Data Centre Virtualization

The way that your data is housed and stored has an impact on your ability to effectively use and access that information. For example, physical storage of data requires employees to go to the location to look for the file and then bring it back to their workstation to use the file.

It is also common for companies to have an information request form that employees are required to fill out to request access to archived material. The downfall of this approach is that they take time.

This is why the use of data within companies and virtualization technologies are perhaps two of the most talked about innovations that companies in Canada are considering as part of their IT strategy as a means to speed up access to internal data.

What is data centre virtualization?

Data centres come in many different shapes and sizes. They can be housed onsite or offsite, they can be in one central location or dispersed geographically, and they can have a wide variety of specific functions depending on a company’s data storage needs. With the explosion of cloud and virtualization based technologies in recent years, and with the need for companies to keep their costs down, data centres and virtualization have been brought together as an effective means to store data in a cost effective manner when compared to the costs of traditional data centres.

Data centre virtualization sets up servers as virtual machines. Each application operates with its one operating system that is separated within the computer. When a data centre is virtualized, it allows a company’s files and data to be located in one central location that can be access either via the internet or internally on an intranet.

Data centre virtualization involves:

• The virtualization of servers, networks, and storage hardware and resources
  
• The partitioning of one device into many in an online environment
  
• Moving all data storage online
  
• The consolidation of data
  
• The consolidation of physical hardware devices used to store data
  
• The creation of a centralized storage resource

The benefits of data centre virtualization

Data centre virtualization has become more common among Canadian companies because of the advantages and benefits it provides. They are as follows:

• Centralization of data: Company data is consolidated and located in one central location that can be accessed online.
  
• Simplified access: With people constantly being on the go and working from multiple locations, having the ability to access files remotely and online provides many benefits and assists with productivity.
  
• Increased collaboration: Employees can easily share files with each other and their clients without and hassle.
  
• Effective management: Having data consolidated in a virtual environment allows for companies to better manage their resources and perform necessary maintenance and modification without impacting operations.
  
• Cost savings: Data centre virtualization provides costs savings in a number of areas within an organization. They include: 

1.    Data backup costs
2.    Costs associated with consultants and specialists to manage specific data issues
3.    Software licensing costs
4.    Operation costs such as the reduction of the number of hardware devices
5.    Power and cooling costs are reduced through the virtualization of resources
6.    Overall IT costs associated with data storage, back up and disaster recovery