Wednesday, September 25th, 2013

Time	Event
11:44a	Data Center Jobs: Another Source At the Data Center Jobs Board, we have a new job listing from Another Source, which is seeking a Critical Facility Engineer (HVAC and Data Center Controls) in San Antonio, Texas. The Critical Facility Engineer (HVAC and Data Center Controls) is responsible for maintaining a positive and professional working relationship with internal and external clients, responding to customer service requests in a timely manner, responding to emergency calls, performing routine maintenance tasks in accordance with McKinstry Safety Policy and Procedures, inspecting buildings, grounds and equipment for unsafe or malfunctioning conditions, troubleshooting, evaluating and recommending system upgrades, and ordering parts and supplies for maintenance and repairs. To view full details and apply, see job listing details. Are you hiring for your data center? You can list your company’s job openings on the Data Center Jobs Board, and also track new openings via our jobs RSS feed. (Comment on this)
2:00p	Video: AnsibleWorks Automation Helps You Manage Apps, Clouds AnsibleWorks is a company which helps system administrations manage their applications and systems that are deployed in the cloud. In this video, AnsibleWorks’ Tim Gerla, VP of Services, demonstrates the radically simple IT orchestration engine and discusses the process with Robert Scoble, Rackspace’s Startup Liason Officer. The open-source engine helps system admins avoid writing scripts or custom code to deploy and update applications, and allows for automatation in a language that approaches plain English, using SSH, with no agents to install on remote systems. The video runs 19:08. For additional video content, check out our DCK video archive and the Data Center Videos channel on YouTube. (Comment on this)
3:18p	Understanding the Business Value Behind DDoS Protection Security in the enterprise IT world is one of the most important topics which need constant review and education. Managers and executives oftentimes misunderstand many security protocols and insist that security teams focus on other, more revenue generating, measures. Today’s modern IT environment is more susceptible to threat than ever before. Organizations rely on their IT infrastructure as a core business tool. This means that any organization, large or small, can be a potential target of security attacks. A continuing and growing threat to service availability is distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. In fact, most hosting providers experience DDoS attacks on a regular basis. An effective DDoS defense system can safeguard business operations against DDoS-related outages, but determining the return on investment (ROI) of purchasing and deploying such a system can be challenging. One needs to quantify both the risks of DDoS attacks and their financial consequences. This white paper from Arbor Networks provides a simple, step-by-step approach for evaluating whether an investment in a DDoS defense system is financially justified. Remember, the overall impact of a DDoS attack is a function of the time it takes to detect the attack, the time needed to mitigate it and the extent of service degradation both before and after mitigation. For many Internet data center (IDC) operators, detection consists of simply waiting for customers to complain, and mitigation consists of dropping all traffic destined to the resource under attack. This form of mitigation may protect the IDC infrastructure and other customers, but it completes the attack on the particular target of the DDoS event. If the target is a high-value customer, the hosting provider will likely suffer financial loss. [Image Source: Arbor Networks] The downtime and monetary repercussions of a DDOS attack should help push any organization to begin to truly see and understand this type of security risk. Arbor Networks not only helps you understand the risk of the attack – the paper also outlines the necessary steps for incorporating the DDoS threat risk into your IT security budget. This includes: Understanding the probability of attack Quantifying the cost of service outages Understanding risk management and business impact Comparing industry averages Download this white paper today to learn how to minimize such outages and optimize the availability of your hosting services. Using the simple, step-by-step approach described in this paper, providers can model the financial impact of a DDoS attack on their operations and calculate the ROI of an effective DDoS defense solution. (Comment on this)
5:30p	HP Launches Cloud-Based Analytics as a Service HP launches a cloud-based analytics as a service offering, NGDATA raises $3.3 million for big data expansion plans, and Gartner sizes up the big data investments and opportunities in 2013. HP Analytics as a Service HP (HPQ) announced a new cloud-based analytics as a service built on HP’s HAVEn Big Data analytics platform. As one of the first adopters of the HP HAVEn platform, HP Enterprise Services deployed HAVEn as part of its Big Data Discovery Experience as-a-service offering, which allows customers to test drive and determine the value of their new use cases and “big data” data sets prior to making large capital investments. HP HAVEn enables organizations to create next-generation applications and solutions that accelerate the monetization of big data. Proven technologies are combined in HAVEn, such as Autonomy IDOL, Vertica Analytics, ArcSight Security Event