What has all these vendors scrambling for a piece of the action? Analysts say government regulations in a variety of industries are putting new mandates on what data records businesses must keep on file. Specifically, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Rules 17a-3 and 4 require financial firms to retain all records -- including email and instant messages -- in some cases for up to six years. The 1996 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) places similar data-retention requirements on healthcare organizations.
Enterprise Storage Group Inc. says such regulations are opening a new window of opportunity for storage vendors, especially those that come to market this year with SEC-compliant storage offerings. In a new report, the firm predicts the worldwide opportunity for compliance-related storage solutions, software, and services will exceed $6 billion over the next four years [ed. note: give or take a couple billion!].
"SEC-compliant record archiving and retention is now a pain point at the highest management levels in financial services firms," the ESG report says. "This pain is often compounded by a general lack of awareness of the issues that need to be addressed."
Todd Spangler, US Editor, Byte and Switch
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