NetApp SnapMirror Business Continuity (SMBC) is the solution specifically designed to meet the requirements of zero Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and near-zero Recovery Time Objective (RTO). It achieves a zero RPO through synchronous data replication between two sites. For a near-zero RTO, SMBC provides automated, application-transparent failover, which is crucial for mission-critical NAS workloads. In the event of a primary site failure, the application can continue operating on the secondary site with minimal to no disruption, directly fulfilling the customer's needs for continuous availability.

A. storage VM disaster recovery (SVM DR): SVM DR uses asynchronous SnapMirror replication, which results in an RPO greater than zero. The failover process is also manual, leading to a much higher RTO than "near-zero."

B. MetroCluster over IP: While MetroCluster provides a zero RPO and a very low RTO, SMBC is a more modern and granular solution designed for application-transparent failover, which more precisely fits the "near-zero RTO" requirement.

D. SnapMirror Synchronous (SM-S): SM-S provides a zero RPO by replicating data synchronously. However, it requires manual intervention to failover, resulting in an RTO that is significantly longer than "near-zero."

1. NetApp Technical Report 4742: SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC) for ONTAP.

Section: Introduction, Page 4.

Quote: "SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC) is a feature in ONTAP 9.8 and later releases that provides a zero RPO and near-zero RTO business continuity solution for mission-critical applications." This document explicitly states that SMBC is designed for the exact requirements mentioned in the question.

2. NetApp ONTAP Documentation: "What SnapMirror Business Continuity is"

Section: Overview.

Quote: "SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC) protects data at the volume level, providing a business continuity solution with zero data loss (RPO=0) and near-zero downtime (near-zero RTO) for business-critical applications." This confirms the RPO and RTO capabilities.

3. NetApp ONTAP Documentation: "Comparison of MetroCluster and SnapMirror Business Continuity solutions"

Section: Feature Comparison Table.

Details: This table shows that while both solutions offer RPO=0 and an RTO of seconds, SMBC provides "Application transparent" failover, whereas MetroCluster provides "Automatic" failover. The application transparency of SMBC is key to achieving a truly near-zero RTO from the application's perspective.

4. NetApp ONTAP 9 Data Protection Power Guide (Legacy Document for context on other technologies)

Section: SnapMirror Synchronous, Page 18.

Quote: "You must manually initiate a failover from the source to the destination." This confirms the manual nature of SM-S failover, making its RTO non-zero. For SVM DR, the guide details a multi-step manual failover process.