Manager, and ArcSight Logger, as well as key industry initiatives such as Hadoop. “Harnessing the value of information is a top priority for our clients and a Big Data solution is a significant investment of time and money for any organization, regardless of industry. HP Enterprise Services has leveraged HP HAVEn’s unified approach to Big Data to provide a low-risk, simplified and accelerated entry path to addressing key client business problems,” said Dragan Rakovich, chief technologist, Information Management & Analytics, HP Enterprise Services. NGDATA raises $3.3 million for big data Customer intelligence management solutions company NGDATA announced that it has closed a $3.3 million investment round led by Capricorn Venture Partners with participation from existing investors, including Sniper Investments, and angel investors. Validating the investment is NGDATA’s market momentum, such as expanding its global presence, opening multiple offices throughout the United States, and executing a number of strategic partnerships. This latest investment will be used to advance the development of the company’s customer intelligence solution, Lily, and build upon NGDATA’s record revenue growth.  “We’re seeing a shift in the Big Data market, where companies are looking for better ways to capture and analyze data in ways that help them solve real business problems,” said Katrin Geyskens, Partner at Capricorn Venture Partners.  “NGDATA brings a unique and effective offering in its Big Data solutions, providing companies with the ability to gain deeper insights into their data—and its growing customer base and revenue streams are testament. We’re thrilled to join NGDATA’s team as the company moves into its next phase of growth and expansion in the U.S.” Gartner Big Data Trends According to a Gartner survey, big data investments in 2013 continue to rise, with 64 percent of organizations investing or planning to invest in big data technology, compared to 58 percent in 2012. Industries leading big data investments in 2013 are media and communications, banking, and services. North America leads big data investments with 38 percent having already made investments, and Asia/Pacific have 45 percent indicating that they plan to invest in the next two years. Some of the big data activities are incremental to current business practices; for example, better understanding customer needs, making processes more efficient, further reducing costs or better detecting risks. “The hype around big data continues to drive increased investment and attention, but there is real substance behind the hype,” said Lisa Kart, research director at Gartner. “Our survey underlines the fact that organizations across industries and geographies see ‘opportunity’ and real business value rather than the ‘smoke and mirrors’ with which hypes usually come.” (Comment on this)
6:00p	A Data Center Build: Breaking Ground Shawn Mills is a technology entrepreneur, founding member and president of Green House Data. You can find him on Twitter at @tshawnmills. SHAWN MILLS Greenhouse Data Finally, with permits starting to be issued, contractors in place, state and local government on board, and schedules starting to really crystallize, it’s time to break ground. Make it a Community Event Because we saw our groundbreaking as symbolic instead of a just construction milestone, we wanted to invite the local community and build a networking event around it. We worked with the Wyoming Business Council and Cheyenne LEADS, two economic development agencies, to improve our reach, and also kept it open to the public. Data centers can have significant impacts from large building footprints to infrastructure improvements that can benefit everyone. For example, Green House Data recently installed a 100 Gbps circuit, and it’s the first of its kind in Wyoming, which means fiber upgrades statewide. This was also a great time to pull together many of the contributors to this project. We set up a tent so guests would have some shade and feel welcome to stay for a while, and we offered tours of our existing data center. Brand It We also approached breaking ground as a branding opportunity, getting custom hard-hats and painting shovels in our colors. A happy side note was that was something employees got excited about—and generating enthusiasm is exactly what we wanted to do. Guest List The more dignitaries, and this includes partners, you can confirm, the easier it will be to get media coverage and also generally drive attendance. We invited elected officials like Wyoming Governor Matt Mead to attend as a VIP guest and to speak. We were pleasantly surprised when the governor’s office arrived with a youth delegation that was spending the day with him. Details There are some details that are easy to overlook that make ground breaking events run more smoothly. For example, we “pre-tilled” a stretch of ground so that it would not be awkward to dig in. We also kept our ceremony mostly in our nearby parking lot instead of in the grass at our new build site because our Network Operations Center (NOC) staff had spotted some snakes. Finally, make sure someone is designated to take pictures so you can share the ceremony with people who were unable to make it: Industry Perspectives is a content channel at Data Center Knowledge highlighting thought leadership in the data center arena. See our guidelines and submission process for information on participating. View previously published Industry Perspectives in our Knowledge Library. (Comment on this)
