-- Human beings revel in imagining what the future looks like. Whether it consists of classic sci-fi tropes like flying cars, clones and fully immersive virtual reality, or if it’s a more modest rendering of driverless vehicles and robots that pass the Turing Test, one thing underpins it all: data.
One thing that’s for sure about the future is that humans will depend almost entirely on technology. Automation, artificial intelligence, machine learning and virtual reality will all become part of people’s daily routines. Furthermore, as global internet access increases, the need for data storage increases with it.
Ian Bitterlin from Data Centre Dynamics sums up the situation: “20 or 25% of the world has internet access and generates data, the other 75% of the world wants it. The 25% that has it is on an exponential curve of data generation, 20% ahead of Moore’s Law. We are going to run out of power unless we have paradigm changes [in data storage].”
So, before notions of cloning, robotics and smart assistants can be entertained, it must consider how the historical and real time data that fuels these new technologies will be stored.
Efficient, affordable data storage
Understandably, data storage is a hot topic. Currently, scientists and researchers are working feverishly on designing storage centres fit for the future. These conversations go much deeper than how to arrange servers: data centres will soon begin to incorporate innovative technologies like liquid cooling, molecular-level data storage, blockchain and AI. And this is just the beginning.
In anticipation of a data-driven future, an ’arms race’ is brewing among the world’s research hubs. In order to be competitive, tomorrow’s data centres must ensure they are fast, efficient and reliable. Given that in the next decade businesses will rely almost entirely upon cloud storage, centres must be affordable enough to win commercial clients. They also need to be practical – physical size and environmental impact are critical factors.
Choosing the right climate to build data centres is also important. “The world has been slow to respond to its environmental responsibilities,” says Ross Archer, CEO of Viderium, a UK-based data centre management company. “As well as being cost saving for the business, the benefit of a cold climate is that it enables you to focus on not putting any additional pressure on the environment,” he explains.
Competition to build the best data centres will drive fast change, with some regions adopting new technologies faster than others. Arguably, developing countries with less legacy IT infrastructure will be react more quickly to innovation than developed ones. For example, the average data centre constructed before 2018 will need substantial upgrades to handle demand in five years time.
What will future data centres look like?
As Microsoft’s David Gauthier argues, “The amount of human intervention [in data centres] is going to decline over time”. Ed Ansett from i3 agrees: “I believe we will continue to evolve towards a model where you will see a very high degree of automation in the data center.” However, it seems that humans aren’t out of a job just yet. As Ansett says, “There will have to be some type of human control over it, but this will be considerably less.” Ansett thinks payment models are in line for shake up, too: “[We will] move to a world of dynamic resource allocation, where the cloud enables customers to pay per use instead of static payment.” He argues that by 2020, data centres will have the ability to be shut down and brought back up on demand.
Finally, one wonders where all of these data centres will live. Gauthier and Bitterlin think containers are the future. “I think we will still be building large white boxes in a modular way,” says Bitterlin. Gauthier discusses an example of a portable data centre: “We deployed containers in Chicago – it takes a day to get them off the truck and placed and plugged in. That is hugely valuable to a cloud provider.”
The architects of tomorrow’s data centres face both enormous and exciting challenges. In order to cope with the booming demand for storage, they must be agile, innovative and efficient. They must also keep their eye on the commercial prize. Given corporate reliance upon cloud data, affordability is a priority. Whatever happens, data centres are at the helm of technology’s next frontier, and it looks like an exciting one.
About Viderium
Based in London, Viderium is a data centre manufacturer specialising in the creation and operation of High-Performance Computing facilities. Founded in 2017 Viderium has existing locations rolled out across the UK, Netherlands, and Latvia with a road map and future plans for HPC locations across Iceland, Latvia and Canada.
Contact Info:
Name: Viderium
Email: Send Email
Organization: Viderium
Website: https://viderium.com/
Release ID: 419621
Google
RSS