How to Save 4 Hours Per Week Managing Office 365 (Case Study)
By Michael S.
The Challenge
Data retention and protection are mission-critical for Tideway. As a project-based company, they are mandated to hand over their data to Thames Water by 2027.
As a result, Tideway knew they needed a third-party solution to extend the standard 90-day backup of deleted data currently offered natively by Office 365. Additionally, they sought a backup solution that was easy to use and had self-service capabilities.
Data also had to be backed up and protected as employees and partners entered and left the project. The makeup of the team has evolved as the project has matured with an array of third-party contractors.
The AvePoint Solution
Tideway chose AvePoint as its third-party backup solution because of Cloud Backup’s unlimited backup policy, and its ease of use.
“We tested out a couple of other backup solution vendors, but we found AvePoint to provide better features than the others,” stated Sanjai Thakur, Sharepoint/Office 365 architect at Tideway.
The organization is currently backing up about 3 TB of data in the cloud mainly across SharePoint Online and Dynamics 365. Currently, Tideway has an unlimited retention policy and are utilizing AvePoint’s Azure storage.
“The main driver for us choosing Azure storage was the ease of having all of our data in one place,” explained Thakur.
“In the past, if there was a deleted file that we needed to recover past 90 days, we were unable to recover it,” said Thakur. “Since using AvePoint’s Cloud Backup we now have peace of mind that our data will be able to be recovered whenever we need it.”
Tideway is also leveraging Cloud Backup for their Dynamics 365 CRM data with automated backups, and granular, item-level restore.
Not only are they protecting their entities, contacts, and fields, but they are also able to maintain the metadata, permissions, and properties.
The Bottom Line
Overall, Tideway is extremely pleased with the solution.
“On a weekly basis, Cloud Backup saves us three to four hours. We now are able to spend the time we would otherwise be taking to search and restore lost files to address more critical issues.”
The organization has also been pleased with the product support they have received.
“The AvePoint Support Team is amazing, even if you have multiple products, you are able to file a support ticket for the individual product and specify how you are contacted, by email, phone, etc,” said Thakur. “It makes it extremely easy.”
In the past two months, Thakur was able to successfully recovered four requests for data.
“It was so smooth, even the user was surprised!” said Thakur. “Normally the users submits a request for recovery and they have to wait for weeks or months. With Cloud Backup we can recover their file very quickly.”
In the near future, Tideway plans on scaling their Office 365 usage and backup by adopting Microsoft Teams, Groups, and Planner.
About Tideway
Tideway is the company delivering the Thames Tideway Tunnel and is owned by a consortium of investors.
More than 400 highly experienced professionals are employed by Tideway to deliver the project, working alongside the company’s four main delivery partners.
Preparatory work on the project began in 2015 and construction is now underway at 24 sites in London. The project is anticipated to be completed in 2024. Tideway is cloud first, with only a few custom applications still on-premise.
Read the full case study here.
By Michael S.
Michael is AvePoint's former director of content and communications.
View all posts by Michael S.
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