The data center industry’s rapid growth over the last decade has led to mammoth investment, especially in the last five years, but the market itself is still relatively immature. Other sectors with longer histories have access to a bulk of historical data and fast moving intelligence infrastructures, enabling them to make faster and more informed strategic decisions.

When it comes to intelligence, its relatively short lifespan combined with its rapid growth has left a gap in the data center market.

In a recent DCD>Talks episode, Dan Davey, chief strategy officer at DCD, discusses how this gap is affecting continued investment and slowing decision making in the industry, and how DCD hopes to plug this gap with its new DCD>Intelligence platform.

To grow and succeed

In the data center industry, data is being collected but not shared, according to Davey, the former managing director, M&A, at GlobalData.

He says: “There hasn’t been a need either because the market has been growing at such a fast pace. In terms of the investment that’s coming into the marketplace, they haven't necessarily required that level of detail in order to channel investments.”

But now, with significantly increased investment and growth in the data center industry, Davey says data sharing is essential, both to inform investment coming in from outside of the industry and to help organizations within the data center industry make smarter and faster decisions.

“Now, we’re talking billions of dollars of investment coming in from across the world. As a result, there’s a need for a granularity of data: Understanding where the market is moving to, where the demand is, where the supply is, what the pricing will be, what innovation is going to shake things up.”

Davey stresses that data centers are hugely important in the modern world, and are critical national infrastructure.

He adds: “It’s vital that the market has the information it needs to be able to grow and succeed and have that visibility to reach its full potential.”

Intelligence and understanding need to be surfaced in order for investment to be released. Davey says analysts need something to “seize upon and understand” to advise where funding should be directed. Players already in the industry need to know how and where they should be investing in product development.

According to Davey, these two different aspects of the marketplace — the sector itself and the outside investment community — have been traditionally using different sets of data and information.

“As a result, there’s inconsistency in what’s happening in the patterns and trends, so the businesses themselves are struggling to make decisions quickly. They don’t have that consistency of information and speed of decision-making.”

If those two parties align with consistent data, it will speed up decision making and investment in the market, helping it to grow further, faster.

DCD>Intelligence

DCD’s new intelligence platform hopes to address this. According to Davey, the platform is, in essence, “a real-time interactive platform with huge amounts of data across all the market segments we cover at DCD.”

DCD>Intelligence hopes to compile information across these different channels, using a combination of private data from its partners and data gathered from its events and news platform, as well as publicly available information.

Davey explains: “We’re compiling the information across these different channels, and at the moment, we’re figuring out which key data sets the market and investment community wants and what we can get out of the marketplace and pull with our own data and information."

For Davey, the scope, robustness, and reliability of the platform is extremely important, and should provide something that “isn’t commonly available.”

Frequent updates are also a major goal of the platform. Davey notes: “Some of the feedback we’ve had in the marketplace is that the timing and frequency of market information is perhaps a little bit slow, which is understandable given the breadth and speed of the marketplace. It’s hard to assess all that information, and [the market] needs something that is updated more frequently.”

Davey believes that, in order for the market to achieve its full potential, this data is “absolutely essential.”

“Yes [the market] has grown hugely over the last decade or two, but it can grow so much faster and so much more effectively. All market players can benefit from having that visibility.”

In terms of offering a competitive edge to those using the platform, Davey’s view is that those who use it effectively will benefit, but notes that it’s “not necessarily a case of someone getting competitive advantage … it’s about bringing up the whole market and giving visibility and understanding.”

“There’s an understanding within those sectors, with the rising tide, all ships lift up. It’s bringing everybody up a level, enabling them to be a more cohesive ecosystem, ensuring there’s greater understanding across the marketplace.”

Watch the full DCD>Talks episode with Dan Davey of DCD here.

To learn more about the new DCD>Intelligence platform, click here.