Backup Anytime

Backupanytime Interview with Rob Cosgrove of Remote Backup Systems

Backupanytime exclusive: 14 Questions answered by Rob Cosgrove.

Thanks to Rob Cosgrove of Remote Backup Systems for taking time out from his busy schedule to participate in this interview. His story is fascinating. If you have an interest in any of  the following you will love this. Cars, record breaking, world firsts, online backup, I.T. pioneers, flying, life, enthusiasm and predictions for the future.

People in the online backup industry will not need to be told who Rob Cosgrave is. For those of you not in the industry, Rob is the man credited with effectively founding the industry. Most non industry sources would likely consider online backup a very recent type of commercially viable technology advance. It’s global proliferation may be recent but Rob Cosgrove provided online backup in 1985 and not as a pilot scheme or University experiment but as a mature and successful business to business service. His company is Remote Backup Systems. Now lets hear the story from the man himself.

1. Name
Rob Cosgrove

2. Company.
Remote Backup Systems, Inc.

3. Position.
Founder, CEO

4. Marital status, family members.
Married, two children. We live in Memphis, TN USA – the home of Elvis Presley and the world’s greatest barbeque pork ribs.

5. Pastimes / Hobbies
Recreational Flying since high school, licensed pilot. Sailing, fishing, collecting and showing classic British cars, raising Tennessee Walking Horses, and working. I love my job.

6. What type of car do you drive?
That’s a trick question, right? I own a fully restored 1981 Delorean DMC-12 made in Ireland, of course, among a few other British cars. What other CEO have you interviewed who can claim the same thing? I will be famous in your blog. My daily driver is a Jaguar Vanden Plas.

7. How long are you in the online backup business?
I founded the online backup business in 1985 and wrote the first commercial RBS software. Back then we used 300- and 1200-baud telephone modems – the kind that had a cradle for the telephone receiver. Clients dialed directly into modem banks attached to the Servers. Backups were slow, but there wasn’t as much data to back up. Our software has evolved over the past 21 years. I now have more than 8,500 Online Backup Service Providers in 64 countries using our software to back up an estimated 1.7 million computers.

8. What are the distinguishing features of your company over the competition?
What competition? RBS is in a very small group of companies who provide software that allows others to start remote backup services. We don’t provide the service to end users – only to Service Providers. So, our competitors are (names redacted) fewer than five companies, unless you count Service Providers who offer affiliate programs, or some kind of reseller partner program.
RBS has been in business since 1985. Our most distinguishing feature is our wealth of knowledge about how commercial online backup services really operate in the real world, and our integration of that knowledge into our products and services.
Our oldest competitor has only been around since 1994. (OK, one of them claims to be older, but we read back through their old press releases and cached web pages and found that they seem confused about it, too.) The others are far younger than that. We take pride in the fact that we have long ago seen and written software for real-world problems that our competitors are still too young to have even seen yet.

9. What are the achievements of which you are most proud?
In our 21 years in business RBS has had a lot of “firsts.” We did the first remote backup and restore, period. We did the first remote backup over a wireless connection. We did the first remote backup over a satellite link. Then we went on the road and did the first remote backup from a sailboat, an airplane, and a car. We did the longest remote backup (60,000 miles) using two satellite ground stations and two different satellites, bouncing twice. We did the first moon-bounce backup and restore, beaming a packet to the moon using an amateur radio, bouncing it back to Earth, and correctly decrypting it (48,000 miles). We’ve done online backups from 3 active volcanoes, and from both the North and South poles – All of this using our standard commercial products. BUT, the achievement I’m most proud of happens almost every day around here, and I know this sounds cheeky, but it’s true.
It’s when a Service Provider calls or writes, thanking us for our work - When Zack phones to buy more client licenses because he has run out of the 11,000 he bought a few months ago; when John orders an additional Server because the one he started with is overloaded with customers; when Mitch reports his 3,000th sign-up. It’s fun to play around with “firsts,” however, what really gets us going around here is a hearty “Thank You” and a “Job Well Done.” That’s why I come to work every day.

