AWS Case Study: Zmanda

Zmanda has built a solid business providing added functionality and top-notch support to popular open source projects such as Amanda Open Source Backup and Archiving software. Zmanda’s focus on backup and recovery solutions has lead to several products such as Amanda Enterprise, Zmanda Recovery Manager for MySQL and Zmanda Internet Backup.

Noticing the trend in storing data “in the cloud,” Zmanda quickly reacted and now offers an alternative to traditional backups on disk and tape. Amanda Enterprise customers can now utilize Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) to backup, archive, and retrieve their data with Zmanda Internet Backup (see the diagram below). Using Amazon S3’s scalable, pay-as-you-use solution, Zmanda’s customers can back up any amount of data and access it at anytime from anywhere on the web.

To enable Zmanda’s customers to easily sign up and pay for their new backup solution, Zmanda set up the billing mechanism through a new AWS service, Amazon DevPay. DevPay removes the hassle of creating a metering service and billing system by automatically metering each customer’s Amazon S3 service usage and collecting payments on behalf of Zmanda.

Most importantly, Amazon DevPay offers a familiar payment process by allowing users to sign up using their Amazon.com credentials and stored credit card information. “DevPay makes it easy for customers to pay us,” Dmitri Joukovski, Zmanda’s Vice President of Product Management.

Zmanda launched the Amazon S3 backup solution with Amazon DevPay in January and has seen requests from a wide range of companies, including non-profits, educational organizations, high-tech companies, e-commerce, and traditional manufacturing. Existing AWS customers are also among those to quickly see value in Zmanda’s new offering. “Some of our new customers, such as SmugMug, one of the most known Internet photo-sharing sites, recently purchased Amanda Enterprise specifically because of our ability to back up to Amazon S3,” says Joukovski.

“The combination of Zmanda’s affordable open source backup software and Amazon’s online storage solution, Amazon S3, will fundamentally change the way businesses back up and archive corporate data. With Amanda and Amazon S3, virtually any business can afford the luxury of remote Internet storage that is immediately available, infinitely scalable and secure. Zmanda’s mission is to ensure that our customers can always recover their data while making backup simple, secure and cost-effective—and Amazon S3 fits perfectly with this mission.” Chander Kant, CEO of Zmanda.

Zmanda is also looking at new ways to utilize Amazon S3 and DevPay and are exploring products that will utilize Amazon SimpleDB and Amazon EC2. Read more about Zmanda Internet Backup This link will launch in a new browser window or tab.