Transforming and optimising a data centre can result in “significant bottom line payback” and benefits for business operations, according to Brent Lees, senior product manager at Riverbed Technology.
“Traditionally, data centre management has been the domain of the IT department, but as IT moves to underpin all areas of business, the structure and performance of the data centre has become a management issue,” said Lees.
“Because the data centre is the heart of enterprise operations, the repository of all corporate intellectual property and a key factor in risk and compliance management, the data centre is now management’s problem.”
Lees believes optimised data centres are able to be the driving force behind “forward-thinking enterprises entering new levels of competitiveness, especially since the advent of cloud computing, new technologies and virtualisation and the fact that new emphasis has been placed on the value of data as a competitive differentiator.
“The global focus for data centres now is moving to the cloud, the software defined data centre and ensuring optimum security and performance while keeping costs to a minimum. In addition, data is now being recognised as an enterprise asset, which needs to be stored, managed and accessed efficiently, in order to support growth,” said Lees.
He said data centres must be transformed before they are able to deliver on their potential. “Not only can data centre transformation revolutionise the enterprise’s operations – it can also deliver on substantial savings and a significant return on investment.”
Lees believes a key point to address is the consolidation of data centres, to enable enterprises to reduce the costs and complexities involved with managing multiple data centres. Consolidation will also allow greater security and control on data. This is especially applicable to companies with branches in remote and high risk areas.
“It is also critical as the increasingly mobile workforce demands access to enterprise applications from remote areas. The consolidation of data centre[s] deliver significantly improved control and as well as reducing operating costs,” said Lees.
He added: “Riverbed itself runs one main data centre, with one back up, which delivers significant efficiencies.”
If a virtualised and consolidated data centre is not properly executed, Lees warned, challenges could be faced. According to Lees a key issue on this is latency.
“If the server is based geographically distant from the user or branch office, the user may experience delays in accessing enterprise applications. This hampers productivity and customer service. Effective solutions need to deliver the same performance to the end user remotely as they would if the user was based in the head office,” said Lees.
Lees said the next generation data centre needs to function proactively, meaning alerts should be triggered so management is aware before the user becomes aware of the performance issues.
The cost of connectivity is something to consider when implementing virtualisation. Lees said this is because “constant communication with a remote server can add significant bandwidth costs.”
According to Lees, an ideal solution would be eliminating bandwidth wastage without losing application performance.
“Riverbed has invested massively in R&D (Research and Development) and the necessary acquisitions to enable us to deliver data centre consolidation, WAN (Wide Area Network) optimisation and performance management tools that significantly improve data centre performance, ensure a future-proof data centre infrastructure, yet still reduce operating costs,” concluded Lees.
