Do hosted email archiving services differentiate themselves through e-discovery features?

Do hosted email archiving services differentiate themselves through e-discovery features?

It's hard to keep track of it, there's so many mergers and acquisitions in this space. No sooner does a company get somewhat of a footprint than they're acquired by someone else. But there's half a dozen or so reputable ones, and a ton more are cropping up. And some of the more established enterprise storage vendors are starting to launch services in this area, so you can definitely see a ramp in this market.

In terms of differentiation, it's around the different kinds of e-discovery services and how sophisticated they are. The better players are the ones that have data analytics functionality. They'll have more records retention, more management capabilities, better security and better supervision capabilities. They can handle other data types than just files, and they'll have a proven scalability with larger companies. There's a concrete line between those that can offer that level of sophistication versus that basic "we'll keep the email for you" type of provider.

This was first published in August 2008