INDUSTRY INTELLIGENCE POWERED BY THE DCA
INDUSTRY INTELLIGENCE POWERED BY THE DCA
Is the industry on
the Edge of a great
opportunity?
The term ‘Edge Computing’ is now widely used among
business leaders as we discover more about its potential.
Stephen Whatling, Chairman at Business Critical Solutions,
discusses how Edge Computing is contributing to the
development of the data centre landscape to support the
growing demand for connectivity and availability.
T
The changing landscape
The data centre landscape is
fundamentally changing and alongside
the hyperscale development we are also
seeing an increasing market towards
Edge data centres to support a growing
need for greater connectivity and data
availability. While the decentralised data
centre model has been around in various
guises for some time, it fell out of favour
for a lot of businesses as they sought
to exploit the efficiencies of operating
fewer, larger data centres.
However, the phenomenal growth of
the Internet of Things (IoT) is driving
a resurgence in its popularity. Cisco is
predicting that in the five years up to
2022, 1.4 billion Internet users will have
been added, there will be 10.5 billion
more devices and connections and
broadband speeds will have increased
by over 90%. Only Edge networks can
provide the high connectivity and low
latency required by the IoT to meet users’
expectations and demands for instant
access to content and services.
The rise of AI
In addition, the rise of AI and immersive
technologies such as Virtual and
www.intelligentdatacentres.com
Augmented Reality (VR/AR) is also a factor
that will help drive this move. While not
perhaps mainstream yet, many sectors
are assessing the benefits. For example, in
the manufacturing environment the now
ubiquitous robots on many production
lines can be improved and their role
expanded by AI.
A report found that 92% of senior
manufacturing leaders believe that the
‘smart factory’ will help them increase
productivity and empower their staff
to work smarter, but a similar Forrester
report also found that only one in eight
large manufacturing businesses are using
any form of AI. However, these kinds of
innovations require a lot of computing
power and an almost immediate response
as a single machine that ‘pauses for
thought’ could create a knock-on effect
that causes immeasurable damage to the
factory, production line and productivity.
Once again, Edge Computing is best
placed to support this.
In the case of AI and AR, speed is an
important factor. In the Edge, decision-
making is held closer to the point of need
and as a result the reduction in latency
between the device and the processing
power enables a much faster response
time. Equally important, the data itself
Issue 13
21