Technology Reseller v27

01732 759725 36 PREDICTIONS ...continued their IT mix and expenditure to the needs of their applications. As we see more of these hybrid architectures, it is becoming increasingly clear that the enterprise data centre is alive and well, even if its role is changing to reflect a mix that best serves modern organisations. 2 Speed of deployment is the new arms race. As capabilities across technologies and systems flatten out, data centre and IT managers will increasingly use other criteria for selecting equipment. Cost is always a separator, but more and more the decision will depend on how quickly assets can be deployed. When all other factors are close, any advantage in speed of deployment and activation can be decisive. This is especially so in today’s distributed networks, where delivery delays mean lack of service – and revenue. 3 Average rack density remains static… with pockets of high performance. Although average rack density is likely to reflect marginal increases at best, the surge in advanced applications and workloads related to artificial intelligence (AI), such as machine learning and deep learning, will make pockets of high- performance computing necessary and more common. Expect early activity in the areas of defence, advanced analytics and manufacturing in 2020 to lay the foundation for more widespread adoption in 2021 and beyond. These racks so far represent a miniscule percentage of total racks but they still present unfamiliar power and cooling challenges that must be addressed. The increasing interest in direct liquid cooling is a response to high- performance computing demands. 4 Batteries pay it forward. In 2016 Vertiv predicted lithium-ion batteries would begin to find a home in the data centre, and that has proven to be true as lithium-ion today holds a significant share of the UPS battery market. That share is growing and starting to extend to edge sites, where its smaller footprint and reduced maintenance requirements are a natural fit. The next step is leveraging the flexibility of lithium-ion and other emerging battery alternatives, such as thin plate pure lead (TPPL), to offset their costs. As we move into 2020, more organisations will start to sell the stored energy in these batteries back to the utility to help with grid stabilisation and peak shaving. Expect this to be an important part of larger conversations around sustainability in the data centre industry. 5 Global cross-pollination. The U.S. has been the epicentre of the digital universe and this generation of Prioritising RPA in these socio-political contexts and policy discussions will be crucial if robots become key players in the coming economic downturn. 7 Consolidation among RPA vendors and automation-led services companies will accelerate. As larger, more established organisations move into the RPA market, they’re going to acquire and merge with upcoming RPA vendors. The leaders, identified in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Robotic Process Automation Software, Forrester Wave and Everest PEAK Matrix reports, are unlikely to be acquired, because of their high valuations. Instead, enterprise entrants to the RPA market will acquire and merge with smaller services and technology businesses to compete with these leaders. Data centres Enterprise data centres alive and well Rob Johnson , CEO, Vertiv As the world charges into 2020, organisations will increasingly give up the enterprise-or-cloud debate that has dominated C-level conversations in recent years in favour of hybrid architectures that incorporate public and private cloud models and edge assets around a reconfigured core. Hybrid architectures will allow organisations to maintain control of sensitive data while still meeting soaring demand for more capacity and increased computing capabilities closer to the consumer. As connectivity and availability become conjoined concepts in this new data ecosystem, an increasing premium will be placed on seamless communication from core to cloud to edge. This evolving approach to managing data and computing resources provides the background to five emerging data centre trends that Vertiv is anticipating for 2020. These are: 1 Hybrid architectures go mainstream. While cloud computing will continue to be an important part of organisations’ IT strategy, we are seeing a subtle change in strategy as organisations seek to tailor way that YouTube is for video content. The centrality of RPA will run parallel with the development of automation code that is more useful and reusable, enabling it to spread even further as organisations reuse code across industries and geographies. This is the front end of an even longer term trend, as RPA becomes more accessible and extensible. 3 More organisations will combine and reuse robots. In 2020, organisations will learn how to standardise robots better and apply them across use cases and departments and eventually across companies and industries. This will result in more predictable deployments and easier scaling, rather than adopting automation in silos, which constrains the benefits of RPA. 4 Students entering the workforce will drive automation deployment. Historically, employees have had to connect and integrate increasingly outdated technology systems via repetitive, manual work. In 2020, students entering the workforce will be familiar with better options and will force lagging businesses to transform and modernise their processes. They’ll be asking why we’re doing the same things the same way after all these years—and many organisations won’t have adequate answers. Given the proclivity of students to learn automation in school, they will start automating bits of their jobs. As new employees become more efficient and effective, the now vivid benefits of RPA will outweigh any remaining hesitancy, compelling organisations to change. 5 We’ll continue to be surprised by the intelligence of machines. The power and abilities of machine intelligence are continuing to grow. Tasks that we once thought uniquely human are quickly becoming do-able by software. The growth of AI will be exponential, similar to Moore’s law, with plenty of surprises in store. Every innovation we’re seeing in AI and computing is happening on top of innovations in quantum computing. We’re regularly increasing the number of qubits in quantum computing, and the potential use-cases for this power is vast. Limitations that we’ve previously accepted as immutable won’t last. 6 RPA will become a topic discussed on the world stage. In 2020, extra-governmental organisations such as the United Nations and the World Economic Forum will discuss RPA in the context of jobs, wages and global economics. Individual countries will become increasingly interested in the effects of automation on their societies. Sanjay Castelino Rob Johnson