Enterprises continue to invest in data centre infrastructure despite the economic downturn. Dr Ispran Kandasamy*, Vice President and Managing Director of Asia-Pacific, CommScope, shines the light on data centres and the drivers for continuing investment.
The data centre is a primary component in the universal drive for greater productivity and efficiency as businesses rush to better manage and safeguard increasingly large flows of business-critical information. So important is its role in business sustainability that researchers have warned against holding off investment into data centre projects in the current economic downturn. Rather, they suggest that companies take advantage of the recession to make strategic data centre investments so that they can be ready when the economy recovers - which is what’s happening in Asia today.
A recent report by research company Gartner foresaw a steep decline in global IT spending in 2009, particularly in the hardware sector which includes data centre equipment and components. The report forecasts hardware spending to fall by 16.3% by year end.
However, the 2009 Data Centre Survey of 730 IT professionals from 54 countries including 15 countries from within the Asia-Pacific region reveals a more positive picture in terms of data centre investment. The survey, conducted by CommScope, indicated that despite the economic downturn, about 83% of enterprises globally have ongoing data centre projects. In fact, about 32% of them are planning to deploy new facilities this year.
Traditional drivers
Companies have various motives for pursuing data centre projects and business continuity has traditionally been a key driver of data centre build-out. This trend continues today as 41% of survey respondents identify business continuity among the key projects in the pipeline. Not surprisingly, about 37% of respondents said they are also funding security, backup and recovery projects, which, like business continuity, are also traditional drivers of data centre deployment in the majority of organisations worldwide.
What is apparent in the research is the increasing focus on server consolidation (37%) and virtualisation (39%), performed with the view of optimisation of IT resources. These types of projects demand greater density in the data centre environment and allow more servers to be installed per unit area of floor space.
Consolidation and virtualisation meet not only the performance and economic requirements of a data centre, but also its environmental considerations. An overwhelming majority of respondents (85%) see server consolidation and virtualisation as a way to simplify operations and reduce costs. It is also seen as a way to cut energy costs and reduce carbon footprint, which are increasingly becoming a priority for Asian companies who wish to build a more energy-efficient network infrastructure.
Demands on performance
For consolidation to work, an enterprise must prioritise investments in high-performance servers that will allow them to simultaneously support several mission-critical applications. These servers, in turn, would need a data centre infrastructure that can guarantee reliability as well as performance to match that of the latest servers.
Enhancing server efficiency through virtualisation requires higher network bandwidth. To support this demand, 54% of the respondents said that they will deploy high-performance copper and fibre cabling infrastructure for new projects, specifically 10 Gbps Category 6A cabling for new copper cabling installations.
Since its ratification seven years ago, 10G Ethernet (10GbE) has been gaining traction in the data centre space. The research reveals that 27% of Asian companies surveyed were already using 10 Gigabit Ethernet over twisted pair in the network backbone, with a further 44% planning to do so within three years. Among the Asian companies building horizontal networks where each layer has its own standards-based management, control and resources, 20% are using 10GbE over copper with another 40% planning to upgrade within three years.
Demand for space optimisation
When purchasing high-density equipment and network infrastructure, excessive cabling volume must be avoided to optimise use of limited and costly data centre space. Space is also vital to the effective flow of cooling air which is required for the efficient running of data centre equipment.
Early adopters of high-bandwidth network infrastructure cabling such as 10G/Category 6A copper cabling and OM4 fibre understood that they will be able to build a truly futureproof infrastructure using fewer cables. This is because higher performance cable solutions reduce the need for installing additional cables even as their bandwidth requirement continues to grow.
To avoid major upgrade costs while at the same time minimising disruption to their existing network infrastructure, enterprises planning to support parallel transmission migration paths can install pre-terminated OM3 or OM4 backbone fibre when the data centre is built.
Demand for greener infrastructure
Enterprises around the world are embracing green networking to support long-term cost reduction strategies as well as to become more responsible from an energy awareness perspective. The CommScope research shows that 78% of respondents cite reductions in data centre cooling and costs as key areas of concern with over a half of them indicating a plan to reduce power consumption by 20% or more.
However, power consumption is not the only aspect of data centre management that has direct environmental impact. Bear in mind that all green equipment installed in the data centre had to be manufactured and disposed of when it becomes obsolete - these processes also consume energy and resources.
To save costs while still maintaining green credentials, enterprises should carefully consider the total life cycle of equipment and solutions to determine which ones offer the best return over their lifetime. For instance, active equipment can have shorter replacement cycles as investment in them can be justified by selecting higher performance and more energy-efficient models.
However, premature replacement is harder to justify in passive components such as cabling. Ripping out cabling that is only a year old will not only put a dent on your company’s budget, but will also harm your green credentials.
Demand for reliability and ease of maintenance
Enterprises maintaining an existing installation or building new data centres have listed reliability and ease of maintenance as the key concerns, particularly when it comes to selection of network switches, connectivity and topology. Nearly a quarter of respondents have experienced failure due to human error - a challenge that can be addressed by the judicious use of intelligent infrastructure.
By building intelligence into the data centre infrastructure, IT will have better visibility of the physical layer of the network and will be able to manage cabling more effectively. It allows for easy identification of data traffic channels and it alerts data centre management of the possibility of unplanned connectivity modifications.
Overall, the 2009 Data Centre Survey shows that enterprises around the world have recognised that data centres are drivers of performance enhancement which can help them meet the challenges of the current economic downturn as they prepare for recovery - if they are better prepared than their competitors then they will gain a competitive edge. This is achievable though optimisation of passive systems and integration of intelligence into the data centre environment to reduce waste and realise greater efficiency and better management control.
* Dr Ispran Kandasamy is the Vice President and Managing Director, Asia-Pacific, CommScope Enterprise Solutions Division. Kandasamy has been responsible for driving sales within the enterprise arena within the Asia-Pacific region since 2001. Over the past 20 years, he has built up a proven track record in research and development, manufacturing, and sales and marketing within the telecommunications and general communications industry.
