Thanks to the increasing demands and digitalization, the data center industry has grown by leaps and bounds over the past few years. This has been forecasted by experts that the industry will reach $226 billion by the year 2022, and year-on-year growth is expected around 11%. However, this rapidly increasing demand is not the only challenge faced by data center operators. Data centers are moving towards sustainability, they are going green, and achieving these sustainability targets can prove to be difficult for businesses that are operating older data centers. So, if you are among them, and looking forward to making your data center more efficient and sustainable, then modernizing your legacy data center is the way you should choose.

Why modernize your older/existing data center?

If you are operating in an older data center for a long time, your business may need to deal with some unexpected challenges. Some of the common challenges include a lack of flexibility to meet rapid growth, inefficient cooling, lesser space to add more capacity, and many more. Such issues need to be addressed timely so that you can put your modernization efforts in the right direction. If increasing the capacity is the only goal you have, then all you need to do is add prefabricated modular data centers having one or more rows of racks grouped together with dedicated row-based cooling. You can have more energy-efficient and innovative systems when you are operating on the approach of scale as you grow.

You can also choose to upgrade all the older physical infrastructure components including electrical distribution systems, and UPSs. Using the latest UPSs electrical distribution systems, you can be assured that you have a lesser cost of ownership, the lifespan is better than before, and you move towards sustainability.

Think beyond hardware upgrades

Data center modernization is more than just upgrading and/or replacing hardware. All the software and data maintenance solutions have also become highly advanced in the last few years, and data center managers need to assess them as well. With the help of digitally connected sensors, you can get the right information and insights regarding adaptability, efficiency, and how you can do optimization.

If you want to implement digitalization, you can do it simply by retrofitting electrical systems with smart devices all connected with energy and power management. This will also help the entire data center team, it will enable monitoring of software to make use of this data and optimize performance, performing condition-based maintenance, and also keep track of energy consumption. It will help in eliminating unwanted service visits, save you crucial time, and extend the life of your data center. There's one more key advantage of this approach, businesses can upgrade the active components, of the current electrical equipment, and the modernization process will not cause any kind of material wastage.

Finding the right data center partner

 The right data center partner becomes more and more crucial to simplify your modernization journey. You need to collaborate with an experienced vendor to ensure that all your modernization goals are met. Connect with a company having in-depth knowledge and experience in working with the latest technology to help leverage digitalization and incorporate sustainable solutions. The right partner will provide you with the right insights regarding refurbishing, retrofitting, or replacing to meet all your business needs within the specified budget. A vendor can help you prepare for the future, can streamline the entire planning process, and help mitigate losses. Another important thing to keep in mind is that your vendor should also provide you with the support and guidance needed after the completion of the modernization project.

Know these key tips for agile data center infrastructure

Avoiding the need for data center modernization or not doing timely upgrades can prove to be risky for businesses. Data center modernization has become a key necessity, regardless of the location of the data center- in the cloud, on-premise, on the edge, or any other combination. To be more specific, the physical data center must adapt to the supported application portfolio. If you are not focusing on modernization, you are compromising with responsiveness and performance of the data center. While making some changes in the application, it is important to know that it will have a profound impact on the IT equipment required. Some key reasons behind the aging of data center physical infrastructure include the increasing use of GPUs as well as the Internet of Things (IoT). Increasing higher density computers and storage will need some modifications and redesigning to avoid downtime whereas power and cooling systems may still be functional. There can be an exponential workload increase on the data center infrastructure when real-time data is processed in large quantities. With this vast amount of data, IT and network administrators may need to face some new set of challenges.

Prioritizing modernization

Before you get started with modernization, it is advisable to start with the aspects that are going to affect reliability and performance the most. Modern data centers need to be highly available and should scale as per the requirements while providing powerful processing and AI capabilities, the entire focus needs to be on scalability, security, and visibility.

You also need to ensure a cyber and physically secure environment, this can be achieved with the help of a technology ecosystem that will protect customer data. Software as a Service (SaaS) based asset management products can provide you with the required visibility. All the devices on the network can be easily seen by data center staff on their phones. There is a dashboard with the help of which administrators can dive into any device or alarm and also do any kind of required troubleshooting.

Things to consider regarding power protection and redundancy

 The highest level of availability is needed by servers and systems within a data center, this needs to be identified and configured to provide all the needed support for longer runtime, and a higher level of redundancy. Place them in separate racks and separate areas, it can help in increasing the availability of critical systems, the concept of targeted availability works really well and it's a cost-effective solution. You should consider two important aspects- precision cooling and density control, both Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) technologies need compute power that produces concentrated heat, and precision air cooling devices should be in place.

Don't forget about industry-specific needs

IT is becoming increasingly important in a wide range of businesses and industries. hence, IT and data center staff need to be well aware of how general technology trends can have an impact on physical infrastructure, and also business-specific transformations. For instance, data centers have become the heart of the retail industry, they are capable of processing hundreds of thousands of orders that can come from the storefront, website warehouses, or any other place. Ultimately, they help in providing better customer experiences.

Final words

So, now that you are aware of the reasons to modernize your data center, data center modernization needs to be on top of your priority list. Connect with a highly experienced and reliable team to get all your data center modernization needs to be done as per your specific business needs.