Significant, industry-wide investment in edge computing will change the profile of the data centre ecosystem over the next four years, increasing the edge component of total compute by 29% over that time, from 21% of total compute to 27% in 2026.
Vertiv’s What’s Your Edge survey of data centre industry professionals noted that 34% are either planning or in the middle of significant edge deployments. Twenty-five per cent have deployed new, purpose-built edge sites, and 41% are operating legacy edge sites.
Source: Vertiv 2022
Survey participants also anticipate a 150% increase in core sites and increased activity in the cloud. The percentage of IT resources deployed in the public cloud is expected to grow from 19% currently to 25% by 2026.
“The next five years will reshape the data centre landscape, shifting more and more computing to the edge while buttressing the enterprise facilities at the core of modern hybrid networks,” said Martin Olsen, global vice president for edge strategy and transformation for Vertiv.
He surmised that the survey reveals the future of computing is about speed and latency, and the only way to meet the need is to build out the edge of the network.
Edge use cases
Legacy edge sites were generally specified based on the power requirements of the IT load, regardless of the use case or application being supported. Emerging use cases have more demanding requirements and must be configured not only to IT requirements but also based on the latency, bandwidth, availability, and security requirements of the use case.
Source: Vertiv 2022
Data-Intensive edge use cases are those managing such a high volume of data that it is impractical to transfer it to the cloud, such as video streaming and IoT applications. With the explosion in data volumes over the previous five years, Data-Intensive use cases are the most mature of the new generation of edge uses cases. Thirty-eight per cent classified their edge investments as being driven by Data Intensive use cases (Figure 2).
Human-Latency Sensitive use cases are those where latency issues can negatively impact humans’ experience with technology, such as virtual reality and natural language processing. This was the second most popular edge use case category, with 32% of participants saying their edge investments are being driven by Human-Latency Sensitive use cases.
Machine-to-Machine Latency Sensitive use cases generally require even lower latency than Human-Latency Sensitive use cases, because of the speed at which machines can process data. Key use cases in this category include smart grid and smart security systems. Twenty per cent said their investments in edge technology were being driven by Machine-to-Machine Latency Sensitive use cases.
Life Critical use cases are the most demanding — and generally the least mature — as they directly impact human health and safety. The best-known Life Critical uses cases are autonomous vehicles and robots and digital health applications. About 11% of survey respondents said their edge investments were driven by Life Critical use cases.
“In Asia, a good percentage of those surveyed were either already deploying several edge locations or are planning to deploy a significant number of edge locations in the near future. This tracks with what we are consistently seeing in our business, as more customers shift select deployments to the edge, to reduce latency and improve bandwidth and overall services,” said Anand Sanghi, president, ASI (Australia/New Zealand, Southeast Asia, India, Japan and South Korea), Vertiv.
Concerns remain
“Survey respondents in the region ranked security and latency at the edge as their top concerns and we are working with our customers to ensure that these are addressed,” he continued.
The survey results arrive on the heels of the release late last year of Edge Archetypes 2.0: Deployment-Ready Edge Infrastructure Models. That report furthered Vertiv’s research into the edge of the network and identified four edge infrastructure models that enable a more intelligent, semi-standardized approach to edge infrastructure deployment.
The survey results are consistent with the premise of Edge Archetypes 2.0 – that massive growth at the edge necessitates a more standardized approach to edge architecture.
The survey also revealed the changing profile of the modern edge site. Twenty-nine per cent of sites feature between 5 and 20 racks, and 13% have more than 20 racks.
More racks mean more power, and the survey results reflect that: 28% say their sites require between 21 and 200 kW, and 14% report power demands more than 200 kW. The days of single racks tucked away in rudimentary IT closets are over.
Other findings
Sustainability is playing a major role in new and planned edge deployments. More than three-quarters of sites (77%) are using or planning to use energy-efficient UPS systems.
In addition, 40% are planning to use renewable energy; 31% water-efficient cooling; 29% dynamic grid support technologies; and 19% refrigerants with a low global warming potential (GWP).
While security and availability were top priorities of participants deploying edge sites, the survey exposed some current design and operating practices that could reduce edge computing sites’ ability to achieve these objectives as the number of sites expands.
