Edge Computing is the Future: A Look at the Benefits and Tips on How to Build Edge Data Centers

Every industry, from healthcare to finance to retail, can benefit from putting computing power closer to the people and hardware that need it. 

Computing power that is located closer to where it is needed or generated by users runs faster and more efficiently. That is not delivered by the cloud. It’s delivered by non-traditional physical data center locations in cities and neighborhoods around the country – otherwise known as edge data centers. 

“As the volume and velocity of data increases, so too does the inefficiency of streaming all this information to a cloud or data center for processing,” Santhosh Rao, principal research analyst at Gartner, told Data Center Knowledge. “Currently, around 10% of enterprise-generated data is created and processed outside a traditional centralized data center or cloud,” says Rao. “By 2022, Gartner predicts this figure will reach 50%.”

The future is a lot more distributed: the Internet of Things is growing and the rise of Augmented and Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence incorporated in our daily lives will exponentially increase the amount of data that is generated and demanded all over the world.
 

Challenges and Opportunities in Going to the Edge

However, the data center sector has not fully incorporated edge data center management yet because building out edge data centers requires looking at data processing a little differently. How things were done in the past simply is not how they need to be done in the future, and this is true beyond just the physical limitations of building out an edge data center.

While edge facilities are smaller and generally have limitations on power that need to be worked around, they also require different storage, airflow management and power management solutions. Increased integration of those systems helps, too, to reduce the footprint of an individual rack. Rethinking how to design and spec out an edge data center is a challenge, but it’s also a huge opportunity to leverage a new approach to data center architecture that can positively impact your business.

Retail is one industry that has found modular cabinets and containment solutions critical to pushing data processing to the edge. When store employees and shoppers are using handheld devices to immediately update or access inventory, putting a small edge data center nearby lets that data move faster.

Hospitals are another good example of an edge data center use case. Hospitals need significant local processing power and often need dedicated bandwidth for huge files, such as MRIs, but they have very little square footage available to spare for servers or other data center equipment. 

A highly resilient, functional edge data center can deliver the kind of local processing performance that’s required in that environment. A prefabricated cabinet and containment system can provide all of that and be designed to fit in any available hospital space.
 

Modular Cabinets and Containment Solutions are the Answer

Modular airflow management systems and containment equipment enable edge data center build-outs and provide many benefits. 

Gartner estimates that ongoing power costs are increasing at least 10 percent per year due to cost per kilowatt-hour (kWh) increases in underlying demand. There is no better way to reduce costs than to leverage cabinet and containment hardware that is better integrated and built around maximizing the efficiency of heating, cooling and power systems.

Organizations can build edge data centers faster than traditional data centers. Moving faster and at a smaller scale, however, does not mean sacrificing quality and reliability. This is another case in which modular cabinet and containment solutions really shine.

Our modular cabinet and containment solutions provide the same level of security as custom designs, but they are flexible enough to accommodate non-traditional footprints and can be configured to fit any environment. They are also easy to scale as demand grows, both at one site or across new sites as needed with repeatable installation processes and training requirements.

Learn more about Legrand’s Modular, Customizable Contain-IT FLEX Containment System here.

Edge data centers are not a fad, they will become increasingly critical to how data is processed. The good news is anyone looking to push their organization’s data center operations to the edge can leverage a growing number of resources to increase data processing speed and improve efficiency without sacrificing resiliency.

At Legrand, we’ve put together some resources for leveraging integration to succeed at the edge, and more, to help you get started. Check them out here: https://www.legrand.us/edge.aspx

To learn more, visit our product page here: Data Center Cabinets | Legrand