14
INTERVIEW
No limits
By Rob Coupland, Managing
Director EMEA, Digital Realty
www.digitalrealty.co.uk
We spoke to Rob Coupland from
Digital Realty about his views on
the data centre industry both now
and in the future…
Digital Realty was formed in 2004 and supports the data
centre, colocation and interconnection strategies of more
than 2,300 companies across its secure, network-rich,
portfolio of data centres located across the globe. Customers
include organisations of all sizes and types, ranging from
financial services, cloud and information technology
services, to manufacturing, energy, gaming, life sciences and
consumer products.
What have been the most significant changes in
the industry over the past five years?
Businesses have really woken up to the value and potential
opportunities in the data they hold. Where five years ago
a company’s data strategy was all about the mechanics of
storage and backup, firms are now focused on unlocking the
potential value held in their data. This has led to increased
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demands for data centre providers to enable a diverse
ecosystem of interconnection for their customers.
The adoption of innovative new technologies like Artificial
Intelligence (AI) and big data analytics has also led to
providers helping customers to do much more with their
data, and companies are increasingly adopting strategies to
unlock new benefits and financial rewards from it.
What are the main challenges for your sector?
The data centre industry is in a strong position at the
moment thanks to the rapid transformation in the creation
and use of data. The challenge, for now, is helping customers
to make the most of it to gain competitive advantages.
In the face of the overwhelming explosion of information,
driven by social networking, IoT, AI and mobility, companies
often struggle with the challenges of providing access to and
refining their data into real business value. This depends on
businesses having access to the right data and engineering
skills to extract that value.
Another challenge for the sector is the speed at which
business ecosystems are becoming dependent on digital
ecosystems. Being in the right location with the appropriate
speed and agility for a digital ecosystem to be competitive
is a challenge we see customers face. Data centre providers
need to offer flexibility in data environments so customers
can respond rapidly to this transformation.
In many countries, underinvestment in foundational
infrastructure such as Internet connectivity and power
threaten continued growth. Businesses and governments
need to invest in both, and the data centre sector’s role here
is to encourage this and illustrate to them the benefits of
that investment.
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