Gartner: future data centres will have more flexibility

As such, Cappuccio says, the data centre’s role will shift dramatically from simply a repository of legacy applications, to become the linchpin for enterprise agility and enable IT efficiency, greater security and lowered risk, and competitive advantage, he says.

Software-Defined Everything

“This year, we’re seeing organisations really start to examine how ‘software-defined’ everything impacts the data centre,” Cappuccio says. “Software-defined networking, software defined storage, that’s all part of the conversation; how to move away from the physical and into the conceptual, but is there a way to take that concept and apply that to data centers as a whole.”

There always will be a need for physical data centre locations, but if the inner workings of a data center facility are less about the hardware and physical machines and more about the software, organizations can see increased flexibility, agility and lowered risk of downtime, he says.

“We’re not there yet, but the idea of having a site in the Midwest United States, for example, and one in Europe, linked together and managed from a single location is appealing,” he said.

“Data centres will no longer be constrained by one specific site. Instead, organisations will have multiple sites, connected by high performance networks, with the ability to move workloads to where it’s less risky and more secure for the business.

He discussed how during hurricane Sandy in 2012, organisations ran into a fatal flaw in otherwise robust disaster recovery plans – even those with offsite backup and disaster recovery sites were left crippled if roads were impassible, if backup generators failed.

An IT Strategy Shift

He believes  the data centre will evolve beyond that focus on geography over the next five years, toward an operational strategy that puts more emphasis on business continuity and workload management.

“We see organizations asking, ‘what if I had an offsite data center, in a completely different geography, where I could move workloads instantly to minimize risks’?” He said.

He believes this strategy will also contribute to increased efficiency, and will offer organisations a greater competitive advantage.

“Certain times of the day, you may be running at higher utilisation; in the mornings, for example, when all your users are logging in. If you could move workloads during those times, you could get better utilisation from the facilities, and have a more flexible environment,” he says.

Leading edge companies are beginning to realise that this kind of flexibility and agility offer a great competitive advantage, he adds, though it will still be a few years before the strategy is commonplace.