The days of the onsite server room are numbered: Interactive

With Interactive's Eamonn Eason.

Where do you host customer data?

Customer data is hosted in Australia within Interactive’s data centre space and on our own equipment. For business critical applications, our customers recognise the benefits of this along with our security protocols and ISO 27001 certification.

When did you first get involved in data centre services?

Interactive has been supporting customers with our hardware maintenance contracts since 1989. We moved into disaster recovery services around 1992, driven by customer demand. Our data centre facilities initially supported disaster recovery systems, but they quickly developed into hosting facilities for customers’ production systems. 

What credentials do you have that apply to the data centre?

Interactive is ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certified. Interactive supports the need to reduce energy consumption within the data centre industry and has undertaken certification for NABERS Energy for one of our facilities in Melbourne.

Have you heard about any cool developments in the data centre space recently?

The adoption and use of IoT sensors within the data centre space is gaining momentum and challenging the traditional DCIM models. Energy consumption can also be monitored with live PUE by combining the sensor inputs.

Can you tell us about a recent deployment you have done?

Using IoT, we have undertaken a live PUE project with the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage to measure and reduce energy consumption.

What is driving customers’ data centre investments?

For most customers, data centres are not core business and it is being recognised that this critical function should be outsourced to professional operators. Customer expectations are for more resilient facilities at increasingly competitive prices. With the move of many IT functions to the cloud, the days of the onsite server room are numbered.

Data centres are...?

Not all the same. The data centre has been commoditised to some extent, but not all customer needs are the same. The initial price may be attractive, but look at the total cost of ownership and how aligned and flexible the organisation is in order to meet your business needs today and in the future.