When I ask IT leaders whether they could recover from ransomware, the answer is almost always “yes, we have backups.” Then I ask a second question: when did you last restore a full application, in a clean environment, and time how long it took? That’s usually where the conversation gets honest.
That gap between having backups and being able to recover is worth looking at right now, for two reasons. Attackers go after backup systems on purpose, and the VMware hosting market underneath a lot of mid-size infrastructure is being reshuffled. 11:11 Systems, one of the cloud, backup and disaster recovery (DR) providers we work with, has been in the middle of both.
What Has Changed This Year
- The VMware provider market is consolidating. Broadcom has cut down the number of authorized VMware Cloud Service Providers. On October 8, 2026, 11:11 announced it had acquired select IBM VMware Cloud Service Provider enterprise customers, its eighth VMware-related transaction. In February it acquired Digital Sense in Australia for similar reasons. (Sources: 11:11 Systems, Oct 8, 2026; 11:11 Systems, Feb 22, 2026.)
- Networking and security are being bundled with cloud and recovery. In July, 11:11 launched a managed SASE service built on Cato Networks, combining SD-WAN, zero trust access, firewall as a service and 24×7 monitoring. (Source: 11:11 Systems, Jul 21, 2026.)
- Recovery is being designed for cyber attacks, not just hardware failures. 11:11’s Cyber Recovery Platform uses immutable backups that can’t be encrypted or deleted by attackers, plus recovery testing in an isolated clean room before workloads go back into production. (Source: 11:11 Cyber Recovery Platform.)
If your VMware workloads are hosted by a provider, the first practical question is simple: is your provider still authorized, and what happens to your contract and your DR plan if it isn’t? I wrote more about the licensing side in what the Broadcom changes mean for your VMware renewal.
Backup and Recovery Are Different Decisions
Backup answers “do we still have a copy of the data?” Recovery answers “how fast can we run the business again, and can we trust what we brought back?” A plan built for a failed server often falls apart in a ransomware event, because the backups themselves may be compromised and you can’t restore into the same infected network.
Before you renew a backup tool or sign a DR contract, I’d want clear answers to these:
- Can an attacker with admin credentials delete or encrypt your backups? If the answer isn’t a confident no, immutability and an offline or air-gapped copy should be on the table.
- Where would you recover to? A clean, isolated environment matters more after an attack than raw speed. Ask whether the provider can verify workloads are clean before failover.
- What are your real recovery targets per application? Your ERP, phone system and file shares probably don’t need the same recovery point. Tiering avoids paying premium rates to protect everything the same way.
- When did you last test, end to end? A DR plan that hasn’t been tested in the last year is a document, not a capability. Look for a provider that makes testing routine rather than a once-a-year project.
- Who runs the recovery at 2 a.m.? Self-service tools work if your team has the time and skills. If you have a small IT team, a managed recovery option with runbooks built in advance may be the better fit.
Practical Tradeoffs to Weigh
- One provider or several. Combining hosting, backup, DR and network security with one provider reduces finger-pointing and the number of contracts to manage. It also concentrates risk, so make sure the exit terms and data portability are clear.
- Self-managed or managed. Managed recovery costs more each month, but it buys tested runbooks and people who have done this before. Compare it honestly against the internal hours it replaces.
- Data residency. If you’re in a regulated industry or have contracts that require data to stay in Canada or a specific region, confirm exactly where primary and backup copies live, including the immutable copy.
- Don’t forget Microsoft 365. Many teams assume Microsoft keeps everything recoverable. Retention isn’t the same as backup, and email, Teams and SharePoint data deserve a separate look.
Where Quantitel Fits
Quantitel works with 11:11 Systems alongside other cloud, network and security providers, so we can compare options for your environment rather than push a single answer. You can see how we approach cybersecurity and network and infrastructure as a service. If a VMware, hosting or backup contract is coming up, our renewal review is a good place to start before you sign anything.
A question I’d put to any IT director or COO right now: if your main systems were encrypted on Monday morning, which three applications would you need back first, and how sure are you of the timeline?
If you’d like to walk through your current backup, DR and VMware situation, book a meeting with me. No pitch deck, just your environment and the decision in front of you.
— Rami