DEEP DIVE challenging for the many data centre and facilities teams that don ’ t yet have a clear understanding of how their rooms are performing from a thermal , capacity and power perspective . DCIM systems might be great at cataloguing what they have in the data centre , but what operations teams need is real-time visibility into how their rooms are performing right now . It ’ s only with this kind of granular insight that you can start to make the right decisions about capacity optimisation and , ultimately , energy reduction .
The good news is that , with EkkoSense , the kind of data-driven decision-making and scenario planning is already available to help them make the transition from simply monitoring critical facilities to identifying and actioning the steps needed to unlock carbon savings . Given this , it ’ s disappointing that many operators – especially co-los – seem reluctant to take advantage of tools that guarantee both an OpEx and carbon footprint reduction based on existing installed equipment .
How do you deal with stress and unwind outside the office ?
Lots of golf and running keeps me busy and I try to fit in two or three half-marathons each year .
What do you currently identify as the major areas of investment in your industry ?
I WAS ONLY EVER REALLY INTERESTED IN SPORT AND TECHNOLOGY , SO IT WASN ’ T A DIFFICULT DECISION FOR ME TO GO DOWN THE IT ROUTE .
dramatically different energy costs – up to three times more expensive in Europe than the US – still make a huge difference when building compelling data centre optimisation solutions .
What changes to your job role have you seen in the last year and how do you see these developing in the coming months ?
Clearly the pandemic has had a massive impact – especially for data centre operations teams , who found it hard to get on-site in sufficient numbers due to lockdown challenges . Our ability to offer comprehensive remote data centre thermal monitoring proved an important differentiator for us and it ’ s a service that we believe will continue to be important as working conditions relax .
From my own perspective , perhaps the biggest change has been the arrival of Boris – our new pug . He ’ s become a regular fixture on EkkoSense Teams calls – whether he ' s welcome or not ! ◊
Organisations are keen to use energy in smarter ways , so we ’ re seeing more and more interest in the optimisation . Now particularly , we ’ re working to help data centre operators as they work to balance cooling data centres more efficiently and delivering energy savings while at the same time recognising that demands on critical facilities have never been so intense .
What are the region-specific challenges you encounter in your role ?
It ’ s important we recognise that we ’ re working in a sector that ’ s always changing , with often surprisingly significant regional variations . In the Middle East , for example , there ’ s less acceptance of the cloud model with many organisations still preferring perpetual on-premises pricing . In the APAC market there ’ s a much greater focus on data sovereignty . And we always need to understand how
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