10. Where do you see the industry going?
Back in October of 2007 I was asked the same question. I went out on a limb and predicted that the Mozy acquisition by EMC would start a land-grab as companies bought up Online Backup providers.
(http://remote-backup.com/kb/mozy-acquisition-by-emc-signals-changes-in-remote-backup-industry/). As you know, that prediction came true.
Within a few months of Mozy/EMC, Carbonite and other providers began announcing major venture capitalization. Millions flowed into the industry. Press releases flowed like rain.
Recently IBM announced it is going to invest US$300M to expand its backup sites. EVault announced a 50% growth rate over six months, due in part to its Online Backup business. HP has just reported a 16% growth rate in storage revenue.
HP Upline came online with great fanfare. Symantec is going strong. It seems all the properly managed online backup companies are doing very well.
Our own Service Providers are reporting their businesses growing stronger than ever, and we see this as they order more licenses. My prediction for the industry? More consolidation and land-grabbing for the next twelve to sixteen months as the public continues their dramatic uptake of the technology and venture capital continues to pour into the industry, albeit dampened by the current economic downturn. When the economy rights itself, as it surely will, the activity of the past year will continue with fervor.
By 2011, online backup will become the default method of doing backups for 90% of computer users.
I could go on and on forever answering this question.

11. What advice would you give to business people who have data backup concerns?
If you can, have a professional come in and audit your backup procedure and write you a disaster recovery plan. Make sure you’re doing backups according to Best Practices. Make sure you are in compliance with all laws and regulations regarding your backup procedure and the protection of private information. Make sure you are backing up the right files. Re-audit every six months – every three if you can. Test your restore process every three to six months. Get your encrypted backups offsite on a regular basis. Make sure you can restore to a computer that did not do the original backup.
DO NOT hire a backup service based on price alone. Business cannot afford the risks of a $5/month backup service. Automate your backup procedure. Most online backup services for businesses offer an adequate level of automation. Have a written Disaster Recovery plan. Make sure staff members all know exactly what to do in a disaster. Keep contact info for all staff up to date, and away from your office. Once a year, test your disaster plan. There are many adequate online backup solutions. DO NOT try to re-invent one for yourself. I see far too many disasters caused by people who tried to save money using free services, or free software. Your business is not worth that risk. Spend adequately on backup.

12. What advice would you give to I.T. companies considering offering online backup to their clients?
You mean, besides buying all their solutions from Remote Backup Systems?
Here’s my best advice. I’ve been telling people this for more than 20 years. Unfortunately, some don’t listen. Here’s the catch: The software is cool. It’s high-tech, and it’s really fun for a geek like me to watch. I sometimes sit up at night just watching the files fly back and forth in our Virtual Hosting environment as customers do their backups. I had my developers write me a graphically amazing status screen that looks like something from Star Wars.
BUT, the software isn’t what’s going to make you rich. SALES will make you rich, and nothing else. Yes, buy my software. But don’t spend your last shilling on it. To be successful you will need money for marketing and advertising, adequate hardware, insurance, staff. I can’t begin to tell you the many starry-eyed nerds I’ve had to kick back into reality, who knew nothing about sales, who have phoned me over the years just darned sure that the software would sell itself. Yep, just install it and watch the money flow in.
Do market research. Talk to others in the business. Read blogs and news. Develop a responsible business plan, marketing plan, and technical plan. See if you can get a salesman-to-geek ratio of about 3 to 1. Call RBS. We know all this stuff. Online Backup is selling fast. It’s a good time to get into the business with a clear head, a good plan, and adequate capitalization. And yes, buy all your solutions from Remote Backup Systems.

13. From where do you get your inspiration?
I read a lot of industry publications and history. I’m inspired by people who are smarter than me, who do great things. Josh Coats (Mozy) did some amazing things. I like to watch David Friend (Carbonite). He has a great way of communicating in a down-home way while growing his company – answering blog posts personally. That picture helps. He looks so likable.
I try to hear wisdom everywhere, even from people I find it difficult to like; even from idiots. I’m sure there’s some kind of Unified Theory for business, linking the absolute right way to conduct business with natural forces, society, the economy and everything else, although I haven’t found it yet.
I try to learn lessons when bad things happen. I’m convinced that when things go wrong, it means my business is not in tune with our goals, or with our customers, or the market. So, I make some adjustments.

14. Where do you see yourself in five years time?
In five years I will be 58 years old. I will have been in the Online Backup business for 26 years. My Delorean will be 32 and still shiny. The Pomeranian who comes to work with me every day will be 12 and not very shiny.

And me? I’ll still be here, in the business, although maybe not every day. As I said earlier, I love this stuff!

Ed. Thanks again Rob. Much appreciated.

Visitors, want to see more who’s who in data? Then watch next weeks who’s who in data.