Emerging Data Center Industry Trends For 2022

As we enter 2022, what are some of the noteworthy emerging data center industry trends to expect going forward?

Going on two years of the global pandemic, businesses all around the world have had to adapt quickly to remain competitive. This includes their data centers, which often have experienced massive surges in data demand since many employees and clients were stuck at home working remotely. More shopping on Amazon, more social media usage, more everything online.

All of these factors contribute to emerging data center industry trends for 2022 and beyond. The need for secure, reliable, scalable data center solutions has perhaps never been greater, following trends accelerated since the start of the pandemic. What are some of the specific trends to look for in 2022?

Greater Convenience & Accessibility

With more and more organizations moving to cloud-based data center solutions, some early problems have arisen in recent years. Whereas traditional data centers can be upgraded whenever desired, cloud-based solutions are less convenient and accessible since IT staff need to communicate with the solutions provider should anything go wrong.

With the massive shift towards cloud-based data centers, many cloud service providers are incentivized to improve customer service and to provide rapid responses to queries from their clients. This will likely lead to greater convenience and improved accessibility on the part of organizations going into 2022.

Improved Security

There has perhaps never been a greater need for more robust data center services such as security, with massive data leaks and breaches becoming increasingly commonplace – not to mention more costly than ever before.

With more and more services going online, including health services and medicine, emerging data center industry trends for 2022 point to increased cybersecurity and more stringent compliance with HIPAA, for example.

Since cyber and data security is crucial going into 2022, it is also worth considering secure data destruction services for end-of-life (EoL) IT assets and data center equipment, such as hard drive shredding and hard drive degaussing. These are a few of many services that can be retained by qualified, trusted IT asset disposition providers.

Scalable Solutions

One of the most obvious data center industry trends that can be forecasted is the exponential growth in demand for scalability. Building a brand-new data center is a time and capital intensive project, and with the rapid growth of data storage (especially in 2020-2021) organizations require highly scalable data center services.

For massive operations including Big Data and cloud-based solutions, Hyperscale Data Centers have emerged. For organizations considering data center decommissioning and a transition to cloud-based solutions, this means that they can take advantage of highly scalable cloud-based data storage solutions as well rather than investing in data center upgrades themselves.

Remote Management

If the pandemic has taught us anything with regards to data centers, it’s that the resilience of an organization’s data center relies heavily on Remote Infrastructure Management (RIM) to address the increased demand on data centers to provide relevant, accurate data to employees and clients alike.

Data center trends and strategies must include some form of remote management going into 2022 to continue providing employees and clients with data while also enabling IT personnel to remotely communicate with software.

Expect remote management solutions to continue developing and improving in 2022. Solutions such as Wisetek’s VirtuRL, for instance, assist large-scale organizations with global asset return management functionality, live reporting, logistics optimization, and importantly, remote IT asset disposition management. Remote, online, accessible solutions such as this will play an important role for organizations that have partially or fully moved their operations from traditional offices and data centers to online, remote settings.

Sustainable Data Center Practices

In recent years, the enormous power consumption of traditional data centers has come under the spotlight. Sustainable, green energy is increasingly being used to power data centers around the world.

By 2030, major international corporations planning to operate with net-zero emissions in their enormous data centers, leading to sustainable change whereby many smaller corporations and businesses might be incentivized to take action themselves.

Some of the methods for pursuing sustainable practices include optimizing energy consumption, reducing water usage, and improving e-waste management with IT asset disposition. An ITAD partner committed to environmental stewardship and a Sustainable Earth is therefore essential for reducing the impact of data center IT asset disposal on the environment while also helping to meet corporate social responsibility goals for sustainability.

These sustainable data center industry trends are likely to continue in 2022 as more and more data centers see the financial and environmental benefits of going green.

Superior Capital & Operating Expenditure Allocation

The shift towards cloud-based data center providers is likely to continue going into 2022, with an increasing number of organizations partially or fully migrating in-house data centers to the cloud.

Consequently, the capital expenditures required and ongoing operational expenses can be expected to decrease since many organizations will no longer need to continuously upgrade and rotate data center IT assets such as networking and server gear.

So long as organizations realize the cost savings possible with cloud-based solutions and trust in the security and reliability of these solutions, the demand for cloud-based data storage will likely increase commensurately.

Less Downtime, Fewer Outages

In 2021, 69% of respondents in an annual Uptime Institute survey reported experiencing data center outages, 62% of which were classified as serious or severe, the latter of which cost over $100,000 in damages (15% of which cost over $1 million).

While many of these outages were likely attributed to the global pandemic and the subsequent shortage of on-site staff and infrequent or nonexistent hardware upgrades, many organizations were quick to adapt. Increased automation and a greater emphasis on remote monitoring capabilities are likely to reduce outages in 2022 and beyond.

Emerging Data Center Industry Trends

Of the many data center trends likely to arise in 2022 and beyond, one unifying theme is evident: the shift to data center and cloud services is in full swing. From greater accessibility to improved security, lower capital and operating expenses, less downtime, remote management, and data center sustainability, the benefits for many organizations to shift towards cloud-based solutions are tangibly superior to traditional data centers.

As data center industry trends evolve going into 2022, data center storage trends will certainly play an ever more important role for organizations that opt for data center decommissioning (as well as for those that don’t and remain traditional data centers).

For organizations that go the route of data center decommissioning, there’s a lot to consider. Not only will you need to manage the migration of data to another data center, cloud or otherwise, but you’ll also need to manage the safe and secure removal and disposal of all data center IT assets. From hard drive disposal to secure data destruction services, it’s essential to have a trustworthy ITAD company ready, willing and able to assist.

Contact Wisetek for Data Center Services

Does your organization require nothing short of the best, most secure global IT asset disposition solutions for its data centers? Wisetek is a leading global provider of ITAD services with coverage across the United States and worldwide. Get in touch with our team today to learn more about our data center services.

For more information, please contact enquiries@wisetekusa.com or visit our website. 