Rabobank Chooses Veeam Availability Suite

Veeam Software, Inc. announced that Rabobank, a trade name of Coöperatieve Rabobank U.A. and a Dutch multinational banking and financial services company based in Utrecht, Netherlands, chose Veeam Availability Suite as its European data protection.

It delivers enterprise scalability to protect a vast virtual estate, ensures BC by backing up and recovering critical banking systems up to 4x faster and saves 50% in licensing costs annually.

Veeam has also helped Rabobank increase data security by creating immutable backups that protect vs. ransomware.

“Our customers expect 100% data integrity, and Veeam underpins our ability to provide it,” said Colin Chatelier, manager of storage and compute, Europe, Rabobank.

The organization is a cooperative banking organization, rooted in agriculture and dating back more than 115 years. What began in the 1890s as a collection of small rural banks serving local farmers has grown into a global financial services leader and one of the world’s largest banks. Like most Fortune 500 companies, it requires enterprise scalability to protect data, especially as ransomware permeates the financial services industry.

After merging 2 separate IT infrastructures (each with its own backup solution) to improve banking services for customers, the IT team faced a big decision: Which of the 2 solutions provided the enterprise scalability required to protect 3PB across 12,500 VMs? Would it be able to backup and recover banking systems fast enough to ensure BC? Would it be flexible enough to protect a complex mix of workloads including SQL Server? And, did it possess the product maturity to become the company’s global standard for data protection?

“Veeam was the clear winner,” Chatelier said. “We have high expectations regarding BC, so we have to be able to recover safely and quickly in any situation. Veeam is a mature product that offers functionality we’ve never had before, including everything we do in Veeam DataLabs.“

Veeam DataLabs provide Rabobank with functionality such as SureBackup to verify the recoverability of backups, Staged Restore to automate backup testing prior to recovery, Secure Restore to make sure backups are free and clear of malware and Instant VM Recovery to recover data in minutes.

“The confidence Veeam instills sets it apart from other vendors,” said Harry Grevinga, EVP of ICT infra services, Europe, Rabobank. “Protecting SQL Server is critical for us because it supports most banking systems, including the mobile app used by our retail customers and risk assessment systems used by our international wholesale customers. Veeam simplifies protection for SQL AlwaysOn Availability Groups, putting our minds at ease.“

One of the fastest ways to restore data in AlwaysOn availability groups is with Veeam Explorer for SQL Server. It provides an easy-to-use wizard-driven interface for restoring databases directly from a backup, so there’s no need to search for them.

“Something else sets Veeam apart,” Chatelier said. “It’s fairly rare to find a vendor that goes the extra mile, but Veeam does. When we needed advice during deployment, they were there. When we wanted to increase data security to protect vs. ransomware, they were there. At every bump in the road, Veeam technicians and the management team have worked with us to understand the customer perspective and feed that into ultimately a better customer experience. Veeam isn’t a vendor – Veeam is our strategic partner.“

Ransomware is on the rise in banking. The Cost of Cybercrime Study conducted in 2019 by Accenture and Ponemon Institute reported the average cost of cyber-crime in the banking industry was $18.4 million, 40% higher than the average cost across all industries surveyed ($13 million).

Veeam has helped Rabobank increase data security by creating a third copy of backups that can’t be updated or deleted, protecting the bank and its customers from malicious attacks. It uses object lock technology provided by S3-compatible providers to prohibit data changes in backups (until the immutability expiration date).

Chatelier said cost was another significant factor in choosing Veeam: “Cost and ROI will always be a factor in any solution. In this respect we found Veeam was more affordable compared to our legacy solution. When comparing costs to backup a physical server, we calculated the legacy solution’s capacity-based license and compared it to Veeam’s very simple server-based license. Veeam delivers a savings of approximately 50% annually.“

“We’re pleased to strengthen our relationship with Rabobank as its strategic data management partner, ensuring it maintains BC by protecting and securing its critical data while providing speedy recovery capabilities. We’re supporting Rabobank along the next step of its digital transformation journey, overseeing its backup modernisation, enhancing its data security and compliance measures, while enabling enterprise scalability,” said Dan Middleton, regional VP, UK and Ireland, Veeam. “With these upgrades in place, the bank will find itself a step ahead of the competition, utilising the most simple, flexible and reliable data protection technologies to transform how it does business and serves customers – both now and in the future.“