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Leading Greek bank protects Microsoft 365 data for 12,000 users and reduces TCO for data protection by 30%

about About Piraeus Bank

Piraeus Bank was founded in 1916 and is the leading bank in Greece in terms of market shares in loans and branch network. Its network in Greece comprises 387 units and it employs approx. 8,200 people. The bank has received international recognition and several awards, including Best Customer Service, Most Innovative Private Banking and Best Mobile Banking App.

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Piraeus Bank's previous backup solution offered no on-premises backup for the Microsoft 365 data underpinning mission-critical banking processes for 12,000 users.

 

With Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365 on HPE Apollo nodes running Scality ARTESCA, the bank backs up 577 TB of M365 data on-premises and reduced its total cost of ownership for data protection by 30%.

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flag The Challenge

Mission-critical Microsoft 365 data with no on-prem backup
Piraeus Bank's previous backup solution offered no on-premises backup for the Microsoft 365 data underpinning mission-critical banking processes for 12,000 users.

To support customers' banking experience while increasing productivity and collaboration, the bank implemented Microsoft 365 as many financial institutions do. But its backup solution presented a challenge.

Because the bank's Microsoft 365 data supports areas of the business that affect customer experience, protecting that data is mission-critical. Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft Teams underpin banking processes such as loan applications, while Microsoft Exchange facilitates email for employees and notifications for customers. Each time customers make changes to their accounts (deposits, withdrawals, PIN modifications, etc.), they receive automated email notifications. If data in Microsoft 365 is lost or corrupted, the bank's mission — delivering the ultimate banking experience — is at risk.

The solution didn't offer on-prem backup for Microsoft 365 data, so it was time to make a change.

Lazaros Kalafatas

Servers Engineering Manager, Piraeus Bank

Data protection isn’t just important; it’s essential. If someone hit us with ransomware and encrypted our systems, then we’d have a big problem. We’d risk production, compliance, and customer trust.

Lazaros Kalafatas

Servers Engineering Manager, Piraeus Bank

tick Solution

A Veeam-ready, co-designed HPE + Scality ARTESCA repository

When its previous backup solution failed to provide on-premises backup, the bank sought out a modern data protection solution with the guidance of trusted IT partner Infinitum. Their experts were quick to recommend Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365.
Scality ARTESCA software-defined object storage
Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365
HPE Apollo nodes
577 TB of Microsoft 365 data

They explained why Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365 would be perfect for us: Veeam is scalable, so it can easily accommodate our 12,000 users, and Veeam is flexible, so we were able to maintain control of data in a hybrid configuration as we moved from Exchange on-premises to Exchange Online.

Lazaros Kalafatas

Servers Engineering Manager, Piraeus Bank

Veeam is flexible in other ways, too. Thanks to no vendor lock-in, organizations can choose any infrastructure and backup repository that meets their business requirements — HPE Apollo Systems with Scality ARTESCA software-defined object storage fit the bill.

The Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) Apollo Nodes with Scality ARTESCA software are being used at Piraeus Bank as the on-premise S3 Object backup repository (backup target) for Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365. As per the RFP requirements, HPE offered a Veeam-certified (Veeam-ready Object repository), co-designed with Scality (one-stop-shop), workload-optimized solution for on-premises S3 Object storage. The HPE Apollo Nodes with Scality ARTESCA is a reference design, an appliance-like experience solution consisting of all the hardware and software components that satisfy the availability, reliability, expandability, durability, operational efficiency, manageability, functionality and performance requirements of Piraeus Bank.

list The Results

577 TB protected on-prem, with 30% lower TCO

The offered capacity allows Veeam software to back up 577 TB of data in Microsoft 365 to HPE Apollo Nodes with Scality ARTESCA. Also of note: the affordability of the new solution, which has enabled the bank to reduce its total cost of ownership for data protection by 30%.

Taking control of data is very important. In just a few clicks, we can access everything in Microsoft 365.

Lazaros Kalafatas

Servers Engineering Manager, Piraeus Bank

One of the bank's security requirements is on-prem backups. Another requirement is being able to recover 25 years' worth of data for legal purposes. Compliance is easy now. By backing up Microsoft 365 on premises, we reclaimed access and control of data supporting the banking experience for our customers.

Lazaros Kalafatas

Servers Engineering Manager, Piraeus Bank

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