CTERA, the Israeli cloud storage and data protection company, has launched CTERA Portal, a platform to allow MSPs to resell cloud storage solutions to customers. Moreover, Portal storage can go hybrid with CTERA’s existing Cloud Attached Storage appliances to provide disaster recovery and backup. Here are some perspectives.

Portal comes in two flavors: SaaS and Datacenter, according to the press release. The former means that CTERA manages the platform’s infrastructure, while the latter is installed at the service provider’s existing data facilities. Both allow for the remote provisioning and management of the storage cloud, and both are rebrandable.

The really interesting bit is that the CTERA Portal allows MSPs to choose how their data is handled on the backend, meaning that you can choose to have your data hosted with Amazon S3 or Rackspace Cloud Files — or a SAN or locally-attached storage, if you so choose.

The announcement also comes with word that CTERA has released a major new firmware update to its CloudPlug and C200 storage appliances, adding features like secure remote access, local snapshots, laptop backup, and more esoteric features like Apple Time Machine support.

Savvy MSPs are getting on the cloud storage boat, and hybrid solutions seem to be increasingly popular.

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