Carbonite: Windows Server 2003 Migration Failures Could Present Huge Costs For SMBs

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SMB professionals and channel partners are probably aware of the risks involved with missing the July 14 migration deadline from Windows Server 2003, including vulnerability to cyberattacks and failure of hardware. But what about the risks involved in the actual migration process?

David Maffei, vice president of Boston-based backup and recovery company Carbonite, told CRNtv there is a lot at stake when it comes to executing a successful migration.

"Small and medium businesses lose anywhere between $10,000 and $30,000 in a given single hour of downtime. So if that migration fails, and there isn't a backup plan, or they're unable to roll backwards, or if they don't have contingency set up, they put themselves in a situation where they can start to lose significant revenues," Maffei said.

Maffei's point is not that SMBs should avoid the Windows 2003 migration -- although he quoted figures that 20 percent probably will miss the July 14 cutoff -- but rather that going about the migration with a smart backup solution is vital. Equally important is the foresight into what makes sense for the business for the next several years.

"Making the decision around that will dictate and drive, you know, what are the critical business issues for that organization as it relates to how they're storing data on these servers," he said.

For Carbonite partners, helping SMBs navigate the migration process presents a big revenue opportunity.

Maffei said solution providers will find success through the creation of migration plans for Windows Server 2003 users, "and sell services to that customer around making sure that not only are they going to do the migration for them, but they'll be there in case of a failure to the migration process to keep operations moving," he said.

"I think that as it relates to acquiring new customers, we've seen a lot of claim around expertise in terms of moving to new types of environments," Maffei said. He said SMBs are "out there looking for a solution provider that might be able to offer them what they're considering the leading-edge or more relevant data storage capacity than they had before."

PUBLISHED MAY 29, 2015