Steve Beber of TRACKIT
Q & A solution to suit every client need . Our range of services and solutions include : Data Standards Workshop – running data standards workshops to help customers define and agree on consistent naming and labelling standards for all their data centre assets . This helps drive accuracy , consistency and develops effective processes to maintain robust and trusted asset data . Audit Services – We conduct data centre audits all around the globe for customers looking to get accurate data fast . Our audit team have helped hundreds of data centre owners to drive down their utility costs , optimise capacity and identify legacy equipment . We audit everything from floor mounted devices , M & E equipment , racks and cabinets to rack mounted devices , servers , switches and routers . Plus , any asset that takes up physical space including device mounted devices like switch cards / blade servers . All visible assets are audited including serial numbers / asset tags / service details which are scanned , captured and reported on from day one . We can also audit power and network connectivity to enable customers to have knowledge of any single points of failure and port availability . We give our clients full visibility of their data centre assets to empower them with the knowledge to drive full data centre optimisation DCAM Enterprise / Cloud Solution – We also provide our Enterprise solution for managing full data centre lifecycle asset management , this gives complete visibility of all assets contained within a customer environment on a web based solution . We can host this data in the cloud or alternatively the customer can host this internally within their network environment . TRACKIT Enterprise provides easy access to floor plans , rack elevations and reporting / dashboarding . This enables users to maintain , manage and report on all of their data centre environments for more effective data centre planning and decision making . Generic Asset Management – Our soon to be released platform is a ‘ pay as you grow ’ cloud based solution for maintaining all assets inside and outside of data centre environments . It provides the ability to track property , furniture , IT and any physical assets online . With our IOS / Android Apps it also enables customers to scan , take photos and add / move / delete assets simply from your smartphone or web browser .
Can update us on any projects you are currently working on ?
We are currently engaged in a large US project for one of the biggest mobile telecommunications providers .
The project entails auditing over 50 of their main data centres across the US and providing the data back to them to enable complete visibility of their estate and potential capacity . The project will be conducted over seven months and the end goal is to enable the customer to decide how they consolidate and drive power / capacity efficiency from the data that we provide . We are also a BAU tool for one of the world ’ s biggest financial institutions , and they are now starting their phase 2 deployment of our DCAM tool in the UK and Germany , after its already highly successful adoption in North / Central America and Asia . This forms a part of their overall global strategy in utilising TRACKIT services and solutions to be the front end data collection tool to enhance their current DCIM solution in place .
What do you see as the biggest threats to data centre functionality ?
In short , data centre owners not having full visibility of their data centre ; clients not knowing what they have in their data centre , how much real capacity they have and single points of failure such as devices that are on a single power feed without redundancy . Many companies believe they have their fingers on the pulse with regard to accurate asset management in their data centres but 9 / 10 times we have discovered this is not true . Our audit team routinely uncover 300 per cent more IT assets than data centre owners previously assumed they had . Typically , our audits provide our clients with the insight to reduce their power usage by between 15 and 30 per cent .
The cost of bad data can also lead to inaccurate and expensive decisions being made . In some cases , this can even be commissioning new data centre builds or taking on addition colocation space . This is based on the inaccurate picture of what ’ s in their data centre ( s ) and consequently a false perception that they are running out of power , space , cooling or capacity .
Do you think that DCIM has lived up to its potential ?
Definitely not . More and more I hear of failing DCIM implementation from our clients . TRACKIT is often brought in to help clients gain accurate asset data to try and drive some level of ROI from DCIM implementations . Truth be told many of these data centre owners never needed DCIM and would have just benefited from a step up from Microsoft Excel or Visio to a full lifecycle asset and capacity management solution ( like TRACKIT Enterprise ). It certainly feels like DCIM is no longer the trendy buzz word / acronym , but instead , many companies feel disillusioned by the smoke and mirrors and hugely disappointed that DCIM has not delivered the value it promised . It would appear that many don ’ t expect to see the immediate impact that was expected from implementing DCIM – the Uptime Institute , Data Center Industry Survey , 2015 revealed 49 per cent of enterprises ’ do not expect to see ROI from their DCIM within two the next two years ’.
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