Issue link: http://cp.revolio.com/i/611691
18 | THE DATA CENTER JOURNAL www.datacenterjournal.com o wing to the rapidly in- creasing influx of data expected in the coming years—IDC projects that by 2020, the digital universe (the data created and copied annually) will reach 44 trillion giga- bytes—tech and IT executives need to keep their data center operations top of mind, as these choices will affect their business growth for not only the com- ing year, but every year thereaer. e cloud, the Internet of things (IoT) and mobile-device usage are growing at a rapidly increasing pace. Data centers must be able to adapt and incorporate new techniques and tech- nologies to remain relevant to current customers and to attract new ones. I spoke with 15 data center site managers and with the office of the CTO to determine what the top trends for data centers in 2016 will be. Data Centers are Cooling DoWn It's time to give your cabinets a faceli! More and more, high-density compute, storage and networking are making their way into data centers. is trend will require increasing amounts of energy and power to keep data centers at an optimal temperature. While data center cooling techniques are oen a popular topic of conversa- tion, one that we'll see becoming even more popular is cold-aisle containment pod deployments, which will soon be- come a standard in data center design. In fact, the Uptime Institute reports that 72 percent of data center opera- tors and IT practitioners use over 5,000 servers with hot/cold-aisle contain- ment, whereas 53 percent use under 1,000 servers with hot/cold-aisle con- tainment. Even at present, that's a large percentage of operators employing this design option, and in the future we expect this option to grow! the ClouD is here to stay In 2015 we saw the cloud trend in full force. A few years back, there was talk of the cloud having the potential to "kill" the data center, which may have resulted in a bit of panic for some. Over time, however, we've seen that the cloud and data centers are not in competition; rather, they complement one another and must work together to properly function. But 2016 will remain the year of the cloud. Cloud-based businesses increasingly rely on colocation provid- ers to support their large data-storage needs. Data center management teams must focus part of their efforts on high- density design to support increased usage from cloud-based companies and to stay a contender in the data center space. In 2013, IDC found that less than 20 percent of the data in the digital universe is "touched" by the cloud: either stored, perhaps temporarily, or processed in some way. But by 2020, that percentage will double to 40 percent. is projection alone is a big jump, but evidence has led us to believe that the cloud will make an even bigger splash than originally expected, as the digital universe is more than doubling every two years! Data centers having cloud capa- bilities will be a requirement for most customers in 2016 and beyond. loCation, loCation, loCation You've heard it before: location matters! Although it's definitely true in the real-estate industry, it also applies to data centers—now more than ever. Application developers and executives are employing federated design models when it comes to their applications, as these applications have an impact on data center design and selection. Many are relying on a higher number of strategically located data centers rather than a single hub. For example, instead of storing massive amounts of data in a few select data centers, application providers are mov- ing their applications to "the Edge" (sites that allow them to serve custom- ers locally and to reach more business- es and consumers in more markets) in order to be closer to the consumer, reducing latencies and performing at higher rates. e risk of natural disasters is also an element to consider when thinking about location. Is your data center posi- tioned in an area that experiences many earthquakes, hurricanes, tornados or other potential weather-related issues? In 2013, IDC found that less than 20 percent of the data in the digital universe is "touched" by the cloud: either stored, perhaps temporarily, or processed in some way. But by 2020, that percentage will double to 40 percent. This projection alone is a big jump, but evidence has led us to believe that the cloud will make an even bigger splash than originally expected, as the digital universe is more than doubling every two years!