IBM is rolling out a new service that will allow companies to get their computer systems back up and running quickly in the case of a disaster, the company plans to announce.

Targeted at financial services, retail and transportation companies, the new service involves the use of fast backup systems that duplicate not only data, but applications as well, said Roger Schwanhausser, director of storage services for IBM Global Services. As part of the initiative, IBM is also consulting with companies to assess their current disaster recovery systems.

The September 11 terrorist attacks have forced businesses to focus on planning for disasters, Schwanhausser said.

"Recent events have underscored the necessity to safeguard data, but if the applications that use the data aren't running, you're not in business," Schwanhausser said in a statement.

Backup systems have become increasingly important to companies, especially for those that conduct business over the Internet. eBay, for instance, spent millions of dollars to develop a "hot" backup system after repeated multi-hour outages infuriated users.

IBM's new service will work with a range of operating systems and applications, including Windows NT, AIX, Solaris and various flavours of Unix, Schwanhausser said. Schwanhausser did not know whether IBM has developed a backup system for Linux, however.

The new service will allow companies to shrink the time needed to resume normal computer functions from as long as 48 hours down to less than 20 minutes, he said.

IBM has dedicated 100 employees to working with a new group assigned to the data recovery initiative, he said. Large corporations can expect to spend in the tens of millions of dollars for IBM's new service, which could take up to six months to deploy, Schwanhausser said.

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