A recent IT incident occurred at one of our clients called Multi-Ply Components based in Blackpool, Lancashire
They are World leading specialists in the design and manufacture of Carbon Fibre Components for Medical X-ray imaging and downtime for them is very costly for their business.
A hardware failure issue happened in their manufacturing plant, and could have spelled disaster when a PC critical to the manufacturing process failed.
It started with a PC failure out of the blue
PCs do fail and usually when least expected and this highlights the importance of taking out proactive measures in using a local IT support company who provides backup and disaster recovery solutions across all industries to protect a businesses IT infrastructure and data from various IT disasters such as: hardware failures, cyber attacks or human errors.
The machine hosted intricate settings and configurations for the manufacturing process that are time-consuming to restore, leading to significant production downtime in their Blackpool based plant and potential financial losses.
A rapid IT support response time from our disaster recovery planning solution
Fortunately, the foresight to implement a robust business continuity solution paid off. The team at Impact based in their Preston office had previously planned, recommended and installed a backup recovery system designed to deal with such disruptions. When the failure occurred, we were able to set the plan in action and restore the machine in only 90 minutes – a fraction of the time it would typically take.
Without a backup and disaster solution in place for this manufacturing business located in Lancashire, a manual recovery would normally take between 1-2 days and that could really affect the production output of this business.
The outcome from our IT support
This rapid response not only saved the manufacturer from a prolonged production halt, but also demonstrated the invaluable role of disaster recovery planning for businesses throughout Blackpool, Lancashire and the UK. The ability to bounce back from such setbacks is crucial in today’s fast-paced industrial environment, where every minute of downtime counts.
How can lengthy downtime be prevented or mitigated in your company?
- Have a disaster recovery and business continuity plan. Examine your business processes and highlight areas that may be a single point of failure.
- What will you do if this area fails. Do you have an IT team you can rely on for rapid support?
- Have you documented your systems to make it easier and quicker to recover in the event of a disaster? Remember you may not be available to carry out the recovery and its important to document these processes so somebody else can!
- What about your backups? Are they happening daily? Do they work? Who verifies that the backups can actually be used to recover from in a disaster?
Key components of a disaster recovery solution can include the following:
- Data backup and replication: Involves routinely duplicating essential data and applications, taking backups and storing them off site or cloud-based location for easy accessibility in the event of a hardware IT failure.
- Disaster recovery plan (DRP): Documenting detailed procedures and protocols for responding to different types of disasters, including steps for data restoration, system recovery, and communication with stakeholders.
- Failover and failback mechanisms: Implementing automated failover mechanisms to switch operations to redundant systems or backup sites during a disaster, and failback procedures to restore operations to the primary environment once it is restored.
- Testing and validation: Regularly testing the disaster recovery plan and procedures to ensure they are effective and up-to-date, and validating the ability to recover IT systems and data.
Are you looking for disaster Recovery planning?
Impact provides disaster recovery and backup solutions for businesses across Lancashire covering the areas of Preston, Blackpool, Burnley and Blackburn.
Schedule a call today with Will or Chloe in our support team to discuss your business IT requirements by completing our contact enquiry form.