Data Center
By Jyeh Gan |
With Mobile World Congress less than a week away, we are sure to hear a lot about edge computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), Network Function Virtualization (NFV), and 5G, among other trends this year. And rightfully so when you consider how communications service providers (CoSPs) are continually evolving their business models to add new products and services that bring additional revenue streams while also trying to:
- Better compete with Web-based service providers
- Deploy distributed infrastructure closer to the edge of the network
- Ensure end-users receive instant access to applications and services
Next week at Mobile World Congress, Dell Technologies will be showing off how we can help CoSPs on their digital transformation journey. Our Extreme Scale Infrastructure (ESI) division will be there with our latest edge solutions, including our micro Modular Data Center (MDC). We’ll also have our DSS 9000 rack-scale infrastructure and we’ll be running a number of demos. Read on to get an inside look at what ESI has planned for the show.
What’s driving the edge computing trend?
The answer is simple…data. The huge amounts of data generated by IoT is accelerating interest in the edge. IDC estimates that by 2025 there will be 80 billion IoT connected endpoints and that the amount of data will exceed 162 zettabytes. When CoSPs need real-time data analysis, local solutions can respond faster than clouds or centralized data centers whose resources are utilized by a huge range of users spanning vast distances.
What is the Dell micro Modular Data Center?
Traditional data center architectures don’t work well for edge-oriented initiatives and it’s the reason ESI introduced a micro MDC. With a footprint smaller than half of a parking spot, Dell micro MDCs are small, nimble data centers that are pre-integrated with compute, storage and networking as well as power & cooling.
Dell micro MDCs are complete, easily deployable solutions that can be built to your requirements and can be placed virtually anywhere in the world – indoors or outdoors, at the base of a cell tower or in a local neighborhood. They can leverage outside air or mechanical cooling technologies, be built with one rack or three or more racks, configured with all IT equipment or a mixture of IT and power and cooling.
A look at the IT
While each micro MDC can be tailored to meet your needs, at Mobile World Congress we will be showing off a three-rack solution that features one rack of IT (DSS 9000) alongside two racks of power & cooling and a Dell Edge Gateway that connects varied wired and wireless devices and systems to allow for local analytics. The combination allows you to speed the storage, processing and analysis of data at the edge – helping to generate business-driving insights faster while improving response times for end users.
For those of you not familiar with our DSS 9000 rack-level infrastructure, this is an integrated rack that provides compute, storage, networking, power & cooling and rack-level management (via Redfish and a hardware resource manager such as Intel Rack Scale Design [RSD]). Designed to scale with your needs, it’s a leading example of the shift toward software-defined infrastructure and has been recently recognized by the Open Compute Project (OCP) Foundation as OCP-INSPIRED™. It provides the scalability, agility and manageability you need to distribute more processing power closer to the edge.
Another key piece of DSS 9000, in combination with Redfish and Intel RSD, is that it enables composable systems – meaning users can allocate pools of compute, storage and networking dynamically across workloads as they need them and within the cloud environment of their choice. This becomes even more important in the IoT era when your underlying infrastructure needs to support a wide variety of workload requirements. We’ll be demonstrating this capability in an OpenStack environment at the event and you can find more details, including a step-by-step how-to in the following whitepapers:
- Transforming Management for Scale-Out Infrastructure
- OpenStack Kickstart Guide for DSS 9000
Managing from a single-pane-of-glass
While we’re very excited to be showing off our micro MDC and the associated IT at Mobile World Congress, one critical piece that should not be overlooked is the management of edge solutions. It’s one thing to build and deploy edge computing solutions; and another to manage these capabilities as they become more widespread.
Our micro MDCs are managed as a unified, software-defined environment via software we call MDCi. This means operators can administer and manage multiple MDCs from all over the world as well as the associated IT and data center sensors from a single point of control. At Mobile World Congress we will be demoing the software alongside our development partner, OSIsoft, and showing how MDCi can provide a ‘one-stop shop’ for IT and facilities personnel.
Visit us at Mobile World Congress
This will be our biggest year yet at Mobile World Congress and we’d certainly like to connect in person. You can find Dell inside the VMware booth in Hall 3, Booth 3K10. Please drop by to check out our solutions in person, to request a meeting or to just say hello. And if you won’t be at the event, that’s ok too…simply email us if you have any questions. You can also learn more about the ESI and our edge computing solutions in this whitepaper from Heavy Reading (Dell Extreme Scale Infrastructure Brings Power to the Edge).
About the Author: Jyeh Gan
16 year Dell veteran in global leadership roles ranging from engineering to marketing to strategy. Helped start Data Center Solutions (DCS), led Dell Data Center Infrastructure organization and led teams on assignment in Asia.
