The Data Center: When Setting Up Data Center, Don't Forget the Network!

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The Data Center: When Setting Up Data Center, Don't Forget the Network!
By John Rath

August 1, 2008 —

As much as I enjoy reading about data center efficiencies, green agendas and where Microsoft and Google are building mega-data centers, there is a missing piece that, in my opinion, should garner equal attention in the data center industry—the network.

Sun Microsystems founder and chairman Scott McNealy has preached for years that “The Network is the Computer.” There are a number of ways to interpret that statement, and company networks and the Internet have certainly evolved tremendously since it was originally touted as Sun’s slogan. The importance of the data center network however, should not be underestimated. Even Microsoft’s Michael Manos states that “data centers on their own are fairly useless.”

A new survey conducted by IDC and Tellabs finds that 51 percent of telecommunications executives think bandwidth demands will eventually break the Internet. In June 2008, Cisco’s Visual Networking Index projected a sixfold increase in global IP traffic between 2007 and 2012, due mainly to video and social networking. An additional Cisco finding forecasts that global IP traffic will reach 44 exabytes per month in 2012, compared to less than seven per month in 2007. As a point of reference, Cisco shows that an exabyte is equal to roughly 250 million DVDs. Rapid increases in broadband and mobile markets from China and India are helping the numbers grow as well. Anyone looking for amazing and deep analysis of global Internet infrastructure should visit the CAIDA (Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis) Web site.

Further proof of a growing bandwidth dilemma can be seen in market statistics and trends:

»	Infonetics Research reports that the global optical market swelled 19 percent to reach nearly US$14 billion last year.
»	Communications equipment maker Ciena reported a second quarter profit jump of 83 percent.
»	Research firm TeleGeography reports that at least 25 new undersea cables, costing $6.4 billion total, will be constructed between now and 2010.
»	Vertical Systems Group reports that worldwide revenue for Business Ethernet Services will be nearly $31 billion by 2012.
»	The number of mobile phone users will grow to 3.6 billion by 2010. The opportunities and demand for mobile backhaul networking is huge.

An interesting comparison of network use and strategy leads me back to Microsoft and Google. With their data centers going up all over the world, their network backbones are as massive as their facilities.

Microsoft notes that the network is a very important element in overall strategy, and that they strive to build data centers close to Internet exchange points. Microsoft’s Arne Josefsberg has said the company is connected to more than 600 ISP networks directly. Carrier relationships are huge for Microsoft because of the need to get as close as possible to their end users.

Microsoft Live Mesh, introduced this year, will drive home that need for proximity in the user experience equation. And carriers will begin to feel the true effect of software as a service when traffic volumes double every year and new data centers come online in 2008 and 2009. Microsoft is comfortable that it can secure the capacity it needs, but it remains concerned that its billions aren’t well spent unless its customers get the service they require.

Google’s approach to its backbone network is slightly different. In 2005, there was widespread speculation about their dark fiber purchases and the strategy for using all of it. Dubbed Google Net, conspiracy theories ranged from a plan to wholesale bandwidth back to carriers as a part of a peering relationship, to a plan to create mobile data centers for when the public Internet begins to brown out.

Google Net started in 2005 when the company posted a recruitment ad for a “Strategic Negotiator candidate with experience in identification, selection and negotiation of dark fiber contracts.” Stories about Google Net resurfaced early in 2008 when it announced that it was an investor in the trans-Pacific "Unity" cable, a 10,000-kilometer linear undersea cable system linking the U.S. and Japan. According to the TeleGeography Global Bandwidth report for 2007, trans-Pacific bandwidth demand has grown at a compounded annual growth rate of 63.7 percent between 2002 and 2007. It is expected to continue to grow strongly from 2008 to 2013, with total demand for capacity doubling every two years.

Trends in wide area networking (WAN) technologies are further proof of a booming industry. WAN optimization applications and appliances have helped companies connect data centers and branch offices alike. If the fiber is abundant and power is cheap, it won’t matter where the data centers are located, and you might be one step closer to your own version of cloud computing.

How the data center is built, engineered and operated is important, but don’t forget the network. When thinking about building data centers or locating your infrastructure, don’t forget to emphasize the importance of the network.

John Rath is an independent consultant and blogger at Datacenterlinks.com. He can be reached at johnsr4@gmail.com.

Related Search Term(s): data centers, networking, Google, Microsoft

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