Author: Giuliano Di Vitantonio, Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer, Interxion
While most don’t realise it, the data centre industry is the backbone of our current digital society. Though data centres might sound like a somewhat distant concept to an everyday consumer, they allow us to enjoy countless benefits of technology in our daily lives.
Streaming services, gaming and social media represent but a fraction of the way our lives have been enhanced by the high connectivity and data storage services data centres provide. If you’ve ever communicated with loved ones via messaging apps, worked remotely, stored photos and videos digitally, completed mobile payments, purchased things like insurance policies online, or really, anything that involves a wi-fi connection, you’ve benefitted from the power and connectivity of data centres, even if you didn’t know it.
But how exactly do data centres provide technical support for these day-to-day activities we often take for granted?
Digital Transformation Requires Powerful Infrastructure
Businesses have always needed a powerful infrastructure that’s capable of providing high connectivity and performance in order to deliver these day-to-day experiences for consumers.
But as digital transformation remains top of mind, and businesses look to leverage the massive amounts of data – 90 percent of all existing data today was generated in the past two years, with 2.5 quintillion bytes of data created each day at our current pace – being generated by new technologies including AI, the Internet of Things and 5G, they’re requiring evolved infrastructure capabilities, including the need for increased connectivity and flexibility, lower latency, direct cloud access, and secure, high-performant computing capabilities, to name a few.
The problem is that enterprises don’t intend to manage this new, complicated IT infrastructure in a proprietary facility. For example, technologies like AI require an immense amount of processing power that enterprises simply can’t support or afford to maintain on their own. Most companies with on-prem data centres don’t have enough expertise to calibrate them professionally or access the best available technology. As a result, these facilities become a huge money sink and use unnecessary large amounts of energy.
The Future of the Data Centre: Colocation
Colocated data centres on the other hand, help businesses adopt the digital technologies that give them a competitive advantage, increase business agility, and enable new business models. In addition to providing businesses with improved network security and overall cost-savings on IT infrastructure, interconnection capabilities through colocated data centres help businesses grow their geographic reach as they seek to get content as close to end-users as possible and serve users in new regions. Direct connectivity to the cloud and other platforms through colocation creates a connected community that allows enterprises to access a rich array of partners and services while retaining access to their own infrastructure. Colocating also provides flexibility and scalability, allowing businesses to meet their current needs and grow in the future.
Interxion’s colocated data centres serve businesses across all industries, helping them meet their pressing infrastructure needs in ways that impact their consumers’ daily lives. For example, commuters expect train operators to deliver a speedy, reliable end-user experience when it comes to buying tickets through their mobile ticket app. As a result, one major train operator chose to colocate with Interxion, moving their critical infrastructure closer to the internet exchange and establishing a better connection with AWS. By connecting directly to the cloud, colocation enables a flawless mobile experience for end-users, even when tens of thousands of ticket purchases are being processed instantaneously. The bottom line? While consumers may not think about the data centre requirements involved in purchasing a mobile train ticket, businesses know they can’t compromise on connectivity, performance and reliability if they want essential processes to run smoothly.
Developing Sustainable Solutions
You can imagine that playing this significant role in our digital worlds requires immense amounts of power – that we cannot deny. But, over the past decade, the entire industry has invested significant resources into developing critical green technology that mitigates the environmental impact. In fact, Interxion has led by example in improving energy efficiency through technological innovations and operational behaviours.
We have pioneered unique energy-saving designs, harnessing everything from arctic winds to underground aquifers to reduce our carbon footprint. Some of Interxion’s first-of-its-kind energy efficiency designs include groundwater and seawater cooling systems, leveraging air-free cooling systems, and reusing excess heat to warm nearby residential households. As a result of our commitment to sustainability, we have met our goal to be 100 percent powered by renewable energy since 2017, completing our liquid and hybrid liquid cooling designs, and have improved our power usage effectiveness (PUE) metric across our entire European footprint.
Developing these cutting edge, sustainable innovations in data centre design and management is just one way Interxion is changing the industry’s perception from power guzzler to environmental leader. What’s more, the businesses leveraging these green facilities also reduce their own environmental footprint by association. Improving your business performance with high connectivity, low latency, and security networks and more by housing your infrastructure in a green, carrier- and cloud-neutral data centre – it’s a win-win.
Celebrating International Data Centre Day gives us the opportunity to recognise the champions that support the most exciting innovations in our industry. At Interxion, we’re looking forward to continuing to innovate the data centre industry, ultimately enabling our customers to innovate within their own industries, as well.
To learn more about how colocating with Interxion can help your business, click here.