Zerto: A Stealth Startup Revolutionizing BC/DR in the Enterprise and Cloud Sector

As a delegate at Tech Field Day #6, I was fortunate enough to get a sneak peek at stealth startup ‘Zerto’, an Israeli and US-based company founded by Ziv and Odem Kedem. Although I am a little slow on the punch, I haven’t seen much coverage of this exciting new player in the BC/DR space, so I thought I’d share my thoughts and impressions of their technology.

Firstly, it’s important to note that my trip to Tech Field Day #6 was paid for by the vendors we visited, but I am under no obligation to write about them or publicize them in any manner. Zerto is doing some very interesting things in the BC/DR space, specifically in the enterprise and cloud sector regarding virtualization. They promise host-based storage agnostic replication and complete vCenter integration, which caught my attention as a long-time user of array-specific replication products like SRDF and Recover Point (the founders of the company actually created the Recover Point Technology and sold it to EMC).

During my discussion with the Zerto team, I learned that they use a vApp per host and a driver loaded directly into the hypervisor, which sets them apart from other enterprise replication products. Instead of using vStorage APIs like most other products, Zerto looks at the data coming through the vSCSI stack to determine incremental changes and replicate only the changed blocks. This approach allows for faster and more efficient replication, as it doesn’t require storing all the data in an array-specific cache.

I was impressed by several features of Zerto’s technology, including application protection policies and built-in support for VSS to attain better application consistency on the other side. This is particularly useful for example with virtualized Exchange environments and running databases. Another feature I liked is RDM replication to VMDK or the other way around, which would be really useful if you were moving datacenters and wanted to change some things around in your storage configuration during the initial replication stage.

Additionally, Zerto allows for the creation of checkpoints/bookmarks on replicated VMs from different points in time, which is similar to RecoverPoint technology. This feature would be useful in case you had a replication of a corrupted VM or data inconsistency that you needed to go back in time to resolve.

The video below provides a quick explanation of Zerto’s product:

As an old-school FC network guy and a big user of array-specific replication products, I am still curious to see the speed and resilience of Zerto’s replication in a massive 100TB+ environment. Would the built-in compression and WAN optimization be enough for such an environment? How would it handle the initial synchronization? Would third-party partnerships and certifications with WAN optimization products like Riverbed Steelhead increase the replication efficiency?

Over time, I’m eager to see how Zerto will mature and evolve to address these questions and improve their product. vNinja.net is the digital home of Christian Mohn and Stine Elise Larsen, and it will be interesting to see what third-party partnerships and certifications they develop to better the usability and maturity of their product.

In conclusion, Zerto is a stealth startup that is doing some very exciting things in the BC/DR space for the enterprise and cloud sector regarding virtualization. Their host-based storage agnostic replication and complete vCenter integration are just a few of the features that set them apart from other products. While I have some questions about their replication efficiency and scalability, I am eager to see how they will address these issues and mature their product over time.