SCHOTT protects 300+ VMs worldwide with Synology

SCHOTT operates in a highly distributed manufacturing environment, with IT infrastructure 
required to support both high-volume production systems and core business functions 
across 14 sites in North America. As the company’s virtual machine (VM) footprint grew, 
with 5 to 200 VMs per location, its file-based backup solution failed to keep up. The file
based system also lacked VM-level access controls, making it difficult to manage backup 
permissions and ensure full coverage across virtual environments. In addition, limited 
scalability from legacy vendors combined with growing licensing fees introduced 
unnecessary complexity and overhead.

To future-proof its operations, SCHOTT needed a backup platform that included air-gapped 
functionality and streamlined VM management across hundreds of systems. It also had to 
support multiple storage tiers and scale flexibly without triggering additional licensing or 
infrastructure costs.

To modernize its VM Backup strategy, Schott deployed several Synology NAS units to 
centralize backups across multiple sites and ensure enhanced cyber resilience for their 
critical workloads.  Around the globe, the company protects over 300 virtual machines and 
stores approximately 80 TB of backup data per region. 

SCHOTT deployed Synology NAS units across all 14 of their locations in North America. 
Each site houses a Synology SA or RS series NAS for their virtual workloads with another 
offsite Synology NAS deployed to centralize backup data. Testing Synology’s newest 
enterprise offering, SCHOTT deployed an ActiveProtect DP7400 backup appliance at their 
Pennsylvania facility to manage daily VM backups. DP7400 replaced older volume-based 
systems, simplifying storage management and improving backup efficiency without requiring 
pre-allocated volumes.

Synology ActiveProtect has enabled SCHOTT to automate the safeguarding of business
critical and operational systems. These systems include file servers, database hosts, and 
virtual machines that control real-time output and quality monitoring. IT teams established 
predefined rules that linked VMs to designated plans by department ensuring newly added 
workloads were automatically protected. This setup reduced the overall IT overhead and 
enhanced Schott’s overall cyber resilience. 

Synology ActiveProtect has been a key asset for IT managers responsible for multiple sites, 
offering higher visibility across the environment and enabling more responsive oversight. 
The improved user experience and centralized monitoring tools have made ActiveProtect a 
practical solution for managing complex, distributed VM infrastructure.

With Synology, SCHOTT has implemented a reliable and flexible backup framework 
purpose-built for its global manufacturing environment. Active Backup for Business 
addressed long-standing file-level permission limitations by enabling VM-based backups 
with more centralized access control, while the switch to ActiveProtect eliminated the need 
for volume allocation and manual VM assignments. Crucially, the move to Synology has 
also brought cost savings. In North and South America alone, SCHOTT avoided an 
estimated $35,000 per year in competitor licensing fees. 

Today, SCHOTT safeguards more than 300 VMs across three continents with a backup 
platform that matches the flexibility and resilience required by the manufacturing sector. 
ActiveProtect has proven itself as an efficient, future-ready solution that delivers both 
operational simplicity and enterprise-grade protection.