Power efficiency is a strategic growth enabler
Written By Eric Herzog
Historically, CIOs have been in charge of managing servers, storage, networking and the associated budgets. Today, they must also manage something else – something that has become just as valuable as those resources – access to power.
As enterprise data continues to grow exponentially and AI workloads place increasing demands on infrastructure, power availability is emerging as one of critical constraints affecting growth potential and digital transformation rates.
Access to power has become a strategic issue. The enterprises that can most effectively manage their access to power will have a competitive advantage and greater control over how quickly they can grow, modernise their infrastructure and deploy AI. In this new world, power efficiency has become a strategic growth enabler.
New, power-constrained world
This situation has arisen because of tremendous data growth. Data has become the foundation of almost every business decision and supporting that data requires an ever-growing amount of energy. The challenge is that demand for power is now increasing faster than the infrastructure needed to supply it.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasts that electricity demand from data centres could increase by between two and three times by 2030. At the same time, Gartner predicts that up to 40% of AI data centres could experience operational issues by 2027, because of power constraints.
Importantly, this is not simply an issue because of the rapid adoption of AI – although AI is clearly exacerbating the problem. Yes, AI workloads are accelerating demand for power, but conventional enterprise data centres are also experiencing power shortages too, as enterprises continue their rapid expanding of digital operations.
This changing landscape has already prompted significant investment in new data centre capacity around the world, with operators increasingly considering proximity to sustainable energy sources as part of their planning. For instance, Amazon is reported to be building a new data centre next to a major river, with a view to harnessing the water as a source of sustainable energy. Smart thinking.
Why has power efficiency become a growth issue?
In an environment like this, power efficiency has become a driver of business agility and is no longer just a question of finding ways to reduce electricity bills.
Every watt that can be saved creates additional capacity that can be redirected towards innovation, new workloads and AI initiatives. Organisations with more efficient infrastructure create valuable operational headroom, allowing them to introduce new services without necessarily expanding their physical footprint or increasing power consumption at the same rate. This situation fundamentally changes how IT leaders need to be thinking about enterprise storage infrastructure investment.
In our new, power-constrained world, CIOs and CTOs need to manage watts as strategically as they manage capital expenditure because energy availability increasingly determines an enterprise’s ability to scale.
New concept of infrastructure efficiency
Traditionally, enterprise infrastructure has been evaluated against measures like performance, capacity and cost. Whilst these remain very important, another measure is becoming increasingly relevant: how efficiently does enterprise storage infrastructure use power to support increasing business workloads?
This requirement is reflected in the concept of “watts per workload” – a new metric that measures how efficiently enterprise storage supports growing application demands whilst consuming the least possible amount of energy. Rather than viewing energy efficiency solely as an operational metric, it becomes a measure of how effectively infrastructure enables business growth.
Power-efficient enterprise storage platforms provide enterprises with greater flexibility to absorb new workloads, extend the useful life of existing data centres and reduce the operational risks associated with constrained energy supplies. Ultimately, having an efficient infrastructure provides more options for future growth.
Creating space for innovation
Power efficiency also has a direct impact on how enterprises can allocate their finite resources. For instance, by consolidating enterprise storage onto high-capacity platforms and minimising what IT analysts refer to as “storage array sprawl,” enterprises can reduce both capital and operational expenditure while simplifying their IT infrastructure. The resulting efficiencies create opportunities to redirect budget and available power towards higher-value initiatives, including AI and other strategic transformation projects.
Winners are those with the most efficient infrastructure
Power has become much more than another operational consideration. It is now a strategic resource that directly influences the ability to expand infrastructure, deploy AI and support continued business growth. Every available watt has become a valuable strategic resource.
Tomorrow’s enterprise winners won’t be the enterprises that consume the most power. They will be the enterprises that make the best possible use of the power they have available, using it to maximise innovation, AI and long-term business growth. And CIOs and CTOs will find themselves managing watts with the same strategic importance as they manage their budgets, capacity and performance.
About Eric Herzog
Eric Herzog is the Chief Marketing Officer at Infinidat, a Lenovo company. Prior to joining Infinidat, Herzog was CMO and VP of Global Storage Channels at IBM Storage Solutions. His executive leadership experience also includes: Senior Vice President of Product Management and Product Marketing for EMC’s Enterprise & Mid-range Systems Division, and CMO and Senior VP of Alliances for all-flash storage provider Violin Memory.
