Intelligent Data Centres Issue 23 | Page 67

DEEP DIVE global economies , businesses , people and are absolutely fundamental to everything we do today . My goal is to work with Kao Data and help us to grow , asking how we can become more efficient , more effective and more agile .
What style of management philosophy do you employ with your current position ?
My managerial philosophy includes a number of aspects : inclusiveness , collaboration , transparency and teamwork . I believe that recognising the expertise of the people in your organisation and constantly seeking to learn and improve are essential .
Kao Data has strong sense of purpose with a team that ’ s come together through a vision of technical excellence . By focusing on empowering the team and staying true to our vision , we can continue to accelerate our market position .
What do you think is the current hot talking point within the data centre space ?
With many of the challenges experienced this past year , I believe that awareness of HPC and AI has grown and has become a very hot topic – one where supercomputers are re-shaping data centre design and architecture at a tremendous pace . Another key discussion point is on how can today ’ s data centres house or accommodate HPC and AI technologies . Especially when so many legacy , or traditionally built facilities , will struggle to power and cool
HPC at higher densities and industrial scales . Having a facility built to OCP- Ready standards , where customers can benefit from abundant renewable energy , alongside air and liquid-cooled highdensity infrastructure is crucial to meet HPC demands . Here , data centres must be engineered to accommodate the latest CPU and GPU technologies to provide an effective platform for HPC innovation .
How do you deal with stress and unwind outside the office ?
I often find that I can reduce stress by spending time with the family and prioritising my health . We live near the Chiltern Hills , so enjoy long dog walks in glorious countryside , as well as early morning High Intensity Interval ( HIIT ) Training sessions , so that I ’ m ready for the day ahead . I also enjoy drives with my teenage son , just to catch up , to talk and to listen to music – often the latest drill and grime tracks !
What do you currently identify as the major areas of investment in your industry ?
I see a great deal of industry efforts focused on efficiency and sustainability . At Kao Data we ’ re lucky to work with some of the best engineers and thoughtleaders in the sector . Today , we aim to drive data centre sustainability and maintain equilibrium between cost and efficiency . This all weaves into the high number of ISO standards that we have embedded in the business and its operational processes .
What are the region-specific challenges you encounter in your role ?
Commuting from Marlow to Harlow , one of the biggest regional challenges I will undoubtedly face is the M25 ! From a business perspective , being one of 250 + data centres around London , the obvious regional challenge is differentiation . How can one data centre be different to another when essentially the core components – power , space , cooling , are pretty much the same ? Kao Data has approached this by focusing on the world-class technical foundations , where people like our COO , Paul Finch , and CTO , Gérard Thibault , have provided us with resilient and hyperscale-inspired digital infrastructure . This has enabled us to specialise in accommodating HPC , AI and GPU-powered computing , which makes our UK Innovation Corridor location between London and Cambridge – two of the UK ’ s supercomputing hotspots – all the more significant . As a company , one of the key differentiators is the talents , skills and experience of your team – and at Kao Data we probably have the best in the business . That ’ s a hard thing for a competitor to replicate .
What changes to your job role have you seen in the last year ? How do you see these developing in the coming months ?
With the challenges that we ’ ve experienced throughout 2020 , many of us have seen key changes in our roles and day-to-day lives . My key reasons for joining Kao Data are first and foremost the quality of the people across the organisation and , secondly , the opportunity to both contribute and lead the team towards its next phase of development and growth . This is not a change to my previous commercial experience as such , but a change of sector dynamics .
Kao Data is not constrained by institutionalised thinking and we ’ re small enough to be agile and disruptive . We continue to be inspired by the intensive computing organisations with which we work , adopting a process of continuous innovation to help customers overcome their challenges and adapt to new opportunities . It ’ s an absolute privilege to support organisations like EMBL-EBI , and help it spend less time focusing on its data centre infrastructure and more time focusing on the complex bioinformatic datasets in which it specialises . As we look forward , we must retain our ethos , delivering technical excellence for organisations dependent on missioncritical digital infrastructure . As data centre demands continue to grow exponentially , ensuring we are agile , flexible and ultra-efficient will be key to meeting customer requirements . ◊ www . intelligentdatacentres . com
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