Are data centers in our world or our world is in data centers?
Data centers are becoming a vital component in the development of our technology and application. I think of Datacenters as libraries, record rooms, and experimental data storage rooms. In the previous century, scientists used record rooms in a university or their homes to keep a record of their scientific readings and used libraries for references of previous theories on the subject. Libraries were used to hold information about discoveries, and inventions of the world, but in the current era data centers have taken over and everything is being stored in these data centers. Previously, we had to go to the library or record rooms to access the information which cost buying racks, paying rents (in the case of personalized record rooms and libraries), provide energy resources and manpower. Amazon, Dell Inc., Huawei, and many other companies like them store information which only was accessible from libraries. In current times, we can hire hardware from the data centers and also use their services with just a single click. Therefore, it is a more efficient way of storing and accessing information and also to analyze data.
Now about the data centers, it is a physical facilities used by organizations to house their critical data of applications. The design of the data center is based on the network of storage and computing resources to enable the delivery of shared data and applications.
The old traditional on-premises physical servers are being integrated with modern data centers. Modern datacenter shifted their infrastructure to virtual networks which give support to applications and workloads in a multi-cloud environment. In the current era, data is connected with multiple data centers, the edge, and public and private clouds. The sole components of the data center are network infrastructure which connects servers (physical and virtualized), data center services, and external connectivity to end-user from data center service and storage. The fuel of any modern data center is storage infrastructure as it holds data and from this data computing resources drive the applications, as servers provide, memory, local storage, processing, and network connectivity.
There are many types of data centers that are being used, first is ‘co-location’ which is also known as “Carrier hotel” which is a type of data center in which you can rent equipment, space, and bandwidth from the owner. The second type is ‘Enterprise’ in which the data center is fully owned by an organization to process their internal data and host critical application missions. The third is ‘Cloud’ which is a third-party service that can be set up in the cloud, similar to colocation but in this type of data center, we can take advantage of specific services instead of just renting the hardware. Fourth is the ‘Edge Data Center’ it is smaller than a usual data center and it is close to the end-user. Instead of having a huge data center facility that creates latency and lag in providing the data to the user, we can have edge locations in the areas which are closer to the user. Last is ‘Micro Data Center’ which is just like an edge but it is much smaller, it can be arranged in a single office room. This type of data center is set up to process the data of a specific region.
Using data centers companies can increase the productivity of any company as it enhances the ability of any company in operation, better use of IT assets, and higher availability and flexibility. Data centers can reduce costs as any organization can increase their investments and also reduce them in the specific field in case of business fluctuations. Data centers also enable the companies to centralize their data infrastructure which helps them to reduce the landscape of attacks.
Now let’s talk about the scope of data centers by viewing the investments and gains of the companies competing in the data center market. Taking a view at the scope of data center market services its size has exceeded up to 15 billion USD in 2020 and it is set to grow more at 10.5% CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) till 2027. The high demand for maintaining optimum operations and maximizing productivity during the infrastructure upgrades and storage transformation has fueled the industry’s growth. The increasing number of new data centers throughout the world will raise the demand for services that enable maximum throughput from facilities. For instance, to cater the growing demand for video conferencing Zoom Video Communications launched a data center in Singapore in August 2020. Likewise, Oracle Corporation launched its second data center to enhance the digital transformation and economic growth in India in June 2020.
The company which has the largest data center in the world is ‘China Telecom’ which is securing almost 50 % of the market share in China’s data center market. China Telecom has 400 data centers around the world. The largest company which has the most data centers in the world is ‘Equinix’ which has 202 data centers around the world and servers in 24 countries including UK and USA. The main companies operating in the data center services market include Cisco System, Dell Inc., Equinix Inc., Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., HP Enterprise Company, HCL Techs Ltd., and Fujitsu Ltd.
In Europe, around 30 % of shares have been accounted for in the data center services market from colocation applications and it is projected to grow at the rate of 14% and above till 2027. Advanced techs have been employed by data center colocation providers to ensure the best functioning of assets for customer satisfaction. Colocation services have become very popular due to the rise in SMEs (Small and Mid-Size Enterprise) in Europe. Equinix, Inc. has opened its third data center in Poland which offers 475 cabinets and approximately 1400 sq/meter of collocation space. Likewise, Digital Reality in July 2019 has established its data centers in Frankfurt, Germany. Colocation providers are enhancing their offerings to hold their place in the increasing market competition, there is a high demand for data center services for the most favorable infrastructure management.
The Asia Pacific data center services have been estimated to grow at a 13% CAGR of market share by 2027. Due to the popularity and acceptance of cloud computing techs in Asia, China’s data center market will grow at a considerable rate. The demand for data center services has increased due to the incorporation of cloud technology and also increased the demand for massive storage requirements. Alibaba Cloud has invested about 28 Billion USD from 2020 till now to build high-performance data centers in the market. The company also in July 2020 launched its third data center in Indonesia in 2021 to support Alibaba Cloud Services. Expansion in the cloud industry has encouraged the demand for data center consulting, training, and integration services.
The increase in usage of data center services has increased the demand for consulting services, an idea has been floated that consulting services in the data center will achieve a 6% CAGR through 2027 in the United States. Micro and edge data centers depend on market trends such as cloud computing and IoT which has created them vital for organizations. Organizations are transiting from traditional to modern infrastructures and for this transition to the latest infrastructures consulting service is playing an important role.
Digital technologies nowadays have become very important in our daily lives and these technologies are mostly dependent on data centers, while mentioning the benefits of data centers we have to mention the impact it is having on our ecosystem. It is estimated that data centers worldwide use more than 2% of the world’s electricity and generate an equal amount of carbon emissions as the global airline industry (in terms of fuel consumption). According to Professor John Naughton of British Open University, data centers use around 50% of all energy consumed by the digital ecosystem (personal devices use 34% and manufacturing industries use 16%). The more new technologies emerge in the market there will be more severe impacts on the earth’s atmosphere due to these emissions. As per, a Paper published at the University of Massachusetts Amherst showed that training an AI could emit five times more carbon than a car used to emit during an average person’s lifetime. These data storage centers are contributing to global warming as these data storage centers are emitting carbon into the atmosphere.
We have to come up with a plan to reduce the carbon emissions from these data centers to maintain our ecosystem and give a better world to our coming generations. Renewable and eco-friendly energy may be introduced which emits less carbon into our atmosphere. Data centers are using water for cooling towers to enhance cooling efficiency which is consuming a lot of water, therefore, a comprehensive plan may be executed to save drinking and clean water by using the water already used instead of potable water which will help to reduce the pressure on the local usable water.
