terms of contribution to total business.

Zmanda’s competition includes enterprise storage backup players like EMC, CommVault, IBM, and Symantec. The global market for back-up and restore is estimated at around $3.2 billion.