6:30p	Oracle Introduces Broad Portfolio of Cloud Services Oracle announced sweeping enhancements for the cloud, with a new database as a service, 10 new cloud services, and a roadmap for Nimbula Director and OpenStack API Integration with Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud. Oracle OpenWorld continues this week in San Francisco – with the event conversation on Twitter hashtag #OOW13. Database as a Service Oracle announced new  services for supporting a wide variety of workloads: Oracle Database as a Service, Oracle Java as a Service, and Oracle Infrastructure as a Service. All of these new offerings augment Oracle’s portfolio of Application, Social, Platform, and Infrastructure Services, all available on a subscription basis. The new Oracle Database as a Service provides full control of a dedicated database instance, supports any Oracle Database application, and gives users greater flexibility and choice over their services. Java as a Service provides full control of dedicated Oracle WebLogic Server clusters, supports any Java application, and gives users greater flexibility and choice over their services. “By building upon the world’s broadest selection of flexible, reliable and secure enterprise cloud services, Oracle is perfectly positioned to help organizations unlock all the benefits of cloud computing,” said Thomas Kurian, executive vice president of product development, Oracle. “With a comprehensive and growing set of functionally rich, integrated and secure cloud services, the Oracle Cloud provides customers with a variety of options through a full suite of Application, Social, Platform, and Infrastructure Services.” Ten New Cloud Services Extending its cloud portfolio, Oracle introduced ten new cloud services for its customers and partners. Joining the traditional Oracle ERP cloud services are Compute Cloud, Object Storage Cloud, Database Cloud, Java Cloud, Business Intelligence Cloud, Documents Cloud, Mobile Cloud, Database Backup Cloud, Billing and Revenue Management Cloud, and a new Cloud Marketplace. Oracle Cloud partners will be able to refer and resell the new Oracle Cloud Platform and Infrastructure services through the existing Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) Cloud programs. “To realize the true benefits that cloud computing offers, organizations need access to flexible, reliable and secure cloud services that are designed to meet their specific business needs,” said Thomas Kurian, executive vice president of product development, Oracle. “With the broadest selection of enterprise-grade cloud solutions in the world, Oracle is uniquely positioned to meet this demand. With an expanding portfolio of functionally rich, integrated and secure enterprise cloud services, Oracle continues to lead the cloud computing industry by delivering instant value to both business users and developers.” Nimbula Director Roadmap Earlier this year Oracle acquired open cloud player Nimbula, and Tuesday it announced a roadmap for integrating Nimbula Director, an Infrastructure-as-a-Service software solution that enables enterprises and service providers to build a cloud environment on their own infrastructure, with Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud. Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c will also be integrated with Nimbula Director for a complete, unified and automated out-of-the-box cloud automation solution that will offer full IaaS lifecycle management, full PaaS lifecycle management, and a single management regime for cloud and traditional IT estates. This will be the first time the extreme performance of Oracle Exalogic and OpenStack capabilities will be available on a single system. “By integrating Nimbula Director into Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud, we are positioned to bring Oracle customers the industry’s first engineered system that can deliver a scalable, resilient cloud infrastructure with breakthrough application performance,” said Thomas Kurian, executive vice president, Oracle. “Customers and partners deploying Java, Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle and ISV Applications on private cloud environments will be able to consolidate all their workloads on the industry’s only engineered cloud platform that scales linearly within the data center and across Oracle Public Cloud.” (Comment on this)
7:00p	With NCS, Cisco Targets the Internet of Everything The Cisco Network Convergence System (NCS) Cisco (CSCO) this week introduced the Network Convergence System (NCS), a network fabric family designed to help service providers handle rapidly growing volumes of Internet traffic in cloud, mobile, video and machine-to-machine applications. A key focus for NCS is the “Internet of Everything” -  the trillions of programmable device-driven events generated by networked devices and sensors. NCS is a solution combining hardware, software and silicon, featuring the recently announced nPower X1 integrated network processor. It is designed to help service providers build services and capabilities to build business from the explosion of data being generated by new devices being used to monitor our world. Cisco cites data from Machina Research projecting market opportunities of $174 billion  in health care, $284 billion in manufacturing and $850 billion in smart homes. Monetizing that opportunity requires even smarter networks, according to Cisco. The NCS is its solution, and the offering has seen early adoption from global service providers such