---
title: [MTE] [Oct] [2026] [P1] IT Disaster Recovery in a Saas World
description: [MTE] [Oct] [2026] [P1] IT Disaster Recovery in a Saas World
image: https://blog.bcm-institute.org/hubfs/MTE%20Executive%20Summary%20Icon/David%20Tay%20Graphic%20Folder/IC_MTE%20Summary_David%20Tay_Part%201.png
---
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# \[MTE\] \[Oct\] \[2026\] \[P1\] IT Disaster Recovery in a Saas World
[](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/f98e6275-903b-439e-b2f7-63350f225f9a)[![x \[MTE\] \[Presentation Summary\] \[Part 1\] David Tay](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/f82876be-095f-4222-862e-1b5cdf7ebfea.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/f82876be-095f-4222-862e-1b5cdf7ebfea)The recent webinar that concluded on October 1, 2026, featured guest speaker David Tay.
The webinar, IT Disaster Recovery in a SaaS World, examines how the adoption of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is transforming traditional IT Disaster Recovery (IT DR) practices.
As organisations increasingly rely on externally hosted applications, IT DR can no longer focus exclusively on recovering infrastructure, applications, and data centres. Instead, organisations must consider provider responsibilities, service dependencies, data protection, recovery capabilities, and the continuity of critical business operations.
The central theme is that moving technology to SaaS changes who operates the systems, but does not transfer the organisation's accountability for business continuity and resilience.
This is Part 1 of the summarised presentation for the Meet-the-Expert Webinar.
[Moh Heng Goh](https://blog.bcm-institute.org/meet-the-expert/author/moh-heng-goh) Oct 8, 2026
### 
### Part 1: IT Disaster Recovery in a Saas World: Rethinking IT Disaster Recovery in a SaaS World
#### Introduction
[![x \[MTE\] \[Presentation Summary\] \[Part 1\] David Tay](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/f82876be-095f-4222-862e-1b5cdf7ebfea.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/f82876be-095f-4222-862e-1b5cdf7ebfea)[](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/f98e6275-903b-439e-b2f7-63350f225f9a)The transition from traditional on-premises infrastructure to cloud-based services has fundamentally changed how organisations approach IT Disaster Recovery.
During BCM Institute's Meet-the-Expert webinar, David Tay shared his experience of moving from a conventional disaster recovery environment, supported by two data centres in Sydney, to a cloud-based operating model following an outsourcing decision in 2023.
His experience illustrates an important challenge: when organisations no longer control the underlying technology infrastructure, how can they ensure that critical business operations remain recoverable?
#### The Changing Landscape of IT Disaster Recovery
Traditional IT DR focuses on restoring servers, networks, databases, applications, and infrastructure following a disruption.
In a SaaS environment, much of this responsibility moves to the service provider. Organisations increasingly rely on contractual commitments, service level agreements (SLAs), vendor recovery arrangements, and third-party assurance.
David explained that different cloud service models create different responsibilities. Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), and SaaS require different approaches to backup, restoration, application management, and recovery.
#### Understanding the Shared Responsibility Challenge
Although SaaS providers manage their technology platforms, organisations remain responsible for ensuring that their business processes can continue.
David highlighted the importance of understanding provider RTOs and RPOs, contractual obligations and the organisation's own recovery requirements.
An organisation cannot assume that purchasing a cloud service automatically provides a recovery capability that satisfies its Business Impact Analysis (BIA).
#### Identity Services: A Critical Dependency
One of the webinar's important examples concerned identity providers and Single Sign-On (SSO).
Organisations frequently use a central identity platform to authenticate employees across multiple SaaS applications, such as enterprise resource planning, human resources, and collaboration systems.
If the identity provider becomes unavailable, employees may be unable to access otherwise operational applications.
This illustrates why IT DR planning must examine dependencies beyond the SaaS application itself.
#### Business Continuity Must Drive IT Disaster Recovery
David emphasised that IT DR supports Business Continuity Planning rather than replacing it.
