Dell announced what is essentially its software group’s first acquisition: AppAssure, a maker of backup software solutions. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but what we do know is that, unless Dell agreed to pay a particularly outrageous sum for the firm, AppAssure will likely prove to be a good investment in its own, not to mention its overall value to the hardware maker.

The company has been named the fastest growing backup software maker by Inc Magazine, having seen growth throughout the past 19 consecutive quarters. AppAssure employs about 230 workers, all of whom will remain in their positions after the merger.

From the original announcement:

“AppAssure’s award-winning(4) technology delivers reliable application recovery from customers’ servers to their datacenter and their cloud. AppAssure goes beyond simply protecting data, to protecting entire applications enabling service providers and enterprises to adopt a cloud model to deliver fast, reliable and secure data protection.”

This means that in addition to boosting Dell’s software portfolio, the latter will also be able to integrate the new IP into its considerably more profitable storage unit.  This will help Dell remain competitive in this area, which is essential, especially now.

For one Dell’s latest quarterly earnings failed to meet analysts’ expectations, leading to a big decline of its share price. And secondly, competition is suddenly very intense. Rival Hewlett-Packard (which has also seen poor growth across its core businesses in the latest quarter) recently revealed the ProLiant Gen8, the server that has been the center of attention ever since. The massive R&D effort resulted in a product that offers cost savings in almost every possible area, on top of the other advantages that come with all that automation. EMC in turn is strongly holding on to its leadership in the storage industry, including backup.