Kozminski University is known worldwide as a leading destination for business study and research. To maintain its first-rate reputation, the organization invests continually in optimizing the learning experience for students, faculty and researchers. Kozminski University recognized that rapid, reliable access to data plays a key role in users’ productivity.
“We store all the university’s data in a secure Microsoft Azure public cloud environment,” said Dariusz Wronikowski, IT Director at Kozminski University. “From student work to research findings, the importance of this data cannot be overstated. Tutors, students and research teams rely on our IT services to collaborate more than ever.”
As reliance on technology increased at Kozminski University, the organization’s IT team faced new challenges. Most users connected to the university with their own devices, introducing potential security vulnerabilities. When the global pandemic hit, a sudden rise in remote working put additional pressure on the organization’s IT services. The IT team decided that deploying a more powerful data protection solution could help mitigate some of these risks.
“Before, we used the Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager tool built into Microsoft Azure to run and manage backups, but it was failing to meet our needs,” said Wronikowski. “Often, we encountered errors when creating or verifying backups. We weren’t confident that we could use the previous solution to copy or restore data adequately in the event of a disaster, so we kicked off a search for an alternative.”
Kozminski University engaged long-term partner Senetic to perform a rigorous audit of data protection solutions in the market. After detailed tests, the university decided to deploy Veeam Backup & Replication.
“Our selection criteria included stability, performance and scalability,” said Wronikowski. “Security was also crucial. Veeam Backup & Replication emerged as the most competitive option.” Senetic deployed the Veeam solution in less than four weeks, before conducting training sessions for the organization’s IT team. Kozminski University now backs up its entire IT environment daily, storing backups in the Microsoft Azure cloud.
“Implementation of Veeam Backup & Replication was very smooth,” said Wronikowski. “During the entire process, there was just one small issue with one of our servers, which was resolved quickly and efficiently. Senetic demonstrated just how easy it is to manage backups and replicate data using Veeam. The Senetic team went above and beyond to make sure everything worked perfectly.” Kozminski University had the opportunity to see the Veeam solution in action when an incident brought down its IT services. With help from Senetic, the organization was able to recover quickly and easily.
“As soon as we discovered an outage, we alerted Senetic,” recalled Wronikowski. “They were able to restore all necessary data from a Veeam backup unbelievably fast — I was pleasantly surprised by the experience. Keeping the university’s data available at all times is a huge responsibility, but with Veeam and Senetic in place I have complete peace of mind that we can rise to the challenge.”
Established in 1993 in Warsaw, Kozminski University is one of the oldest private universities in Poland. It is an international center of knowledge and an educational and scientific institution where research in the areas of management, finance, economics and law are carried out. According to a ranking by the Financial Times, it has been recognized as the leader in business education in Central and Eastern Europe for many years.
Nearly 10,000 users rely on access to data stored in Kozminski University’s cloud environment to progress their studies and research. To protect its global reputation for excellence, the organization is always looking for ways to provide better experiences for students, faculty and researchers. Kozminski University identified an opportunity to achieve this goal by deploying a more robust data protection solution, which would reduce the risk of data loss and delays to retrieving data.