52 MODULAR DATA CENTRES to customer demands more quickly . In fact , the speed of prefabricated construction allows a colocation company to build an order book at the same time as building the facility off-site , without any serious risk that they will be late to deliver service .
52 MODULAR DATA CENTRES to customer demands more quickly . In fact , the speed of prefabricated construction allows a colocation company to build an order book at the same time as building the facility off-site , without any serious risk that they will be late to deliver service .
Informed expansion planning Traditionally constructed data centres are typically built oversized , and then fractionally occupied over time – an expensive and highly inefficient process . By contrast , because prefabricated facilities are built in a controlled factory environment before being assembled on-site , the lead times are shorter . This enables capacity to be planned over a much shorter time and then incrementally expanded as the need for more capacity arises . This provides a number of key benefits :
• Allows colocation providers to delay expansion orders until much closer to when they are actually needed , when they will have a clearer view of exactly how much and what kind of additional capacity they ’ re going to need
• Enables outlay to be phased more in line with business growth
• Significantly reduces business risk
• Each new phase can take advantage of the latest innovations that typically increase efficiency and reduce cost
• Taking a prefabricated approach effectively introduces an on demand , or just in time model to the provisioning of data centre capacity market ’ s requirements . So this is where more flexible prefabricated facilities come into their own .
Lower cost of entry The lower upfront cost of prefabricated data centres versus larger traditionally built facilities , will lower the cost of market entry making edge markets more accessible to service providers , which makes the cost of the services hosted there more attractive to the ultimate customers .
With prefabricated solutions minimising their initial capital outlay at individual sites , colocation companies will also see an increase in the total number of markets they can address as they will be able to spread their investment in modular data centres across a larger number of sites . These factors will open up edge market opportunities for collocation providers , reducing overall investment risk and thereby making them more financially viable .
Speed to revenue Unlike traditionally built data centres which can sometimes take years to build , the much faster speed of construction of prefabricated data centres will enable colocation providers to start bringing in revenue faster and to respond
Leveraging repetition A large element of the cost of data centres is the design element . With a prefabricated solution though , using a repetitive design approach will streamline the process , minimise the cost and standardise not only the facility design but also the associated operational processes . These include training , support , spares , engineering , etc . In this way repetition not only reduces capital expenses , with lower ongoing design costs , but also operating expenses – with lower and more streamlined operational processes .
Using the same design for every site means the design cost is only incurred once for the very first facility . Regional variations may be added over time but site specific designs can be kept to a minimum . Additionally , a standard design opens up the possibility of repetitive manufacturing that further increases efficiency and reduces cost .
Speed to the edge With increasing numbers of businesses and consumers demanding quicker access to data outside the world ’ s Tier 1 cities , market opportunities at the edge are growing fast . There ’ s no question that the next wave of data centre development will be the land grab at the edge , and the colocation companies that take a prefabricated approach to building their new facilities will undoubtedly be best positioned to take advantage of this growth market while at the same time minimising their risks . n
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