{"id":7056,"date":"2021-06-26T19:54:52","date_gmt":"2021-06-26T17:54:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/?p=7056"},"modified":"2021-06-26T19:54:54","modified_gmt":"2021-06-26T17:54:54","slug":"post-pandemic-it-are-virtual-datacentre-tours-here-to-stay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/post-pandemic-it-are-virtual-datacentre-tours-here-to-stay\/","title":{"rendered":"Post-pandemic IT: Are virtual datacentre tours here to stay?"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading Time-approximately:<\/span> 5<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>\n

A physical tour of a datacentre has traditionally been a key marketing and selling tool for colocation operators, and the Covid-19 pandemic has forced many to provide virtual alternatives. But how do they compare?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Nicholas<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Nicholas Fearn<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A physical tour of a datacentre has traditionally been an important part of the sales process for any colocation operator looking to entice enterprises or hyperscale cloud firms to consider renting space from them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHistorically, datacentre tours have been an industry staple, used to show prospective customers the quality of your facility, as well as demonstrate features like the robustness of your physical security, for example,\u201d says Jeff Tapley, group managing director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) of Digital Realty-owned colocation giant\u00a0Interxion.<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in spring 2020, and the stay-at-home mandates and social distancing restrictions this ushered in, the datacentre industry has had to find new ways to showcase their facilities to prospective clients, prompting a pivot from physical to virtual tours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen Covid-19 hit, a physical tour wasn\u2019t something that the industry could simply do away with \u2013 we had to adapt,\u201d says Tapley. \u201cThus, the virtual tour rose to prominence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it\u2019s not difficult to see why, he says, given that virtual datacentre tours are often more convenient for clients to take part in, and easier for operators to tweak the content of based on what clients require from a performance and location perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Microsoft to Equinix, many of the world\u2019s biggest datacentre operators are now offering virtual tours of their facilities, but \u2013 from a post-pandemic perspective \u2013 are they really a viable, long-term alternative to physical tours?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Noelle Walsh, corporate vice-president of cloud operations and innovation at Microsoft, certainly seems to think so, based on the positive feedback the tech giant has received in response to the virtual online tours it now offers companies of its own\u00a0Azure public cloud datacentres.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe pandemic has in many ways normalised virtual alternatives to physical gatherings, all of which is made possible by the cloud,\u201d Walsh tells Computer Weekly. \u201cCustomer response to the virtual tour has already been overwhelmingly positive, and the virtual tour will be a staple of customer and partner tours \u2013 even when we return to pre-pandemic conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keeping clients safe<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

This view is backed by Adam Nethersole, vice-president of marketing at Harlow-based colocation provider\u00a0Kao Data, who says the datacentre industry\u2019s ability to pivot from physical to virtual tours during the pandemic has played a key role in helping keep clients safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe move to virtual tours has been crucial to maintain Covid-19 safe procedures, ensure operational continuity and provide a safe environment for our customers,\u201d says Nethersole. \u201cHowever, this has also provided the opportunity to create engaging virtual experiences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So much so that Kao Data credits the creation of its virtual tour experience with helping to secure a major client win during the pandemic in the form of the Nvidia-backed\u00a0Cambridge-1 supercomputer, which is billed as being the UK\u2019s most powerful supercomputer dedicated to life sciences research.\u201c<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Customer response to the virtual tour has already been overwhelmingly positive\u201d<\/p>

Noelle Walsh, Microsoft<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Traditionally, supercomputers take several years of planning and building work to bring online, but Cambridge-1 went from inception to initial deployment in 20 weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cProviding a virtual tour was instrumental to the Nvidia Cambridge-1 contract win and the oversight of the supercomputer\u2019s 20-week deployment was largely delivered remotely,\u201d says Nethersole. \u201cSuch was its success that we\u2019re yet to even welcome some of Nvidia\u2019s core team to the datacentre.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Online tours are among a number of business continuity measures Equinix has introduced to protect stakeholders during the pandemic, says Lorraine Wilkinson, the firm’s regional vice-president of UK sales. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe took action to restrict access to visitors, customers and customer contractors, along with non-critical Equinix employees, contractors and vendors, for anything other than critical and essential work,\u201d says Wilkinson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDue to these restrictions, we began offering virtual datacentre tours as an alternative to physical ones. Doing this means we can showcase the innovative solutions we provide, in addition to the physical infrastructure that underpins our entire platform and our design processes that prioritise sustainability.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A tour in 60 minutes<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

