Cloud Adoption Is Moving Faster Than Expected

Cloud Adoption Is Moving Faster Than Expected

The use of virtualized environments and private clouds to maximize resource utilization is happening faster than most industry experts had expected. These infrastructures are becoming very pervasive in data centers today.

Power-Usage Standards Quickly Developing

The power consumed by servers, storage and networking equipment is becoming an increasingly important consideration in the data center, which will result in routine use of standards such as Energy Star from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Power Measurement (UL2640) from Underwriters Laboratories.

Virtualization Is Proving Its Value Across Regions

More organizations are taking advantage of virtualization, which makes it easier to manage loads within and across data centers in order to operate multiple, geographically dispersed data centers to enhance disaster recovery preparedness and achieve other operational benefits.

Power Distribution Becoming More Effective

Capacity planning efforts that eliminate stranded power that is present in nearly every data center will begin to include power distribution and actual consumption as critical design factors, potentially resulting in an increase of up to 50 percent in server capacity.

Centralized Data Center Management Packages Will Become Mandatory

Data center infrastructure management (DCIM) systems will become a mainstream—and even a must-have—tool. Early adopters already have proven its value along with an increased focus on power consumption as driving factors.

DCIM Will Take Over Physical Plant Management

With the considerable overlap between the DCIM system used by the IT department and building management systems used by the facilities departments, organizations will begin migrating to DCIM as the primary platform for managing data centers and integrate other systems into it.

DCIM as a Cloud Service is Moving Up the Charts

With the increased use of software as a service (SaaS) and other cloud-based services, DCIM functionality will also become popular as a service for monitoring and managing a data center’s environmental conditions and power consumption.

Automation Preventing, Fixing Human Errors

Data center automation will make a comeback. With the adoption of technologies like virtualization, DCIM, load-balancing and other sophisticated management systems, mitigating the risks caused by human error by managing critical functions in the data center through automation is once again desirable.

Can Automation Be a Revenue Creator?

Increased automation will finally make it possible for data centers to participate in lucrative energy markets, making them a direct source of revenue for the organization.

Is a Tipping Point Coming for DC Power?

As DC power becomes more common in new data centers owing to its greater efficiency, Thomas Edison will be vindicated for his preference for DC over AC.