This article originally appeared in the Dec. 2012 issue of INTERNET TELEPHONY.

Many SMBs and small enterprises are still under the impression that a full BC/DR plan is out of reach. However, today’s cloud technologies provide even small organizations access to affordable protection.

It’s not too late to put together a 2013 BC/DR plan, but you need to get started now.

The list of hosted service options seems to be growing exponentially and most provide a unique blend of features perfectly suited for the BC/DR market. First, for small organizations, hosted or managed services are simple to deploy and maintain. Second, they can provide significant cost savings compared with the traditional arrangement of customer premises equipment combined with a separate DR site.

Data storage, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS (News - Alert)) and VoIP were some of the earliest hosted cloud solutions and continue to be widely popular. Current hot items include IT-as-a-Service (ITaaS), suites like Microsoft Office 365 plus some hybrid newcomers like hybrid ITaaS and hybrid fax services. Hybrids combine CPE with cloud architectures and are particularly attractive for industries like healthcare that prefer to maintain on-premises customer records.

Two hybrids offer unique opportunities suited to these types of industries. Entreda’s (News - Alert) ITaaS and etherFAX’s fax hybrid both offer CPE deployments combined with a secure cloud service.  

Both service offerings tout their high levels of security and both utilize advanced encryption as part of their solutions. For etherFAX, which never actually stores faxes off site at their facilities, encryption provides a secure pipe to the customer to safeguard the TIFF formatted documents and transactional data. Entreda’s ITaaS Suite manages every device on the customer network so encryption is used to ensure that information and data access are fully secure.  

Hybrids are relative new to the cloud picture, but being one of the first a couple of years back, etherFAX can definitely be classified as an established service. Entreda is in the launch stage but has already been recognized by TMC (News - Alert) as “Best Onsite Launch” at ITEXPO West in Austin, Texas, so it is on the right track.

Speaking of ITEXPO, don’t waste time. Get online now and register for ITEXPO (News - Alert) East, Jan. 31-Feb. 3, 2013, in Miami, so you can see and learn about technologies like the above firsthand.

Max Schroeder is the senior vice president of FaxCore, Inc. Rich Tehrani (News - Alert) is the president and group editor-in-chief at TMC, and conference chairman of ITEXPO.