IoT Drives Data Centre Efficiency With Schneider Electric’s Cloud-Connected StruxureOn

Automation and energy management firm Schneider Electric has announced a service that connects physical data centre infrastructure assets to its cloud with the aim to deliver faster services in a simplified fashion.

Dubbed StructureOn, the service has been designed intersect between the Internet of thing world and the cloud, by picking up information from data centre hardware and processing it in the Schneider Electric cloud.

This allows data centre operators and companies with systems in said centres to get a real-time view of how their servers are performing and the maintenance and service requirements they might need, all through a mobile app.

IoT in data centres

Cloud and the IoT are common bedfellows, though not as some industry voice have stated wholly inseparable. So it makes sense for IoT systems to be used in conjunction with the cloud to ensure that some of the underlying infrastructure that powers IoT and cloud networks is running as effectively as possible.

“Today, as data centre managers face tightening budgets, growing customer demands on data centre performance, and an increasingly competitive market, optimising operations while staying within financial confines has become a significant challenge,” said Henrik Leerberg, Global Director of ITD Digital Services, Schneider Electric.

“With StruxureOn, Schneider Electric is harnessing the power of IoT to give data centre and facility managers the insights, tools and support they need to proactively predict and prevent incidents and system downtime.”

Rhonda Ascierto, research director of datacenter technologies at 451 Research, lends some credence to Leerberg’s claims: “The IoT initiative at Schneider Electric appears to be wide-reaching and StruxureOn is a move that could fundamentally change the DCIM software market as well as the data centre services engagement model.”

Rather than just rely on the StruxureOn system to take care of the data centre optimisation, Schneider Electric is also offering a its Service Bureau personnel to be on hand to assist with troubleshooting issues StruxureOn identifies, either remotely or in the field, effectively offering what the company claims is a “second set of eyes” to assist data centre and facility managers.

Finding new automatic ways to improve data centre and server efficiency is a prevalent trend in the IT industry, with the future looking like it could include smart software that can independently re-configure itself to ensure the gamut of tasks handled in data centres are done so as effectively as possible.

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