Before & After: Measuring the Impact of Synology M365 Backups

How Synology Microsoft 365 Backups are Measured: Before & After

For many organisations, Microsoft 365 is now the go-to system for email, file storage, collaboration, and communication. As data volumes increase, many businesses are looking to third-party backup solutions to protect Exchange Online, OneDrive, SharePoint, and Microsoft Teams.

However, as time goes on, many organisations face issues with traditional backup platforms such as increasing subscription costs, slow recovery times, less control over storage, and more complexity as the number of users increases.

More organisations in the education, healthcare, legal, nonprofit, and commercial sectors are turning to Synology Active Backup for Microsoft 365 to improve control of data protection while reducing long-term operational expenses.

In this article, we will go over typical before-and-after improvements seen in real-world Synology deployments.

Why Your Organization Should Reconsider Its Microsoft 365 Backup Strategy

Most organisations start their backup journey with:

• Native cloud retention capabilities
• SaaS backup providers
• Licensing models per user
• Backup management subscriptions

As environments get larger, a number of challenges often arise:

• Increasing yearly licensing fees
• Increasing storage requirements
• The need for long-term retention
• Bigger, slower recoveries
• Restricted control of backup repositories

For many IT teams, the goal is to find a solution that offers both protection and scalability.

Before: Increasing Annual Subscription Fees

One of the most frequently discussed concerns is the recurring cost of backup.

A typical organization might see:

More users mean more backup costs, usually in direct proportion.

After: Predictable Long-Term Costs

Organisations frequently redirect their spending from recurring user-based licensing to storage infrastructure with Synology Active Backup for Microsoft 365.

Benefits Include:

• No per-user backup licence
• Improved long-term budget planning
• Easier to scale
• Greater ownership of backup data

Savings will vary by organization, but those with hundreds or thousands of users typically realise significant reductions in total backup ownership costs over multi-year periods.

Before: Slow Recovery Workflows

Existing cloud backup environments may need:

• Downloading data from remote repositories
• Several recovery steps
• Extended recovery times
• Limited flexibility for administrators

This is particularly problematic during large recovery events.

After: Rapid Local Recovery

Synology users often see improvements in:

• Recovery speed
• Administrative efficiency
• Granular recovery
• User self-service recovery

This is especially helpful when restoring:

• Exchange Online mailboxes
• OneDrive files
• SharePoint content
• Microsoft Teams data

Recovery Time Comparison

Actual results may vary based on infrastructure, internet connection, and amount of data.

Before: Problems with Growing Storage

Storage growth is directly related to subscription cost, making it difficult for organisations to predict future backup costs.

Usual Growth Drivers Include:

• Teams adoption
• More OneDrive storage
• Compliance retention requirements
• Alumni archives
• Shared mailboxes

After: More Adaptable Storage

With Synology, organisations can:

• Expand storage as needed
• Keep backups under local ownership
• Deploy flexible retention policies
• Scale independently of user count

This approach often helps with long-term planning.

Enhanced Storage Efficiency

Many deployments benefit from storage optimisation techniques which can increase overall efficiency.

Typical Areas of Improvement:

• Storage utilization
• Backup visibility
• Recovery efficiency
• Administrative efficiency

These numbers represent typical improvement ranges reported by organisations that have centralised their backup management.

Lessons Learned from Education Deployments

Schools and universities are often some of the best examples of backup modernisation.

Organisations like Western Reserve Academy have shown what effective backup protection can do for thousands of Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace accounts.

Key Benefits Include:

• Centralised management
• Reduced long-term costs
• Independent backup ownership
• Alumni data retention
• Easier administration

Educational institutions often achieve strong ROI because of their large user populations and long-term retention requirements.

Lessons from Enterprise Environments

Business organisations tend to focus on:

• Rapid recovery
• Business continuity
• Ransomware resilience
• Compliance preparedness
• Cost predictability

For these organisations, backup modernisation is often driven as much by operational efficiency as by data protection.

Why Synology Keeps Gaining Ground

Synology Active Backup for Microsoft 365 gives organisations a single place to protect their Exchange Online, OneDrive, SharePoint, and Teams data. Combined with scalable storage infrastructure and flexible retention policies, Synology allows businesses to strengthen protection while maintaining greater control over costs and recovery processes.

About Epis Technology

Epis Technology offers infrastructure assessments, storage planning, backup architecture design, disaster recovery planning, and business continuity consulting to help organisations design, deploy, and optimise Synology Microsoft 365 backup environments.

The company is dedicated to helping businesses replace expensive and complex backup environments with scalable solutions that improve recovery performance and long-term ROI.

By combining Synology expertise with proven data protection strategies, Epis Technology helps organisations gain greater control over their Microsoft 365 backups while reducing operational complexity and supporting future growth.