CHOOSING A DATA CENTER. A Cogeco Peer 1 Guide

Transcription

1 CHOOSING A DATA CENTER A Cogeco Peer 1 Guide 1

2 You know you need a data center. But where do you start? One thing s for certain: your IT needs are changing, and will continue to change. Perhaps your in-house data center has reached capacity. Perhaps you need an upgrade. Or perhaps you need to comply with a new set of regulations and standards. Whatever the reason, you have one of three options to consider: Option 1: Upgrade your existing facility. Option 2: Build a new in-house data center. Option 3: Partner with an external data center provider. For most organizations, the expense of the first two options makes them inconceivable. Each require skilled data center engineers, cooling and power redundancies, security protocols, and capacity considerations. And that s just the start. So it s not surprising that the best choice is the third option: the outsourced data center. But not all data centers are made equal. And with so many providers in the marketplace today, it s diffcult to make the right choice. At Cogeco Peer 1, we understand the importance of knowing exactly what you need from a data center facility. In this short guide, we ll take you through 15 factors you should consider in choosing the right data center for your organization. 1

3 1. Location, Location, Location 2. Power and Cooling Efficiency 3. Regulatory/Compliance Requirements Geographical location is usually the number one consideration when people are looking to buy or rent a new offce space, but it s perhaps even more important when choosing a data center. While advanced networking technologies have practically eliminated latency, you still need to consider data center proximity. Your own tech support personnel will inevitably need to visit the data center on occasion, so it simply makes sense to partner with a provider that has one in your region. At the same time, natural disasters and malicious attacks can pose a risk to your organization s business continuity, which is why many data center providers have carefully selected the locations of their facilities to mitigate such liabilities. Power is the biggest cost associated with running a data center. It s also the primary cause of downtime. So having confidence in your data center provider s power and cooling capabilities is critical. Power and cooling are closely linked and both are essential to keeping your infrastructure running optimally. A data center provider that boasts super-effcient cooling systems will consume less power overall, which means fewer charges will be passed on to you. While politics usually has very little to do with data center facilities, understanding your organization s obligations in terms of regulation and compliance is paramount. For example, do your compliance obligations stipulate that your data must be stored in a certain region/country? Data sovereignty and residency are increasingly hot topics, and organization can find itself with potentially serious legal issues if either is compromised. 2

4 4. Audits and Certifications 5. Deployment Efficiency 6. Service Level Agreements (SLAs) With the compliance burdens organizations face growing all the time, any data center provider should, as a minimum, hold SSAE 16, CSAE 3416, and ISAE 3402 accreditations. These certifications take time to earn: the data center provider has to demonstrate adherence to a strict set of standards through a series of independent, in-depth audits of its premises. With these certifications in place, you can often use them to satisfy your own auditors, relieving some of the financial reporting burden. How quickly does your infrastructure need to be up and running? Will business continuity be affected? Daily operations? What happens if new components to the infrastructure need to be added? Most providers should be willing to give reassurances about deployment effciency, even if it isn t something that can be easily measured or quantified. It s all about managing the expectations of your business and its users. Service level agreements are designed to protect both the organization and the data center provider, and are a crucial component of any relationship. Of course, unrivalled availability and unparalleled uptime commitments are extremely attractive to organizations, but they need to be underpinned by written SLAs if they are to carry any weight. Most data center providers should be willing to support their claims in a written SLA and this should cover network uptime and power guarantees. 3

5 7. Tech Support 8. Security 9. On-site Amenities The level of technical support you receive from a data center provider will obviously depend on what s been laid out in the SLAs between you. Nevertheless, the data center provider will have its own on-site engineers and technicians who will often be available 24/7. These individuals can deal directly with an issue affecting your infrastructure, or work with your own internal IT resources to reach a resolution. Either way, your organization benefits from the peace-of-mind afforded. When you think of infrastructure security, hardware and software solutions often spring to mind first. But while these are essential aspects, the physical security at a data center location is just as vital. A round-the-clock physical presence, sophisticated keycard entry systems, CCTV cameras and cabinet locks, all play a part in ensuring that only authorized individuals get close to your valuable infrastructure assets. Many data center providers have realized that their customers often require more than just a place to locate their infrastructure. Many facilities now include a host of on-site amenities to make their customers lives even easier. You should check whether your prospective data center partner provides access to meeting rooms, telephones, fax machines and photocopiers, as well as kitchen/break facilities for when your own resources are on-site. 4