A virtual tour now takes up about 60 minutes of the client\u2019s working day, she says, whereas a physical site visit takes significantly longer, particularly when you factor in the travel time required to get to get to a datacentre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simon Ford, area vice-president for EMEA at colocation provider\u00a0CyrusOne, would not have predicted, pre-pandemic, that virtual datacentre tours would catch on as they have, but they have proved a viable substitute for physical tours\u00a0.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPre-Covid, we would never have thought virtual tours would replace physical tours entirely, but we are in fact getting very close to that,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the past year, says Ford, CyrusOne has developed a variety of virtual tour options that are tailored to meet the needs of prospective clients at different stages of the datacentre procurement cycle.\u201c<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pre-Covid, we would never have thought virtual tours would replace physical tours entirely, but we are in fact getting very close to that\u201d<\/p>

Simon Ford, CyrusOne<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

These range from land acquisition and pre-construction sales tours to customer inspections and handovers, plus sales tours of operational colocation, he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTwo of our hyperscale customers are now so happy and confident in what we are delivering virtually, that they have determined that they will never need to physically visit a CyrusOne site or facility again from either a sales or handover perspective,\u201d says Ford.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is an incredible environmental positive and will also create vast savings in travel and accommodation and facilitate a better quality of life for US executives, who no longer have to spend weeks on end travelling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the numerous benefits and success stories shared by the colocation and hyperscale firms that spoke to Computer Weekly, it is likely that operators will offer a mix of physical and virtual tour options to clients once the pandemic is over, according to several contributors to this article.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hybrid approach<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

These include Kao Data\u2019s Nethersole, who expects operators to take a \u201chybrid approach\u201d to datacentre tours in the long term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEach medium has its merits, but given the international nature of compute, a virtual tour means that the sales cycle can continue uninterrupted, and from distance,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Equinix\u2019s Wilkinson takes a similar view, arguing that the industry is likely to offer both virtual and physical tours to cater to differing customer needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor example, if a customer is enquiring about a new datacentre that has recently been finalised, we might not have the ability to give them a virtual tour right away, so it may be better for them to arrange a physical visit instead,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interxion\u2019s Tapley is also doubtful that virtual tours will completely replace physical tours in the long term because clients get so much out of being able to experience a datacentre in-person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen you\u2019re shopping in-person \u2013 whether you\u2019re considering buying a new pair of shoes or perhaps a new car \u2013 there is something about seeing it in the flesh that can\u2019t entirely be replicated virtually,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd until technology becomes advanced enough to emulate the tangibility of physical tours, I believe we\u2019re going to see a balance of both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt might be that we\u2019re able to address customers at different stages of the buying process with different types of tours. For example, using virtual tours to initially capture prospective customers\u2019 attention and then switching to physical when they want to get a better idea of the inner workings of the specific facility.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Time-approximately:<\/span> 5<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>A physical tour of a datacentre has traditionally been a key marketing and selling tool for colocation operators, and the Covid-19 pandemic has forced many to provide virtual alternatives. But how do they compare? By Nicholas Fearn A physical tour of a datacentre has traditionally been an important part of the sales process for any colocation operator looking to entice<\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75,155,32,142,4,30,3,238],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-normal-courtesy-of-covid-19","category-batting-for-tech-in-the-covid-19-times","category-covid-19-global-responses","category-covid-19-organization-mitigation-responses","category-datacenter-news","category-expert-advise-and-opinion","category-industry-news-and-expert-advise","category-timeless-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/112"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7056"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7056\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7057,"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7056\/revisions\/7057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}