The landscape of enterprise IT infrastructure has undergone seismic shifts as technology has advanced. What began decades ago as on-premises servers crammed into spare rooms has given way to expansive high-tech data centers powering entire organizations.
Yet for most companies, the costs and challenges of owning and operating their own data centers have fueled a major transition – outsourcing these capabilities to specialized managed service providers.
This comprehensive guide will demystify managed data centers, illuminate the array of infrastructure services available, and demonstrate how partnering with experts unburdens enterprises to focus on strategic initiatives.
Table of Contents
A managed data center refers to an offsite facility surrounded by servers, storage, networking, security, backup power, cooling systems and other infrastructure owned and administered entirely by a third-party provider.
These data center operators handle installing, configuring, optimizing, maintaining, supporting, and upgrading all the equipment and environments on clients’ behalf on an ongoing basis.
Many organizations are now opting to outsource their data centers to managed service providers (MSPs) rather than continuing investment in on-premises data centers requiring expensive specialized staff.
Trusting the hosting of critical IT infrastructure and applications to managed data center specialists provides enterprises with:
For most organizations, outsourcing to managed data centers results in improved performance, security, resilience and agility while freeing up resources.
In addition to managed data center hosting, MSPs also offer comprehensive management and support of the entire IT infrastructure that runs within the data center – the “brains” powering modern enterprises.
This expansive set of managed IT infrastructure services includes:
Some MSPs even provide partial or complete IT staff augmentation through dedicated technicians and engineers to support specialized initiatives or fill gaps.
Source: global hitachi solutions
Outsourcing infrastructure and operations management to managed services provides enterprises with:
Consolidating infrastructure costs and leveraging outside IT specialists eliminates expensive in-house IT headcount and facilities overhead. Economies of scale enable favorable pricing.
Top MSPs maintain state-of-the-art architectures and continuously refresh technology to provide clients continuous access to the latest hardware, software, and cloud platforms as soon as available.
MSPs architect resiliency into infrastructure and implement robust disaster recovery mechanisms like redundant failover sites and advanced backup solutions minimizing downtime risks.
Managed infrastructure can expand or contract elastically based on changing workload demands rather than organisations having to procure new capacity in chunks. Resources scale cost-efficiently.
Advanced cybersecurity technology and vigilance is built into managed services providing continuous detection and defense against infiltration, data breaches, and crippling attacks like ransomware.
With infrastructure off their plates, organizations can direct more resources toward competitive initiatives rather than IT oversight providing greater agility.
Selecting the ideal partner enables realizing the full benefits of outsourced data center and IT infrastructure management. Key selection criteria include:
While a significant relationship, taking the time to rigorously evaluate providers will maximize long-term infrastructure reliability, security and satisfaction.
Exciting developments on the horizon will shape managed services, including:
In today’s highly complex and rapidly evolving IT landscape, leveraging managed data center and infrastructure services is mission-critical. Teaming with specialists unlocks immense benefits from security to availability while allowing companies to stay focused on business-driving initiatives rather than IT upkeep.
With a carefully selected provider, enterprises can confidently entrust the technology foundations powering their organization to fully managed platforms expertly optimized for scalability, resilience, efficiency and growth.
A traditional data center is typically owned, staffed, and managed in-house by an organization. A managed data center is operated by a third-party provider.
Managed services offer advanced security measures, regular updates, 24/7 monitoring, and quick disaster recovery solutions.
Yes, managed data centres offer scalable solutions that can be tailored to fit the needs and budgets of both small and large businesses.
Transitioning involves assessing current infrastructure, planning the migration, and partnering with a reliable managed service provider to ensure a smooth shift.
While managed services require an initial investment, they provide long-term savings by reducing overhead, capital expenditures, and costs related to downtime, security breaches, and inefficient operations if infrastructure was managed in-house.
In today's digital world, schools generate and handle more sensitive student data than ever before.…
In current times, the world pandemic has made people appreciate telehealth more. Telehealth refers to…
In today's world of sophisticated cyberattacks and data breaches, traditional security models focused on perimeter…
Haven’t heard of SASE before? You’re not alone. Standing for Secure Access Service Edge, SASE…
The presence of cyber risks could lead to a disruption in the operations of any…
IT teams require more effective approaches to monitor and control devices remotely as remote work…