Summary
The backup market is competitive and at the same time very sticky, meaning once customers buy a backup solution they will stick with it. This means that the only place for growth is in the SMB space where customers are shopping for price. De-duplication is a great cost savings features so very attractive to the SMB customer.
Analysis
Dell together with CommVault is trying to boost sales of their PowerVault DL2000 backup product by providing free consultancy. This game is all about the SMB backup market. The larger enterprises all have made their choice for a backup (and archiving) solution a long time ago and unless something drastic happens with the supplier they will stick with their choice.
The reason that a backup or archiving product is so sticky is that once you switch you basically loose all of your old backups and archives unless you also spend a ton of money converting them. And even then sometimes the conversion can not be done at all!
So DELL and CommVault together (along with a lot of other players) are targeting the SMB market that is finally starting to see the need for a proper backup and archiving solution. There are two major items when dealing with IT solutions for the SMB space: one they are very price sensitive and two they do not have their own IT department that they can rely on to make a choice this important.
So this is why DELL is providing free consultancy which is focusing on how data de-depulication can save the customer lots of money. I am sure the consultancy will be full of DELL "sponsored ads" but I would urge any SMB IT manager to go and find out where to save money, because once you start archiving and backing-up there is no going back.
