When an organization experiences significant growth, its IT infrastructure must keep pace.  Many growing companies today have multiple IT service providers addressing their requirements.  However, this vendor arrangement may further complicate issues as a company continues to grow.  Therefore, it may be prudent for organizations to consider consolidating data center operations and support under one service provider.

With a single provider, the company can expect more consistency in operations and control.  For example, security, scalability, performance and other critical factors become more focused and easier to manage with a single line of reporting across multiple locations.

Companies choose colocation for scalability, reliability, redundancy, security and simplicity benefits.  An experienced provider with a well-run data center facility can address a company’s demands quickly and easily.  The decision for many companies is not whether to use a colocation model, but whether to use one or more providers to serve multiple locations.

The benefits of using a single provider across a company’s multiple locations include the following:

• Standardized reporting
• Simplified partner relationships
• Uniform compliance
• Easier escalation of problems and standardized processes
• Greater negotiating positions

The right colocation model and number of providers will depend on each company’s specific requirements.  However, in most cases, the scale will tilt to using a single provider for data center support functions.

Continue to read the CoreLink Data Centers’ Blog for more information about our data center service solutions.

Few, if any, businesses can survive without the critical operations of their data centers.  And as complexity increases, so does the job of keeping all systems available.  Further adding to the challenge of managing data center operations is the steady growth expected in capacity and density.

According to the 2011 National Study on Data Center Downtime, the mean cost of any data center outage was $505,502.  A partial outage was estimated at $258,149 and a full shutdown of data center operation was more than $680,000.

With these incredibly high numbers, it’s no surprise data center managers and operators are completely focused on maintaining complete available of all operations.  However, expert data center service providers will also ensure the data center operates efficiently while ensuring availability.

Power and other resources should be managed to accomplish both goals:  100 percent uptime and efficient operation.  As energy consumption and electrical costs continue to escalate, data center managers must continually look for ways to reduce both.  Environmental pressures also play into the focus on reduced power usage.

Another crucial requirement for data center management is flexibility.  A data center operation must be able to scale quickly and economically as business needs change.

Although efficiency and flexibility play key roles in data center capabilities, businesses can’t afford to achieve these goals at the expense of availability.  Data center uptime still remains the number one priority for data center managers.

Best practices will continue to evolve and data centers will grow more efficient and flexible.  The most experienced operators will be able to optimize efficiency and flexibility while maintaining systems availability.

Continue to read the CoreLink Data Centers’ Blog for more information about our data center service solutions.

When companies outgrow their data centers and need more resources like physical space or power, they need to undertake the challenging feat of migrating their data center operations.  A migration affects everyone in the organization, not just the IT managers.

To make the move as painless as possible, data center managers should thoroughly analyze the process and then take the five following steps:

Step 1:  Develop a requirements document for the next five to six years.  As requirements increase year after year, make sure corresponding power, cooling, floor space, storage and other resources keep pace as well.

Step 2:  Determine the required space layout.  The basis for this determination should begin with how information flows within the data center.  For example, the network termination equipment should be located closest to the network entrance.  Although fork-lift upgrades are unlikely within a five year time period, data center managers still need to plan for growth.

Step 3:  Plan for electrical and telecommunications cabling.  It makes sense to pull fiber to each cabinet and plan what’s going to be constructed the under-the-floor so it can be done at the start of the migration.

Step 4:  List the entire inventory for the data center.  Include all network components as well as internal and vendor contacts.

Step 5:  With the list developed in Step 4, begin adding the required migration processes for each data center component.  As the migration processes are identified, data center managers can update the floor layout.  In each iteration, growth must be accommodated until the facility is at full capacity.

Although data center migrations are extremely complex, time-consuming and labor intensive, the project can go smoother with good planning and analysis.  Breaking the project into steps can help make it more manageable.  Working with an accomplished data center service provider can help streamline the project as well.

Continue to read the CoreLink Data Centers’ Blog for more information about our data center service solutions.