Large firms face big data proliferation challenge

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Data growth is the biggest issue facing data centre managers at large firms, a survey has shown.

Almost half of respondents to a Gartner poll ranked data growth in their top three data centre hardware infrastructure challenges.

To cope with the proliferation of data, firms have looked to archiving and retirement projects, as 62 per cent said they will start funding such initiatives or will maintain current investment in them through to the end of 2011.

"While all the top data centre hardware infrastructure challenges impact cost to some degree, data growth is particularly associated with increased costs relative to hardware, software, associated maintenance, administration and services," said April Adams, research director at Gartner.

"Given that cost containment remains a key focus for most organisations, positioning technologies to show that they are tightly linked to cost containment, in addition to their other benefits, is a promising approach."

System performance and scalability was placed in the top three challenges by 37 per cent, making it the second biggest data centre infrastructure issue.

“As the global economy begins to revive in 2010 and organisations start to shift focus to a return to growth, IT organisations will be challenged to support the various growth initiatives," said Naveen Mishra, principal research analyst at Gartner.

"Many data centre managers were forced to defer infrastructure upgrades and extend technology refresh cycles in 2009 and, as a result, are now dealing with an aging infrastructure or, in some cases, product obsolescence.”

Vendors who wish to take advantage of this need for system updates should offer infrastructure solutions that are high in efficiency and provide scalability, Mishra advised.

As for what drivers would be behind strategic change in data centres through to the end of 2011, business continuity and availability were ranked in first.

Cost containment projects and maintaining or improving user service levels and satisfaction were in second and third respectively.

Gartner recently advised businesses to address their data centre energy use so it does not become an escalating problem.

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