Understanding the Business Benefits of Colocation

Rowland Kinch has led Custodian Data Centres since its inception. He not only oversees the corporate aims, but works with the technical director and his team to ensure that the business strategy is supporting the very best technical requirements.

As more and more companies shift from individual servers to networked systems, they are realizing that the original benefit of running their own server room is being outweighed by the advantages of a colocation solution. Many companies do not realize that you can save money and have greater resilience in a data center.

Maximizing Business Potential

Reductions in operational expenditure and the ability to focus your IT team on your core business, means that data centers offer organizations the ability to maximize the potential within their businesses. Do businesses have a team where people are available 24/7/365 to re-boot servers when they fail at 3 a.m.? Colocation companies specialize in data center and network services so businesses don’t have to.

For financial directors and IT directors, colocation provides the perfect win-win scenario, providing cost savings and delivering state-of-the-art infrastructure. When comparing the capabilities of a standard server room to a colocation solution, an assessment of the power alone demonstrates the gap between in-house solutions and utilizing the expertise of a specialist.

While many in-house server rooms have access to power and may well have air conditioning and battery back-ups, this system does not fully protect infrastructure. Organizations need to consider whether their power solution also include diverse power feeds and distribution paths, with dual generator systems that can be re-fuelled while in operation as well as onsite fuel reserves. Do they have diverse cooling systems, with UPS support in place? Who is monitoring their power and battery levels 24/7? Do they have a 100 percent uptime solution?

Connected Globally, Quickly, Securely

When it comes to connectivity, colocation means a business is connected globally, quickly and securely. We find that many companies with onsite server rooms often do not have onsite access to a resilient Internet connection, nor do they have dedicated personnel monitoring traffic flow to ensure they always remain on.

Colocation enables organizations to benefit from faster networking and resilient connectivity at a fairly low price – delivering 100 mbps of bandwidth might be hard at an office location and trying to create a redundant solution is often financially unviable. Data centers are connected to multiple transit providers and also have large bandwidth pipes meaning that businesses often benefit from a better service for less cost.

Sustaining Your Infrastructure

With these considerations in mind, some organizations start to look to cloud solutions rather than colocation. However, cloud does not provide organizations with a fully auditable system and the ability to have full control over their own infrastructure. Colocation often enables businesses to avoid spending money on storage bills in the cloud as it is often cheaper to store information on their own servers.

From the periodic necessary replacement of UPS batteries, to the maintenance and testing of UPS systems, the hidden costs of sustaining your infrastructure to optimal levels can be surprising. As part of a standard colocation solution, organizations instantly benefit from high level security with ISO 27001 accredited processes, onsite security teams and infrastructure.

Additionally, data centers have the time, resources and impetus to continually invest in and research green technologies. This means that businesses can reduce their carbon footprint at their office locations and benefit from continual efficiency saving research. Companies that move their servers from in-house server rooms typically save 90 percent on their own carbon emissions.

Location, Location, Location

Choosing a colocation provider away from a city or data center hub with optimal connectivity options – both to the capital, Europe and further afield – means having the advantages of all central data centers with the added benefits of having attractive power capabilities and the security of being away from centrally targeted terrorist activity. Out-of-town colocation providers allow businesses to take full advantage of the capital’s infrastructure without the premium costs associated with it.

A colocation solution provides companies with a variety of opportunities, with exceptional SLAs and having data secured off-site, providing organizations with added levels of risk management and the chance to invest in better equipment and state-of-the-art servers. This can enable IT teams the possibility to explore options such as virtualization and condense the amount of racks and servers required.

Colocation providers are able to meet business requirements at a lower cost than if the service was kept in-house. Data centers and colocation providers have the ability to have businesses up and running within hours, as well as provide the flexibility to grow alongside your organization. Colocation space, power, bandwidth and connection speeds can all be increased where required to ensure that all sizes of colocation clients can be catered to.

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