He illustrated this relationship through business processes such as payroll and dividend payments.
Where an automated SaaS-supported process becomes unavailable, organisations may need to activate manual arrangements, such as preparing payroll information in spreadsheets and submitting payment instructions directly to banks.
These arrangements demonstrate the importance of developing business continuity alternatives for situations where technology recovery is outside the organisation's direct control.
#### Availability Is Not the Same as Recoverability
David also explained the distinction between system uptime, Recovery Time Objective (RTO), and Recovery Point Objective (RPO).
A provider's uptime commitment describes service availability over a defined period. It does not necessarily establish how quickly data can be restored or how much data could be lost following an incident.
Organisations must therefore assess availability and recoverability separately.
### [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/7a6d118f-9e00-4849-a013-9cbe38dbda19)
IT Disaster Recovery in a SaaS environment must begin with business continuity requirements rather than technology infrastructure.
Organisations should understand their critical business processes, establish appropriate RTOs and RPOs, identify dependencies, and determine whether their SaaS providers can meet those requirements.
When technology recovery is outside the organisation's control, practical business continuity alternatives become essential to maintaining critical operations.
[](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/d9ca3818-14aa-428b-a81d-edda4d191516)This is Part 1 of the two-part summary of David Tay's presentation during BCM Institute's Meet-the-Expert webinar.
The webinar is summarised by Dr Goh Moh Heng, President of the BCM Institute.
*Dr Goh Moh Heng, President of BCM Institute, summarises this webinar. If you have any questions, please speak to the author.*
*[](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/9f00129b-47f5-4a92-8db4-88b9bc250036)*
### **For Parts 1 & 2 ...**
Click the icon below to continue reading parts of David Tay's presentation.
| **IT Disaster Recovery in a Saas World** | | | | | |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/f98e6275-903b-439e-b2f7-63350f225f9a) | [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/677ed71d-c289-4192-80cc-f2996c9bb0a7) | [![x \[MTE\] \[Presentation Summary\] \[Part 1\] David Tay](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/f82876be-095f-4222-862e-1b5cdf7ebfea.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/f82876be-095f-4222-862e-1b5cdf7ebfea) | [![x \[MTE\] \[Presentation Summary\] \[Part 2\] David Tay](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/b37ba35a-7f07-4aed-803b-74638154d0f7.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/b37ba35a-7f07-4aed-803b-74638154d0f7) | [![x \[MTE\] \[Lesson Learned\] David Tay](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/d74f116e-252a-405f-bd93-29298894b8f8.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/d74f116e-252a-405f-bd93-29298894b8f8) | [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/d9ca3818-14aa-428b-a81d-edda4d191516) |
#### More Information About IT DR Blended Learning
BCM Institute offers the BL-DR-3 Blended Learning DR-300 IT Disaster Recovery Implementer and the BL-DR-5 Blended Learning DR-5000 IT Disaster Recovery Expert Implementer.
| [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/327c5089-d467-4963-b044-9ae8707d1eed) | [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/6e2ef2c6-0ee8-45df-9e85-0c143aacf438) | [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/e54a496c-70d5-432a-8928-570d6979d6a5) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/0ff58b61-ae11-405b-b92b-599af8614269) | [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/0150d077-9a38-4a64-ab37-d9c20b56856b) | [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/bee1af30-a91a-43fe-92b8-3ec6f84dce3c) |
| [](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/57e3cea2-a6ae-448f-a641-d185d02f0c1b) | Please feel free to send us a note if you have any of these questions.[![Email to Sales Team \[BCM Institute\]](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/3c53daeb-2836-4843-b0e0-645baee2ab9e.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/3c53daeb-2836-4843-b0e0-645baee2ab9e) | [![FAQ \[BL-DR\] \[5\] DRP-5000](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/3893111/e1e30273-3d46-4a5b-9f9d-11d9457a377a.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3893111/e1e30273-3d46-4a5b-9f9d-11d9457a377a) |
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