Several recent surveys by analyst firms document the perception that the amount of data within remote offices and branch offices (ROBOs) is greater than the amount of data within the data center. In an era of growing compliance regulation, and increased internal and external threats to data, managing and protecting ROBO data has become a big problem.

ROBO users require and expect the same level of services and support as users in the primary data center. This means ROBO data accessibility, data protection and application response times must be equivalent to those local to the data center. The requirements are simple. Delivering on those requirements isn't.