The Data Center is Changing: Are You Ready?

The Data Center is changing, becoming more virtual, fungible, ephemeral... a whole load of adjectives that describe flexible infrastructure, whether delivered via the public cloud, an on-prem consumption-based model, or even a hyper-scale data center provider like Equinix, and its Equnix Metal offerings. Matt & Steve are joined by an expert in this field, Zac Smith. Zac is the co-founder of Packet, and the current head of Edge and Metal Infrastructure at Equinix. There isn't much talk about Equinix -- this conversation quickly focuses on how data center architecture is evolving, embracing various alternate consumption models. Cloud, hosted, consuption-based, and other emergent models are supplementing and, in many cases, replacing traditional on-prem infrastructure. This is one you don't want to miss. 00:00 Fade In. 01:00 Introducing Zac Smith 02:00 Zac's different thinking about the data center world and the founding of Packet 05:37 Shifting, often generational, views of data center and workload management 07:15 It's all about the workload: why servers may not ever fully commodtize 09:35 Where do providers like Equinix fit in data center architecture? 16:09 The Rise of ARM-based processors in the data center 20:08 What IT customers are choosing the ARM path, and why? 24:05 Open compute initiatives, and the Linux Foundation's Open19 Project 31:30 The Sustainabilty Impact 35:55 Consumption-based infrastructure's place in data center architecture 39:08 Fade to black. Special Guest: Zac Smith.