The Cyber Protection Revolution: More Than A Name Change

In the wake of the Acronis Global Cyber Summit 2019, there’s been a lot of excitement, as well as some changes at Acronis that have prompted questions from customers, resellers, and our managed service provider (MSP) partners. Most notably, they want to know “Why has Acronis changed the names of your products?”

It’s true. During the past month, we’ve been updating the names of nearly all of our solutions to include the word “cyber” – and the addition has caught many people by surprise.

So what’s the reasoning behind the change?

The short answer can be seen in a statement our founder and CEO Serg “SB” Bell has made on multiple occasions: traditional backup is dead. Today’s digital world needs modern cyber protection.

Renaming our products makes it clear that customers are getting – and partners are delivering – modern solutions that are specifically designed for this new reality.

There are many reasons why organizations face new challenges when protecting their data, applications, and systems.

• The amount of data being generated is tremendous, doubling every year. Storing and safeguarding all of that data isn’t just a logistical issue, but a budgetary issue as well.
• The complexity of environments is increasing as computing shifts closer to where data originates. Soon, we estimate only 1% of devices will be located in the data center – and all of those endpoints must be protected.
• The way cybercriminals develop and propagate malware has become industrialized – using artificial intelligence to make their zero-day attacks more effective.

As SB explained to TechTarget a few months ago, against this backdrop, the needs for protecting data have grown beyond the capabilities of traditional backup and anti-malware solutions.

“There is no ‘just backup’ anymore. Data protection is about safety, accessibility, privacy, authenticity, and security,” SB explained. “Backup is just the safety portion – ensuring nothing is lost ... [but] all of these things need to be done to get full protection.”

That’s why Acronis has focused on a more holistic approach – designing all of its solutions to address all Five Vectors of Cyber Protection (also known by the acronym SAPAS).

This more complete approach of cyber protection is in the DNA of all Acronis solutions, which is why a recent IDC whitepaper determined our unique approach separates us from traditional data protection and recovery software vendors.

The new product names are a way to reinforce this difference with customers. The names also help our reseller and managed service provider (MSP) partners explain the need for cyber protection - a strong marketing message and sales tool – while differentiating Acronis. 

The current names that have been changed include:

• Acronis Cyber Backup (was Acronis Backup)
• Acronis Cyber Disaster Recovery (was Acronis Disaster Recovery Add-on)
• Acronis Cyber Files (was: Acronis Files Advanced)
• Acronis Cyber Infrastructure (was Acronis Software-Defined Infrastructure)
• Acronis Cyber Infrastructure Appliance (was Acronis SDI Appliance)

Similarly, the different solutions available through the Acronis Cyber Cloud platform have been renamed as well. These include:

• Acronis Cyber Backup Cloud (was Acronis Backup Cloud)
• Acronis Cyber Disaster Recovery Cloud (Acronis Disaster Recovery Cloud)
• Acronis Cyber Files Cloud (Acronis Files Cloud)
• Acronis Cyber Notary Cloud (Acronis Notary Cloud)
• Acronis Cyber Cloud Storage (Acronis Cloud Storage)

This new approach is not only creating new names for our products, but also the development of new, comprehensive solutions like Acronis Cyber Protect.

Announced at the Acronis Global Cyber Summit, Acronis Cyber Protect (which is currently in a closed beta), will unify an organization’s cyber protection efforts with backup, disaster recovery, AI-based malware protection, remote assistance, and security in a single, reliable tool.

At the same time, a software as a service (SaaS) version called Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud is also in development, which will allow MSPs to offer their customers the same integrated protection through the Acronis Cyber Cloud platform.

Both Acronis Cyber Protect and Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud are scheduled to launch in Q1 2020.