Veeam product strategy vice-president, Doug Hazelman (right), on stage at VeeamOn in Las Vegas
Veeam Endpoint Backup Free will be open to a public beta from November before receiving a public release in early 2015.
The free standalone application lets users backup Windows-based systems to an internal or external hard drive, a NAS (network attached storage) share or a Veeam backup repository.
Product strategy vice-president, Doug Hazelman, unveiled the solution at VeeamOn in Las Vegas and said some devices will "always remain visible," such as desktop and notebook PCs.
“These are still devices that will not be virtualised and need to be protected,” he said.
Endpoint Backup Free is a standalone product that is installed individually on each device, and does not require another Veeam product to work.
Since it is a free product, Hazelman said it is not targeting “an enterprise with 50,000 employees.”
“We just want to get it in the hands of IT professionals and typical Veeam customers to receive feedback and see how the product can be expanded,” he said.
Free for all
Hazelman points out this is not the first time Veeam has released free software, as the company got its start with a free product.
“Veeam would not exist if it had not released Veeam FastSCP in 2006,” he said.
“That product was released free as a way for the company to get started in the era of virtualisation.”
By putting out a utility and making it free, Hazelman said it allowed Veeam to get contacts in the virtualisation space, as well as feedback that provided insight into the problems facing IT professionals.
Other free tools that Veeam released in the past include Backup Free Edition, ONE Free Edition, and Task Manager for Hyper-V.
Patrick Budmar is attending VeeamOn as a guest of Veeam
