What will this year hold for data centre and the cloud, both public and private? Here are our educated guesses on 10 predictions for the data centre and the cloud. Join the discussion and comment on topics that are top of mind.
As an IT specialist, what exactly do you think this year hold for data centers and the cloud? These are our educating guesses on Data center Trends & Cloud Predictions. The Future Outlook for both public and private cloud.
We are currently heading to summer from winter and we all know that it’s the time of year again, where people are warming up for vacations. We have passed half of the year and heading towards the end of the year.
So people are saving cash to go to malls for shopping. Others may be ordering stuffs online and wait for their package to be brought to their doorsteps. Families are planning for the end of the year and also the upcoming year.
Related: Check out Latest Predictions Articles
Now this period leads to an inevitable tradition of looking back at the year that has been spent and at what the new year will bring. Within the past weeks, I’ve done general looks back at the technology of this year which is very wide to discuss.
So I will be narrowing the predictions of the coming year and focus to the data center and cloud. The reason I choose this topic is because the real battle these days is to find a balance between the cloud and on-premises implementations.
Most of my predictions may already have been hinted at in research or emerging trends, therefore, I’m not over stretching my neck too far out. I will like you to know that in this article, I’m simply making logical assumptions and conclusions based on past experience and technology.
The evidence seen this year will hopefully improve my accuracy rate on this topic. Now that we are on the same page, these are my opinion on 10 predictions for data centers and the cloud for next year.
10 predictions for the data center and the cloud
1. Edge computing matures but requires a new business model
First and foremost, this is not hard to figure out as an IT specialist. You will agree with me that everyone seems to love the idea of edge computing. As a matter of fact, Data center operators see it as a chance to reduce the heavy load on central servers.
On the other hand, companies and businesses see it as a chance to have sub-10 millisecond response time. Cloud vendors such as Schneider Electric and Vapor IO are coming out with several models for placement at base stations, and 5G network is rolling out globally.
Now come the problem of who will pays for it. The math still hasn’t been worked out properly. My question here is; will it fall to mobile cellular providers? Will it fall to the autonomous car makers who wants to connect cars?
The information technology industry has a very long track record of dreaming up high techs and thinking of the business model later. The edge computing is a costly idea in search of organisations to own them. Now you see that this needs to be sorted out?
2. Water Cooling Expands
Did you know that when Google first launched its Tensor Processing Unit AI chip’s version 3.0, they also released updates that it had switched to water cooling? They said they did so because air was no longer sufficient for cooling.
Since GPUs is currently hitting 300 watts and CPUs getting over 200 watts, only air cooling doesn’t give the perfect result any more. Research shows that water is a million times more efficient for heat removal than air. Also, more companies are overcoming their anxiety about the liquid coolant having a leakage.
Furthermore, in some cases, they actually have no choice at all. If you do your own research, you will discover that the demand for more processing power is motivating the move to water cooling more that anything else.
3. More Artificial Intelligence (AI) to cover for human error
Datacenter Predictions: AI Moves In and Cloud Moves to the Edge. Data centers have several thousands of moving trends. They include the power system, cooling system, individual servers, and the network to connect all of them together. For a long time now, that has been manually configured and once they are perfectly in place, they will be left alone.
But a demonstration done by Concerto a startup organisation shows that there is a new class of artificial intelligence (AI). This puts AI in charge of tweaking the equipment through continuous adjustment and close monitoring.
Personally, I’ve seen some instances where AI was used as a constant, tireless monitor to adjust technology systems. With that in mind, I personally predict we will see more efforts going forward and yielding positive results.
4. Data-center growth continues to the future
Let’s get one thing straight; the data center is not dying anytime soon. As of today, there are more increase in compute demands than ever especially with the arrival of artificial intelligence (AI), since the hybrid cloud has proven to have its expensive disadvantage.
This specifically means that the data center is being given a new purpose. In the tech world, some workloads are others are being assigned to the data center while others are going to public cloud providers.
These workloads includes anything with massive data sets, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML), BI, analytics, because migrating them to the cloud is quite costly.
With all these said, we can all see that the data center is changing. Its becoming more versatile and more powerful for the future.
