digital realty

jennifer handshew

Data Center Priorities

– Jennifer Handshew, Executive Vice President, Media Relations, iMiller Public Relations, says:

Digital Realty recently announced the preliminary results of its annual survey conducted by Forrester Consulting.  This year’s survey of data center priorities in North America focused on the data center facility and colocation investment criteria as well as the current facilities, budgets, future plans and influencers of data center decision-makers at mid-market firms.

Eighty-two percent of respondents identified network connectivity options, including carrier availability and carrier density, as a top priority in data center investment decisions, followed by resiliency level and availability of the data center facility (80 percent), the level of control over the facility (78 percent) and access to cloud and other partners (75 percent).

Data center capacity is crucial to mid-market businesses for both internal and external operations, many of today’s mid-market firms require multiple data center sites to meet growing customer demand and requirements.  More than one-third of the businesses surveyed (41 percent) have at least four data centers and the majority (53 percent), requires 2,000 square feet or more of data center space. This includes both internally-owned data centers/server rooms and outsourced, hosted and collocated data centers.  88 percent of respondents indicated they are planning some form of expansion within the next four years, either by provisioning a new site or by expanding a current site.

Forrester’s month-long, online survey evaluated the data center investment plans and drivers of 1,030 organizations in the US, UK, Singapore, Japan, Germany, Hong Kong, France, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, and Ireland.  Survey participants included senior-level decision makers in IT, finance, and line of business roles with responsibility for data centers.  North American study results were based on the responses of 233 senior-level North American professionals responsible for data center decisions at mid-market firms with up to $500 million in revenue.

The results of this survey validate Digital Realty’s understanding of the requirements of its mid-market clients.  According to IDC/EMC, the digital universe is doubling in size every two years, and is expected to multiply tenfold by 2020. As this demand continues to grow, customers need data centers to ensure they can meet customer needs and remain competitive in the market

For further insight on the survey, join Forrester Research’s Analyst Sophia Vargas and Digital Realty’s Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing Matt Miszewski as they discuss their findings during a 60-minute webinar on Friday, May 30 at 9:00 AM PT/ 12:00 PM ET. To register for the webinar, go to http://events.digitalrealty.com/forrester-webinar.

For more information on Digital Realty, visit http://www.digitalrealty.com.