as BSkyB, KDDI and Telstra. “The Internet as we know it is at a crossroads, as the impact of not only human-driven but machine-driven events changes network dynamics and imposes entirely new service requirements,” said Yoshiharu Shimatani, Senior Vice President and Director at KDDI. “Managing bandwidth alone is no longer enough, as Internet transactions communicate at machine speeds. KDDI believes the Cisco NCS is the foundation for a new generation of Internet networks that will allow us to offer our consumer and business customers the newest and most exciting Internet experiences at a very low total cost of ownership.” Flexible foundation, Petabit scale The NCS is built for petabit scale, capable of supporting trillions of events across a connected fabric. The NCS can manage and move network and compute resources across an architecture in real time. Enabling a flexible foundation network fabric, NCS converges IP and optical networks and is designed to seamlessly integrate with the Cisco Unified Computing System. The NCS’s element, system and architectural virtualization capabilities enable the system to orchestrate services and resources across disparate physical, virtual and geographical elements as if they are part of a single unified system using Cisco Prime and Cisco Quantum solutions. NCS’s virtualization features enable service providers to elastically scale up and down both network and compute resources, utilizing scalable multichassis configurations that can be managed as a single entity. “The Cisco NCS was engineered with the programmability, intelligence and scalability to meet the demands of today and tomorrow,” said Surya Panditi, SVP and GM, Cisco’s Service Provider Networking Group. ”The NCS delivers an evolved programmable network that will enable service providers to generate new revenue streams and business models, while delivering exciting new experiences to their customers.” In this video Surya Panditi, SVP/GM of the Service Provider Networking Group at Cisco, introduces the Cisco NCS product family. The Cisco NCS family consists of three key components that can be managed as a single integrated system for business agility and simplified operations. Available immediately, the NCS 2000 connects DWDM transport networks at 100G rates and beyond; the NCS 6000 is also available immediately, for 1 Tbps line card and the capability of transporting up to 5 Tbps per slot and 1.2 Pbps per system; and the NCS 4000 available in the first half of 2014 will support 400 Gbps per slot and 6.4 Terabits per system and be available in single, back-to-back, and multi-chassis configurations. (Comment on this)
7:30p	Net Access Expanding New Jersey Data Center Colocation cages inside a Net Access data center in New Jersey. The company is expanding its facility in Parsippany. (Photo: Net Access) Data center construction is busting out all over New Jersey. The latest project is an expansion by colocation provider Net Access, which this week broke ground on a significant expansion to its data center in Parsippany, New Jersey. The Parsippany II facility, which opened in 2010, will more than double its size to add space for another 1,500 cabinets of customer IT gear. “We are very excited to be breaking ground on this data center expansion in less than three years since opening Parsippany II,” said Blake Ellman, CEO of Net Access. “By increasing the facility size from 50,000 square feet to over 120,000 square feet, we will not only enable current customers at this facility to expand, but also provide plenty of space for new customers in the coming years. With our close proximity to Manhattan, onsite D/R seating, and full suite of cloud and managed services, an increasing number of enterprises are selecting Net Access for their IT infrastructure needs.” The 70,000 square foot expansion will be a two-story facility with high floor load and high roof load capacities, and is expected to come online in the second quarter of 2014. Net Access will add 9 megawatts of power capacity, allowing it to support higher power densities of up to 20 kW per cabinet for customer installations in the new space. The company has 12 megawatts already available on site. “We are committed to supporting high density power needs and enabling future growth for our customers,” said Alex Rubenstein, COO of Net Access. “With N+1 and 2N+1 power configurations available, consumption based power billing, custom sized private and shared cages, backed by our experienced technical support and facilities teams, this is a compelling solution for businesses evaluating data center services.” Net Access is hardly alone among providers seeing an expansion opportunity in the New Jersey data center market, where CoreSite, Digital Realty and Internap all are building new facilities, and Telx just completed a construction project. The New Jersey data center market is segmented, with active players in both the wholesale and retail level. Demand is driven by the financial services sector, with Wall Street companies often seeking space to support trading or disaster recovery needs. But the state is also a hub for the pharmaceutical industry and healthcare businesses, along with the small business sector. Net Access operates three data centers in Morris County, New Jersey, including two facilities in Parsippany and one in Cedar Knolls. Continue to the next page for a look inside their facilities. NEXT: A Look Inside Net Access’ Data Centers (Comment on this)

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