6 10. Resiliency/Redundancy 11. Scalability 12. Connectivity Can your data center provider demonstrate they have suffcient redundancies for power and cooling? Each is indispensable when it comes to the continued operation of your infrastructure assets. Are n+1 redundancies in place, guaranteeing that your IT environments are concurrently maintainable and not prone to any single points of failure? Auxiliary generators can supply the facility with power in the event of a major outage, while critical infrastructure backups and redundancy systems can be used to restore services and safeguard business operations. You know what your organization s infrastructure requirements are today but what will they be in the future? This question is particularly relevant for new businesses experiencing rapid growth with a need to scale exponentially. But scalability scope should not just be measured in terms of a data center s physical space. For example, additional infrastructure comes with extra power and cooling demands, to help ensure seamless growth. The ability to scale is a pivotal requirement for modern businesses, and any potential data center facility should complement this unreservedly today and tomorrow. Business applications and systems are now more network-intensive than ever, placing more demands on your data center. What are the connectivity options it offers? What kind of backbone network does it have in place? Wholly-owned provider networks are clearly desirable and come with many benefits, but can be hard to find. Equally important are the ISPs a provider uses, as well as the peering relationships it has with regional carriers (if applicable). A lightning-fast, resilient network is something that every business wants to take advantage of. 5

7 13. Range of Services 14. Price If your organization requires hybrid IT environments, many data center providers now offer a host of services, including colocation, hosting, cloud, and managed services. In addition, seamless connectivity is a service that many businesses look for useful for when a staff is on-site at the data center, and needs access to off-site infrastructure assets. Price is no longer the huge sticking point that it once used to be, but it s still an important consideration. And while the cheapest and most expensive providers will certainly have different service offerings, any judgement should be made based on added value. In other words, how much will your company benefit from the services provided? Remember, building a data center involves a large capital expenditure. Taking advantage of a provider-owned and -run facility can often be added to an organization s operating expenses. This allows your business to benefit from predictable pricing, which simplifies managing your IT budget. 15. Provider Reputation and Financial Stability Even with a multitude of guarantees and tight service level agreements in place, the reputation and financial stability of the data center provider should never be underestimated. A great overall indicator is the number of existing customers the provider has, and the length of time they have maintained strategic relationships. Any reputable provider is happy for prospective customers to liaise with existing customers and supply references. The financial reports of data center providers should also form a part of your due diligence, and ultimately give you a sense of reassurance that your future partnership won t be abruptly cut short. 6

8 About Cogeco Peer 1 Cogeco Peer 1 is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cogeco Communications Inc. (TSX:CCA) and is a global provider of essential business-to-business products and services, such as Colocation, Network Connectivity, Managed Hosting, Cloud Services and Managed IT services, that allow customers across Canada, the United States and Western Europe to focus on their core business. With 17 data centers, an extensive FastFiber Network and more than 50 points-of-presence in North America and Europe combined, Cogeco Peer 1 is a trusted partner to businesses small, medium and large, providing the ability to access, move, manage and store mission-critical data worldwide, backed by superior customer support. To learn more about how our Datacenter Services can help your organization, please visit Looking for a data center? Contact Cogeco Peer 1 to find the right facility for your needs. CA 413 Horner Ave, Etobicoke, ON M8W 4W US 250 E Grayson St, San Antonio, TX 78215, United States UK 30 Town Quay, Southampton SO14 2AQ, United Kingdom FR GreenSide, Bât avenue Roumanille Biot, France Cogeco Peer 1