More and more storage vendors are making the functionality of their pricey proprietary systems available in a standalone software form to address the accelerating shift toward commodity equipment. EMC Corp. this morning became the latest big name to join the bandwagon by unveiling a new virtual incarnation of its Data Domain backup appliance series.

DD VE, as the offering is called, targets the same types of environments as the software-only incarnation of Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s StoreVirtual family does over in the primary storage category. That includes first and foremost branch offices where deploying a conventional Data Domain system is impractical either due to budgetary constraints, or simply because the limited operational requirements of the on-premise personnel don’t justify buying one. EMC’s new virtual appliance can be installed on the existing infrastructure in a remote location and scaled a terabyte at a time as the amount of information that needs to be backed up grows over time.

The initial release of DD VE only allows for 16 terabytes of data to be kept in an instance, but the cap will likely be increased with future iterations of the software as the vendor works to expand its appeal to large enterprises. To that end, EMC has also included the ability to have the records in a remote office deployment synchronized to an organization’s central Data Domain system. The feature is designed to help protect against natural disasters and other major operational risks that have the potential to compromise all the infrastructure at a branch location.

Alternatively, DD VE can be deployed in the public cloud, which makes it possible to achieve the same result with much less on-premise equipment. The option extends the appeal of the software beyond the enterprise crowd to smaller companies that don’t have the cash or will to buy their own dedicated Data Domain appliance. And to top it off, EMC says that the offering requires as little as a few minutes to install, which lowers the entry barrier even further.

From a midsize firm’s perspective, that makes DD VE an even more attractive alternative to traditional backup appliances, while in large enterprises, the quick setup reduces the time it takes to lay the groundwork for a new branch office and thereby speeds expansion. The software is set to become generally available by the end of the month.

Image via Pixabay