Data Center Facility Business Strategy Consulting

Are you considering a data center migration or relocation?
Thinking about whether to build expand, build new or leverage a colocation provider?

Data Center expansions, consolidations, and relocations are expensive and, therefore, should be analyzed by trained data center design and evaluation experts for potential risks, hidden costs, and other items which can severely impact sound business decisions. Making the wrong decision regarding a Data Center migration strategy can negatively impact a business for years to come. Proper upfront analysis, investigation, financial justification, and strategic thought should be put into the final decision when considering:

Expanding current in-house facilities
Building new in-house facilities
Building new out-of-house facilities
Migrating or moving to an outside or colocation facility

Following are just some of the questions the business and data center management team should be asking when considering a data center migration:

Levels of Redundancy. What facility tier level (1, 2, or 3) does your business require? What is the minimal acceptable redundancy? What is the cost to achieve one tier level versus another?
Span of Control. If you are preparing to establish your mission critical network in another company’s facility, are you okay with giving control of the facility management to an outside resource?
Planning Horizon. Are you considering 1, 3, 5, 10 year planning horizons in terms of cost structure, technology migrations, availability of storage, impact of cloud computing, etc.?
Budgetary Planning. Whether you are expanding, building new, or colocating, having sound budgetary numbers is critical in the decision making process. How can you effectively build a conceptual design for each of several possible migration approaches that allows you to confidently build an accurate non-recurring and recurring expense forecast.
Type of Facility Partner. If you have decided to leave the facility management to a third party, do you need colocation, managed hosting, or a cloud computing structure?
Virtualization. With the cost of floor space in a new facility, the cost of moving IT racks of equipment, and the operational costs for power and cooling associated with high volumes of servers, how will virtualization help to reduce the cost of a migration? How can you perform a quality virtualization assessment?

Selecting a colocation provider can be a somewhat complicated process. When selecting a provider, there are several key areas you will need to take into consideration to make the best choice possible.

Local Network Engineering Resources. Will the facility need to be manned by my people, manned by outsourced staff or dark?
Bandwidth. What are the tiers of bandwidth available, and what does it cost if you exceed your limit for the month.
Rack Space. What are the price differences, based on the size of server you want to place at the provider? There are several types and sizes available, and most providers charge different amounts for each.
Hardware Support. Does the provider offer Hardware Support contracts? If so, how quickly is the turnaround for a hardware repair, and are parts available on-hand or do they need to be shipped? If the provider does not offer Hardware Support contracts, or you do not wish to utilize them, then what methods are available to repair a down server? Do they offer services to diagnose and repair issues for a fee, or allow a technician of your choosing access to the servers?
Type of Facility Partner. If you have decided to leave the facility management to a third party, do you need colocation, managed hosting, or a cloud computing structure?
Internet Connectivity. What size connection does the provider have to the Internet? How many connections do they have, in the case of a failure?
Uptime. What kind of Uptime does the provider guarantee for your presence on the Internet?
Server Monitoring. Will you manage your own monitoring or does the colocation provider offer server monitoring services, to ensure that your system is running and operational at all times?
Backup Services. What level of data backups are included, if any? What additional levels of data backups are available, at what intervals, and at what cost?

PTS provides comprehensive Data Center Business Strategy Consulting for clients in need of a data center strategic evaluation due to business changes, growth, changes in IT needs or requirements, business relocation, or other strategic business reasons. Depending upon the client need, PTS consulting services may draw upon various evaluation services such as Needs Analyses, Site Surveys, Modeling, Planning, Conceptual Design, and Budgeting programs to establish requirements, set financial models, and allow PTS consultants to properly recommend the best data center migration approach to meet your needs.

PTS’ Data Center Business Strategy Consulting leverages the first four phases of the PTS data center project process.

PTS’ Data Center Business Strategy Consulting solutions begin with detailed discussions related to the client need. Why, specifically, is the client considering a strategic consulting program related to the enterprise data center, computer room, or network operations center? Once a baseline has been established for the need, PTS plans an overall program strategy. The strategy may include various PTS services to develop a comprehensive “picture” of the current mission-critical facility strategy supporting the overall business goals and the perceived future strategy needed to support the overall business goals in the long term.

Ultimately, PTS’ Data Center Business Strategy Consulting provides senior management, IT management, and Data Center operations management with specific comparative analysis, planning, and financial justifications to support client decision making. The solution may include market analysis from a competitive, target market, or geographical perspective as well as financial justifications in terms of capital expenditures, operational costs, and Return on Investment (RoI), Net Present Value (NPV), or Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) analysis.

Upon completion of evaluations & planning of alternative approaches to support the business, PTS is able to provide specific costs associated with expanding current facilities, building new facilities, relocating, and/or leveraging leased colocation space by breaking down all aspects of the project costs in terms of capital expenditures, monthly and yearly operational expenses, and business control.

Various PTS services may be bundled to provide your needed outcomes for this consulting solution:

Detailed Business Evaluations. PTS performs detailed Needs Analyses in which key design criteria are developed for any future planning and design efforts. This includes both facility key design criteria and future business needs driving strategic consideration of the data center migration, consolidation, or expansion project. PTS performs detailed site surveys of existing facilities and potential new facilities to assess availability and determine potential risk areas which may impact availability. Programs may include surveys of existing facilities in terms of space, power, cooling, and IT requirements including multi-site operations which may drive a consolidation and relocation program.
Facility & IT Assessments. Assessments of cable plant, IT infrastructure, storage requirements, security for physical and data integrity, technology roadmaps, virtualization, impact of disaster recovery and business continuity, personnel, and budgets are performed to evaluate re-useable technology, processes necessary to be duplicated, potential areas of risk/concern, and other attributes which may affect a sound business decision.
Well Defined Load Requirements. Load requirements for the new data center facility are identified and documented including growth projections, the impact of IT infrastructure changes, consolidations of multiple facilities, long term business planning requirements, and other factors which affect requirements of new facility infrastructure.
Evaluation of In-house vs. Out-of-House Facilities. PTS evaluates all possible choices for the new data center facility including expansion of existing client-owned facilities, client-owned new-build facilities, colocation facilities, and managed services facilities within colocation facilities. Colocation facilities are surveyed using PTS’ proprietary survey techniques to provide objective feedback on quality and fit to client requirements. The choices are analyzed across 3 degrees of freedom including span of control, capital expenditures, and operating expense models.
Comprehensive Business Planning Analysis. PTS consultants review all aspects of the business model for in-house versus out-of-house data center facilities including market analysis, fit to client requirements, strategic growth, and financial justifications. Complete RoI, NPV, and TCO calculations provide objective input to senior management decision making.
Complete Data Center Migration or Relocation Services. Once a decision has been made, PTS plans all aspects of the data center migration including negotiation with landlords, negotiation with colocation facility managers, relocation planning services, project management, engineering planning for build-outs, redesigns, or new build, and overall communications amongst client personnel, product manufacturers, and construction contractors.

To learn more about PTS’ Data Center Business Strategy Consulting Services, contact us or visit:

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