Iron Mountain Acquires Fontis International, Strengthening Information Management Capabilities for Records Retention

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Acquisition of cloud-based subscription service will provide automated capabilities for managing records retention and policy, ensuring compliance with global guidelines

BOSTON, MA – Oct. 2, 2014 — /BackupReview.info/ — Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE: IRM), the storage and information management company, today announced it has acquired Fontis International of Denver, Colo., a provider of a cloud-based subscription service for records retention guidelines. Iron Mountain will now offer unique capabilities for continuously updating retention schedules that can be distributed in a fully-automated manner. Fontis’ offering helps organizations better manage the storage and destruction lifecycle of their records according to industry and geographic laws and regulations, enabling compliance and legal defensibility for their information management programs. As part of the acquisition, Fontis’ President Steve Formica and Chief Technology Officer Matt Hillery will join Iron Mountain to lead sales and product development for this service and technology-based offering; additional terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Most enterprises struggle to keep up with guidelines for retention (how long to keep records for legal or business reasons), relying on manual, time-intensive and often error-prone processes to research, update and communicate changes to policies. In response, they often default to a “store everything” approach that can increase their risk of non-compliance, drive up storage costs, and make it difficult to respond to discovery requests during litigation. Holding records for too long and failing to follow retention guidelines also can hold back the expected benefits of an information management program, making it difficult to mine those records for insights into the business that can deliver real, bottom-line value.

Fontis’ cloud-based subscription service allows Iron Mountain to deliver automated, up-to-date retention guidelines from around the world that are researched, curated and vetted by legal experts within individual industries and geographies. Organizations can update their retention schedule via Fontis’ online interface, and then publish it so that those guidelines can be communicated to all employees across the enterprise – removing one of the biggest barriers to achieving defensible compliance. Organizations can feel secure that they are retaining their records according to policy, giving them the opportunity to cut costs by destroying information in a timely manner and controlling storage spend by keeping only what they need.

“True information management is built on fundamental pieces, building blocks that can mean the difference between effective programs and those not quite good enough,” said Blaine Rigler, senior vice president of Global Solutions for Iron Mountain. “One of those essential pieces is a records retention schedule that details the guidelines you need to follow, as well as the ability to communicate them as part of your policy to the organization. This acquisition helps us strengthen that piece, ensuring our customers are continuously informed of actionable changes to regulations that impact their information. They can get away from the task of making periodic, manual updates, feeling confident that their policy is up-to-date and vetted by geography and industry, with the added advantage of being able to communicate those changes across the enterprise. It fits perfectly with our current solutions and our goal to provide those building blocks for complete, holistic information management to our customers for today and the future.”

“We’re excited to join Iron Mountain,” said Steve Formica. “We created our products to serve as single sources of truth for managing compliance with the myriad of regulations that information managers face every day. Bringing that capability to Iron Mountain is a natural fit, a strong brand with deep roots and expertise, and we look forward to helping the company deliver on its vision for complete information management.”

For more information on the Iron Mountain’s solutions for managing retention and policy, visit www.ironmountain.com/Services/Records-Management-And-Storage/Automated-Records-Retention-Schedule.aspx. And see the Iron Mountain/Fontis service in person, stop by the Iron Mountain booth (#1119) at ARMA 2014 or visit arma.ironmountain.com/.

About Iron Mountain
Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE: IRM) is a leading provider of storage and information management services. The company’s real estate network of over 67 million square feet across more than 1,000 facilities in 36 countries allows it to serve customers with speed and accuracy. And its solutions for records management, data management, document management, and secure shredding help organizations to lower storage costs, comply with regulations, recover from disaster, and better use their information for business advantage. Founded in 1951, Iron Mountain stores and protects billions of information assets, including business documents, backup tapes, electronic files and medical data. Visit www.ironmountain.com for more information.

Contact:
Iron Mountain
Laura Sudnik
617-535-4707
laura.sudnik@ironmountain.com
www.ironmountain.com
or
Weber Shandwick
Katie Carbone, 617-520-7135
kcarbone@webershandwick.com

Source: Iron Mountain Inc.

Tags: Iron Mountain