FOREWORD
05
Editor's Note
The words 'new normal', 'unprecedented' and 'social distancing'
have littered our vocabulary ingestion over recent months and will
no doubt be with us for a while to come – at least until we find a
vaccination for Covid-19.
But with lockdown easing, we finally have businesses tentatively
heading back to the office to rebuild and become stronger amid
the economic crisis. However, we're recognising that key functions
such as IT and security, remote working and dealing with cybercriminals
working overtime have become more important than
ever. In this issue we take a look at the data centre of tomorrow,
how to future-proof and accommodate that new normal, and
how flexibility is critical to enable scalable changes due to
unprecedented demands of data.
Resilience is key, in both critical infrastructure and leadership.
We see that technology drivers such as Power over Ethernet (PoE),
WiFi-6, convergence and Building Internet of Things (BIoT) are
changing the design, implementation and management of data
and power infrastructure. We ask, is your network future-ready?
Of course, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning
(ML) are at the forefront of future-proofing and the interest in
adding these to business models is fast gaining momentum.
Organisations look to find patterns within their data that can
deliver greater business and customer intelligence and predict
future trends. The challenge of this decade is how to prepare for
the unknown. Has being able to see what tomorrow might bring
become even more crucial?
Without the benefit of a crystal ball, AI or indeed ML, Networks
Europe is always looking to support the data centre industry
however and wherever we can. We know the last few months
have not been easy for anyone but we'd like to thank all our
contributors, features writers and advertisers that have helped
produce this issue of Networks Europe. Together, we can share
our industry knowledge and connect our people - social distancing
guidelines aware!
Stay safe, stay well.
Laura Vallis
Editor
Networks Europe
www.networkseuropemagazine.com