LONDON, ON, Sept. 10, 2007 - The potential for critical business computing sites to be impacted due to natural disasters or terrorism-related events remains high for enterprises in North America, says Info-Tech Research Group. Almost 60 per cent of businesses do not have a Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) in place to resume IT services in case of crisis, a survey conducted by Info-Tech revealed.

"Enterprises are still unequipped to deal with disaster and need to address that gap as a high priority," said Ross Armstrong, senior research analyst at Info-Tech Research Group. "Recovering from a disaster will be extremely difficult for businesses where IT departments have not taken steps to support critical hardware and software."

One of the lessons derived from the tragic September 11th events of 2001 in New York City was the importance of diverse storage sites that can provide remote back-up in the event of disaster. Similarly, more recent natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina have underscored the destructive force of nature that can obliterate business sites and knock out computing systems. This summer, Internet service outages were experienced in two major centers - New York resulting from an explosion and in San Francisco due to power failure - impacting numerous high-profile and high-traffic Web sites. Without alternate storage facilities critical files such as hospital records, insurance policies and financial and trading data can be at risk.

"The top motivation cited by survey respondents in companies which have deployed DRP is maintaining customer service levels, with emphasis on keeping the company's Web site up and not losing customer records," said Armstrong. "Lost connectivity translates quickly to lost revenues."

The Info-Tech survey revealing the DRP shortfall conducted earlier this year included 1136 IT personnel in companies throughout the U.S. and Canada. The survey revealed that 475 companies, or 42 per cent, have already implemented DR plans, and of those just over one-quarter have already had occasion to use them. Planning for DRP has already begun for another 30 per cent of companies surveyed.

"It's a positive indicator that most say planning for Disaster Recovery is on the IT agenda at their enterprise, but it would be better if it was an urgent priority with more companies," said Armstrong. "Even a simple plan is better than no plan at all."

Info-Tech advises all enterprises, large and small, to take the following steps to ensure preparedness for their IT functions:

- Assess computing applications through the lens of Risk and Business Impact to determine priorities for the organization;

- Reconcile the recovery objectives for disaster recovery and what people, processes and technology are needed to ensure an attainable and cost-effective response;

- When outsourcing IT infrastructure, transfer risk not responsibility. Do not assume that outsourcing initiatives ensure a complete recovery plan is achieved;

- Once a DRP is in place, frequently test and audit the system to ensure there are no flaws before an actual event occurs.

About Info-Tech Research Group

With a paid membership of over 21,000 worldwide, Info-Tech Research Group (http://www.infotech.com) is the global leader in providing tactical, practical Information Technology research and analysis. Info-Tech has a ten-year history of delivering quality research and is one of North America's fastest growing full-service IT analyst firms.