INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Data Centres
Reducing data centre energy costs
– a top priority according to poll
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A
poll from Secure I.T. Environments
Ltd, one of the UK’s leading
design and build companies for
modular and containerised data centres,
has revealed that reducing energy costs
(46%) and improving energy efficiency
(39%) are key priorities for 2020 among
IT professionals. The poll, which was
conducted across the Data Centre World
event, found nearly a third (29%) will be
focusing on relocating their data centre(s)
over the remainder of 2020.
Asked about the top two challenges
facing their IT infrastructure over the
next two years, half (49%) cited upgrading
their existing data centres as the biggest
challenge. Second was the continued
pressure organisations face around
regulatory compliance (37%), either
in terms of their specific industry, or
areas of general compliance related to
the IT department such as GDPR,
ISO27001, IASME Governance or NIST
to name but a few.
As we all know, bringing projects to life
can be challenging, as revealed when
respondents were asked about areas such as
budgeting and skills. A total of 34% reported
that they see recruiting skilled professionals
to work in their IT departments as a key
challenge for the coming years. Budgets
for projects can also be a problem: 37%
reported getting the budget they require,
but 27% said they need to fight for every
pound, and 20% described themselves as
‘always underfunded’. Only 15% felt they
got generous budgets that allowed them to
do everything they require.
The pressures facing IT professionals
responsible for data centres is also having
an impact emotionally. Asked to comment
on the emotions conjured up when they
think about the current state of their IT
infrastructure, half (51%) reported negative
emotions: worry (27%), anxiety (22%) and
despair (2%). The most reported emotion
was pride at 32%.
The poll showed that organisations
are not only looking to upgrade their
data centres but invest in new technologies
to support their businesses across 2020
and 2021. Improving data centre
connectivity to benefit cloud services and
high performance computing were joint
top at 27%, followed by incorporating
5G technology and Artificial Intelligence
at 24%. Edge data centres also
featured heavily with a fifth (22%)
planning to implement these to
improve the performance and flexibility
of their infrastructure.
Chris Wellfair, Projects Director at Secure
I.T. Environments, said: “The data centre is
becoming more important to organisations
than ever before, as they look at new
ways to grow and support staff. However,
finding the skilled staff to deliver these
transformative projects remains a challenge,
even though organisations can secure the
budgets needed to upgrade. Having the key
personnel and external partners is critical
to the long-term success of any data centre
project, so the time required to assemble
that team needs to be factored into any
transformation project. It’s set to be an
exciting couple of years as data centres are
accommodated across the UK with new
technology to serve their businesses.” •
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