A small Las Vegas-based vendor today introduced to the channel a new business continuity appliance that it believes can make disaster recovery planning more accessible to SMBs and open up opportunities to VARs and MSPs in the process.

XiloCore will roll out the X700 Business Recovery System exclusively through the channel. Designed to be deployed in either a 2U rack-mount or tower chassis, the X700 is a virtualized continuity appliance that runs on Asigra’s cloud-based backup platform and Compellent Technologies’ virtualized storage technology.

A December 2008 survey conducted by Rubicon Consulting on behalf of Symantec found that even though awareness for business continuity and disaster planning is growing within SMBs, their backup and recovery practices still lag. Though 92 percent of the 318 SMBs surveyed said they have at least some kind of backup process, only about 25 percent of them said they would be able to recover lost data all the time. And approximately a quarter reported severe disruptions in company operations due to lost data.

With X700, XiloCore says it will give partners the opportunity to promise near-time recovery times of between 1 and 48 hours. The product offers the flexibility of private storage cloud infrastructure or on-premises storage, plus automatic synchronization with XiloCore data centers through the company’s redundant vaulting system. Data is protected with 256-bit encryption, and the X700 integrates with MSP and PSA platforms.

Resellers can co-brand the product in order to bundle in additional products and services.

"XiloCore's X700 is truly business continuity in a box," Alan McDonald, president and COO of XiloCore, said in a statement. "But what makes it even more compelling is the margin-rich, recurring revenue model around managed data storage and business recovery services that our partners can wrap around the technology."