Enterprise Connectivity Taking on Hyperscale-like Requirements

Recently I attended a call with one of the world’s largest banks. While the call was supposed to be introductory in nature, it quickly gravitated into a discussion about QTS’ connectivity strategy that ended up taking more than half the time allotted. The banks IT leaders were interested in our opinions on things ranging from business risk associated with lack of Internet resiliency, content distribution strategies, mobile banking networking, peering exchanges, and subsea cable interconnection.

At the time I could not help but notice how similar it was to discussions we have been having for several years with the most sophisticated buyer in the market – namely, the hyperscale customers such as AWS, MS Azure and Google that pay equal attention to space, power and connectivity. More recently, we are starting to have these same discussions with large enterprise and government organizations that are starting to seek capacity and connectivity in size, scale and sophistication mirroring the hyperscalers.

How did we get here?

Since 2015, the concept of digitization has exploded exponentially and globally. Content creation has been happening at an incalculable pace resulting in data-driven networking ecosystems all around us. Brick and mortar businesses are transforming into digital enterprises delivering digitized services that come with new IT requirements.

This flood of digitized data, combined with new, compute-intensive technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning and predictive analytics, is increasing enterprise requirements for even larger technology stacks to store, compute, analyze and move the data.   

Where the puck is going

While the world’s largest hyperscale companies are already purchasing capacity, power and connectivity at enormous scale, large enterprise and government organizations are starting to ask, “How do I balance the ever-increasing complexity of compute, storage, connectivity with service delivery to end users with long-term growth? How do I meet the demands and expectations of our customers across multiple platforms and geographies in a way that is scalable and does not introduce risk?”

On one hand, they need scalable, core IT infrastructure, but the new digital economy also requires risk-adjusted access to a myriad of networks that serve their end users. This requires a long-term view, particularly when it comes to data center space, power and access to critical in-building connectivity ecosystems similar to today’s hyperscale strategy and purchasing model.

The large enterprise and government organizations now require a data center with a similar long view of space, power, and sophisticated, risk adjusted connectivity ecosystems. Conventional approaches of using carrier hotels and single network ecosystem providers are not built to serve this new dynamic technically or economically.

What does it mean?

Today, approximately 30 hyperscale giants account for thousands megawatts of power and terabits of network capacity. When you start to add hundreds, and eventually thousands, of large enterprises and government organizations purchasing megawatts and capacity at the same scale, the game changes dramatically.

And as those organizations spend more on larger, more sophisticated infrastructure, they will require equally credible risk-adjusted network access to ensure service delivery and customer experience. We are seeing large enterprise and government organizations beginning to recognize where their markets are heading and they are planning digital infrastructure and network strategies accordingly. 

Innovative risk-adjusted connectivity ecosystems

QTS is in a unique position to serve this new dynamic. As a data center provider serving large enterprise, government and hyperscale organizations, we have mega scale data centers in all the major markets with millions of square feet and hundreds of megawatts of power available. We are also unique in our ability to provide and grow risk-adjusted connectivity ecosystems in the same buildings. This means access and connectivity to the world’s largest cloud providers, the world’s largest IP networks, network access points, fiber providers, diverse transport paths and subsea cables. Like the hockey analogy, we are where the puck is going.

Look for the industry to follow with more sophisticated, more credible, mega-scale data centers offering risk-adjusted connectivity ecosystems available on-site. The marketplace is demanding it and QTS is there ready to serve.