MobilityWare’s Transformation to Data Resilience with AWS and the Druva Data Security Cloud

Founded in 1990, MobilityWare is a mobile games company. Its flagship game, Solitaire, was released on the day the App Store opened in 2008. Other titles include Bubble Shooter Pop, Blackjack, FreeCell, and Spider Solitaire. In 2015, the company expanded its product line onto emerging platforms such as Apple Watch and Apple TV. The company is headquartered in Irvine, California.

Lance Kim, Senior Director of Technical Operations at MobilityWare, described their previous system as a "hodgepodge" of on-premises and cloud solutions, including VM, Windows, and Microsoft SQL backups, Azure, AWS, NAS servers, and tape drives. This fragmented setup created unnecessary overhead and inefficiency. "Before Druva, it was a lot of overhead to manage backup systems that we only maybe had to go to once in a great while," said Kim.

Data recovery was another pain point. The process of retrieving data was cumbersome and time-intensive. "What we were using, it would take time to find the right tape to load so that we could try to get the data back," Kim explained.

Additionally, the company lacked adequate SaaS backup coverage for critical applications. "We didn't really have backups for stuff on our Google Drive, OneDrive, or Outlook emails," Kim admitted. This gap in coverage posed a serious risk to their data integrity.

Druva revolutionized the backup system at MobilityWare by consolidating a fragmented, multi-vendor setup, previously described as a "hodgepodge" by Kim. The consolidation with Druva simplified management and eliminated the need to juggle various tools and media like tapes and NAS, significantly improving operational efficiency. 

Druva also offered comprehensive SaaS backup for cloud services such as Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, addressing a crucial gap in their previous setup and ensuring protection of critical data on these platforms. Not to mention, Druva’s architecture on AWS complimented MobilityWare's public cloud choice with nearly 92% of their infrastructure in AWS.

Additionally, Druva enhanced data recovery by improving speed and ease, with a self-service recovery portal that allows end-users to retrieve their own data. This reduced the burden on IT support and resolved issues faster. The consolidated solution and efficient data management led to substantial cost savings, indicated by a reduction in support tickets and management time.

Druva transformed MobilityWare’s backup infrastructure by replacing a complex mix of on-premises and cloud-based solutions with a single, unified platform. This streamlined approach simplified management and significantly reduced operational overhead.

With Druva's comprehensive SaaS backup, previously unprotected cloud services like Microsoft 365 and Google Drive were fully secured, ensuring complete data protection across the organization.

The platform also enhanced efficiency by enabling end-users to perform self-service data recovery, cutting support tickets by 25 per month and saving 10 hours of IT management time each week. This shift allowed IT staff to focus on strategic initiatives rather than routine backup tasks, further driving productivity.

Consolidating tools and improving processes resulted in substantial cost savings, while accelerating MobilityWare’s return on investment (ROI). They achieved their projected ROI in just three months, far ahead of the anticipated six-month timeline.

Kim highlighted the transformative impact of the solution: "With Druva, we’re able to empower our end-users to fully restore or recall their data, significantly reducing the volume of support tickets.”

He elaborated on the tangible benefits, noting both time and cost savings: "On average, we saw about a 25-ticket reduction in our queue per week or month... and in terms of management overhead, we save roughly 10 hours per week since implementing Druva." This newfound efficiency enabled his lean team to shift their focus toward strategic initiatives, helping them achieve their ROI faster than anticipated.

In summary, Druva proved to be a "diamond in the rough," delivering a combination of reliability and cost-effectiveness that exceeded expectations.