University lecture room with students and professor - Drake University, Choice Solutions, Assured Data Protection
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Drake University

"Choice Solutions and Assured Data Protection have simplified our lives. With their managed service, we sleep better at night knowing our backups and DR plan are tested and ready."Chris Mielke, Director of Infrastructure, Drake University

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Drake University is a higher education institution located in Des Moines, Iowa, serving approximately 3,500 students across diverse schools including law, business, pharmacy, arts and sciences, and education. As a digitally driven university, IT plays a central role in delivering academic excellence and a seamless student experience.

To ensure uninterrupted access to critical systems – from learning platforms to ERP and CRM tools – Drake University needed a modern, secure, and cost-effective data protection strategy. With a lean infrastructure team managing core services, the university partnered with Choice Solutions, powered by Assured Data Protection (Assured), to streamline its backup and disaster recovery through a fully managed solution powered by Rubrik.

The Challenge

Prior to choosing Choice Solutions and Assured’s backup and disaster recovery solutions, Drake University maintained two data centers and relied on a now-discontinued storage and backup platform (Datrium, later acquired and sunsetted by VMware). This model required extensive management, incurred high operational costs, and made disaster recovery planning difficult.

Datrium also served as both the university’s primary storage and snapshot-based backup solution. This integration raised security concerns for Drake University, prompting an exploration of alternative solutions that would provide a clear separation of the two functions to enhance data security and protection.

With increasing cybersecurity risks, Drake University sought a simpler, more secure solution that eliminated the need for a secondary data center and enhanced recovery reliability. Additionally, compliance with the US Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) added further pressure to implement disciplined, tested, and auditable backup procedures.

The Solution

Drake University selected Choice Solutions and Assured to manage its backup and disaster recovery using the Rubrik platform. The standout features of the solution included its simplicity, cloud-based management, and ransomware protection. Additionally, the managed service provided added assurance with technical expertise on hand.

By choosing Choice Solutions and Assured, Drake University was able to:

  • Retire its secondary data center and avoid hardware refresh costs.
  • Deploy both Backup as a Service (BaaS) and Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS).
  • Meet GLBA regulatory requirements through structured, auditable DR testing.
  • Rapidly recover critical systems using Rubrik’s Live Mount functionality.

The onboarding process was smooth, with responsive support and expert guidance ensuring a successful and efficient deployment from day one.

The Result

Drake University has seen measurable benefits since partnering with Choice Solutions and Assured:

  • Operational Simplicity: A single, managed platform reduced internal workload and improved efficiency.
  • Reduced DR Time: DR testing time dropped from 4 hours to just 2, with full systems now tested rather than partial restores.
  • Enhanced Cyber Resilience: Immutable backups, proactive monitoring, and ransomware-focused features safeguard sensitive academic and student data.
  • Compliance Support: Regular testing and reporting provided by Assured helped meet GLBA backup and recovery requirements.

“Choice Solutions and Assured Data Protection have simplified our lives. With their managed service, we sleep better at night knowing our backups and DR plan are tested and ready.” – Chris Mielke, Director of Infrastructure, Drake University.

Looking Ahead

As Drake University explores future opportunities to migrate more services to the cloud, Choice Solutions and Assured remain trusted partners, with Rubrik’s scalable, flexible platform well-positioned to support the university’s evolving IT strategy. With ongoing DR testing, responsive support, and cloud-ready architecture, Drake University is confident in its ability to adapt, recover, and thrive in today’s threat landscape.

A Partnership with Choice Solutions

Choice Solutions connects businesses with the technology solutions they need to succeed today and be prepared for tomorrow. The company is recognized for bridging the gap between digitally transformative technologies and workplace experiences, ultimately driving customers’ productivity and profitability.

Choice Solutions works with over 750 companies across 45 states in a wide range of industries. It provides the expertise, services, and solutions to help business and IT leaders adopt simpler, more secure IT environments tailored to the unique needs of their growing organizations. Choice Solutions specializes in End-User Computing, Modernized Infrastructures, Managed IT Services, and Advisory & Professional Services.

“Choice Solutions has been a trusted IT partner to Drake University since 2013. Through conversations with Drake University IT, exploring cloud security services, we learned of the university’s desire to transition to a future state single data center approach and leverage a capable DRaaS service offering, instead of the cost in infrastructure and complexity in operations to continue to self-maintain a second data center for disaster recovery.

We shared our recommendation to look at our DRaaS services through our partnership with Assured Data Protection. Assured’s services have become a standard offering as part of Choice Solutions’ Managed IT Services, providing peace of mind, security, reliability, and recoverability for our clients.” – Choice Solutions

Visit the Choice Solutions website for more information.