industry news
NETAPP SURVEY: ENTERPRISE APPS DRIVE NEED FOR HIGH PERFORMANCE STORAGE
NetApp’s industry research on flash adoption in EMEA reveals that
applications, cited as the most critical to business continuity.
enterprises require high performance storage to support critical
Over half (52 per cent) said customers would become frustrated
applications, but almost a quarter have no plans to adopt flash
and almost half (45.8 per cent) said customers would lose
technologies.
confidence towards their business if flash storage and the
Out of the 3,000 IT decision makers surveyed across the UK,
enterprise apps support failed for an hour at peak time. Almost
France and Germany, 85 per cent are directly responsible for IT
half (48 per cent) said this situation would cause the business to
buying decisions.
lose money.
Key findings in the survey include:
Payments, CRM and business intelligence apps are most
performance hungry: Almost half (46 per cent) of all survey
participants agree that within their businesses, there is a need
for high performance storage technologies. Payment processing,
Customer Relations Management (CRM) and Business
Intelligence applications require the most consistent levels of high
performance, to support business continuity.
E
MEA flash market is not saturated: Despite claiming to have
high performance storage requirements, almost a quarter of
IT decision makers say they do not support any applications
with flash. Furthermore, only 16 per cent use flash to
support payment processing, CRM and Business Intelligence
Flash awareness and opportunity for growth is high: Over three
quarters (78 per cent) of IT decision makers are knowledgeable
enough to invest in flash – the knowledge is strongest among
large businesses (28 per cent). Despite this awareness, 28 per
cent of respondents from large EMEA businesses do not have
flash, and have no plans to adopt it. Almost one in five (18 per
cent) EMEA businesses are planning to adopt flash and almost
half (48 per cent) have already adopted it. Meanwhile, among the
region’s larger and medium businesses, 14 per cent plan to adopt
flash, with the largest potential for growth occur among smaller
businesses (17 per cent).
NetApp’s survey of 3,000 IT decision makers across the UK,
France and Germany was conducted by Opinion Matters in May 2016.
European Data Centre Association announces new managing director
The European Data Centre Association has announced the
appointment of Nicola Hayes as managing director of the organisation.
Nicola will be responsible for the day-to-day running of the
association and will work closely with the chairman and board to
ensure that its members are effectively represented and strategic
objectives communicated and implemented.
The decision is part of a long term plan to widen the association’s
membership and relevance across Europe. During its annual meeting
in June, the board recognised that the industry is in a period of
change and determined that the association needed to be able to
evolve in order to best serve its members. The task of leading the
association during this period falls to the new chairman, Apostolos
Kakkos, CEO of Lamda Helix, the Greek data centre operator,
together with a newly appointed board. Speaking about Nicola’s
appointment, Kakkos said, ‘In order to ensure the growth of the
association and its relevance to operators of all sizes across Europe,
it was determined that a managing director, independent of the
member organisations, should be taken on. We are delighted to have
Nicola on board. Her long history of working within the industry at
both European and international levels as well as her experience of
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working with other national trade associations will prove invaluable to
the long term success of the European Data Centre Association.’
Nicola Hayes, together with board members, will be present at
the BroadGroup DataCloud Nordic event in Stockholm on the 20th
October, where a briefing will be held explaining the Association’s
aims, objectives and member benefits.