5. Workloads are moving from Endpoints to Data centers
Truth be told, data in and of itself is useless until it is acted upon and processed. Our smartphone really isn’t the device for that function. Our personal computers (PCs), mobile smartphones, and tablets are heavy data collectors but not very suitable for any type of AI or analytics.
Therefore, that data is usually sent up to the cloud for quicker processing. Similarly, the same applies to the Internet of Things (IoT). For example; driverless cars, or even your new car models isn’t going to process the data; it will be forwarded to a data centre for fast processing.
6. Serverless computing & Micro-services take off
First of all, let me say that virtualization is great, but it’s also resource-heavy. On the balance, it needs a full case of the operating system. This can limit the number of VMs on a server, even if it has large memory size.
What is the solution? Its the microservices or containers and on the extreme, serverless computing. WE all know that a container is as small as 10MB in size versus a few gigabyte (GB) of memory for a full virtual machine, and serverless, where you also run a single function app, is even smaller.
My predictions her is that; as apps go from monolithic to smaller, containers, modular pieces, serverless will become more functional, both on premises and in the cloud. The major key to the success of containers and serverless is that the technologies were created with the cloud and on-premises systems in mind and easy switch between the two, which will help their grwoth.
7. Amazon’s AWS and Google focus on Hybrid cloud
Google and Amazon Web Services (AWS) came into the cloud market with no legacy and a sales pitch of a clean cloud play. On the other hand, IBM and Microsoft, had a big legacy software installed base and pitched hybrid cloud, striking a balance between on-premises systems and cloud.
This single act helped Microsoft to push to the number two position in the cloud market very quickly and has also provided IBM a considerable rocket-boost, as well. However, Google and AWS are currently wising up. Google is shoring up its on-premises services.
To achieve this, they hired Thomas Kurian (ex-Oracle cloud chief), who was making a hybrid pitch at Oracle that brought him into conflict with Larry Ellison. Similarly, AWS has introduced a raft of new on-premises offerings to propel to further in the cloud market.
8. Bare Metal without Software continues to grow
What does this mean? The bare metal means that no software is required. All you have to do is to rent CPUs, memory capacity, and storage. When that is in place, you’ll have to provide your own software stack — all of it. Up till now, IBM has been the biggest supporter of bare-metal hosting followed by Oracle, and with a very good intention.
From my research, I discovered that bare metal is ideal for what’s called “lift and shift,” where you take your compute environment from the data center to a cloud provider without any changed to it. Just put the operating system (OS), applications, and data in another person’s data center.
Now, since Oracle and IBM are two key enterprise software vendors, it’s only normal that they would want people to keep using their software but run it in their data centers rather than shift to a SaaS provider.
Conversely, Amazon Web Service is getting into the bare-metal scene, as are prominent hosting and cloud providers such as Rackspace, Internap and Equinix. This also appeals to enterprises as well as SMBs and for the same reason where they do not need to host the hardware.
9. Next year will come with reckoning for Oracle
From my own point of view, I think Oracle really needs to make some tough decisions this before the end of the year, and quick too. From online review, you will quickly notice that their cloud business is uncertain and not keeping up with the big four players (1. AWS, 2. Microsoft, 3. Google, 4. IBM).
If you looked into their licensing process, you will discover that it is still too complicated. Oracle tried to grab a massive Defense Department project known as Jedi from AWS and lost because it didn’t have the reach of Amazon Web Service.
The organisation has been really silent about its hardware business, and now it has lost its cloud business leader; do your research. From my own discovery, I noticed that Oracle has not really made the leap of faith to the cloud as gracefully as Microsoft, but if they will to do it, am very sure it has to be now.
10. Cloud Service providers battle for Virtual Desktop Market
My research shows that Microsoft is not the only provider looking up to the desktop as a means of connecting to the cloud. By the same token, all of the key cloud vendors are interested in the virtual desktop market. Moreover, with popular Windows 7 reaching end of life in January, it means this year will be a year of its transition to glory. Next year will bring its own techs. My own question is; are people willing to just jump to Windows 10 and thus cement Microsoft’s hold? Or will they accept things such as AWS WorkSpaces or Google ChromeBooks that is fast rising?
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In conclusion, I think I will stop here on this topic where I focused on Business Technological Predictions for Data Centre and Cloud. Anyways, more updates on Data centre Trends & Cloud Predictions – Future Outlook will still come your way once I research them.
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