The winners of the inaugural Australia & New Zealand Cloud & Data Center Awards were announced at a presentation ceremony which followed the Cloud & Datacenter Convention at the Grand Millennium in Auckland on 31 October 2024.
The Individual Achievement Award is presented to the individual who has led the industry forward through the labyrinth of challenges and opportunities it has faced and faces now. The trophy was presented by Simon Fletcher, the managing director of W.Media in Australia and New Zealand to Ryan Cockayne, currently director of Mobistore. Ryan has been active in New Zealand’s data centre industry for the best part of two decades during which time the facilities which he has managed and consulted to, have navigated through major demand transitions.
W.Media caught up with Ryan to discuss his achievements and to look at what’s next for the New Zealand data centre market.
W.Media: What changes have you seen in the New Zealand DC market in the past two decades and how did you respond?
Ryan: Since 2000 there has been a move toward outsourcing based on ‘cloud’ offerings from national and international providers. The services offered include the provision of virtual systems, storage and networks and also applications. This followed a move in the previous two decades from predominantly on-premises computing, to IT businesses that offer a hybrid of colocation and IT bureau services.
I worked at Revera in New Zealand providing mainframe outsourcing services, colocation Unix and Windows systems as well as the introduction of ‘cloud’ delivery systems known internally as Virtual Data Centre (VDC). Revera designed and built the VDC in 2002, which was essentially a multi-tenanted open platform for replacing client’s IT infrastructure and applications delivered directly to the client over a network to agreed service levels. Revera created data centre premises adopting more advanced resilient data centre environments – than the clients could provide for themselves.
Many standards were imposed on these environments, some driven by industry standards, but also some self imposed standards to facilitate swifter contract start up and service level management. These standards included cabinet specification, racking layout standards, thermal fluidity management standards, failover standards for power and cooling and uninterrupted access management standards.
The needs of the various platforms running at that time required me to develop various solutions to manage each of the (mainframe, ad-hoc colocations and the planned VDC rollout).
W.Media: What do you view as your highlights over that time?
Ryan: A highlight was delivering a Tier3 modular data centre greenfield build, from design through to lights on in an 18-month timeframe after Revera were chosen to be on the All of Government (AoG) data centre panel. Being responsible for Revera’s data centre’s at the time, we were able to light up data centre spaces that matched Revera’s IT sales lifecycle.
As the sales pipeline filled, the data centre modules blueprints were tweaked (to take on any new infrastructure technologies), built, commissioned and tested within a 3-4 month time frame. When the last white space module was commissioned, this kicked off the base build for the next two white space environments to be built inside. The modular design enabled buildings and technical fit out spaces to be developed without interruption to the live modules already online.
W.Media: You introduced modular designs and PODs – how did that shake things up?
Ryan: Type-R was New Zealand’s first aisle containment POD and Revera was one of the early adopters worldwide. The design allowed for cold/hot air separation to provide better resiliency for cooling to the servers to allow for CRAC maintenance or cooling outages and delivered a more efficiently operated facility even before the Greengrid had rolled out its PUE metrics.
The basic design of a POD was for a an equal number of cabinets to be placed in rows with the fronts facing each other on a false floor containing forced cold air. A frame was then installed over and around the rows of cabinets and grilled tiles placed in the floor between the two rows of cabinets. The idea being that the cold air for forced upwards into the pod. This left only one way out for the cold air and that was managed by the servers fans drawing from it. By sealing the vacant cabinets the pod was then available for deployment. Although containment is standard practice these days, Type-R containment were a significant step forward at the time, moving away from adhoc equipment placement on available white space with thermal air flows being mostly ignored.
The data centre modules that the Type-R containment aisles were housed within became part of the ‘just in time’ data centre design which allowed Revera’s data centre capital expenditures to be matched with incoming revenue and also meant we hit the ground running with regards to data centre utilisation from day one of each module.
The modular design of limiting each individual white space area (100 RSE) and 600kW IT power capacity meant that transformers, switchgear, UPS, generators were all sized at a commercially viable level both from a cost and an availability perspective. It made us nimble while data centre operators at the time were boasting about their large monolithic, capital-intensive builds which were mostly under utilised.
W.Media: What is special/different about the NZ data centre market?
Ryan: NZ is a geographically isolated, volcanic, shaky and experiences regular bad weather events. It has limited power generation capacity, limited cable connectivity globally and has basically no military defence to protect itself. On paper, it’s not an overly attractive option for potential data centre operators.
On the flip side, its isolation in these geopolitical times is an advantage as a data vault (ideal from a world clock perspective (take overnight feeds from Europe etc). NZ does have regions that are not on fault lines are outside volcanic areas and due to its longitudinal shape the country can locate DCs so not to be impacted by the same weather event simultaneously.
The high percentage of renewable energy sources available for power generation is another asset, and new sea cables are in development to enhance global connectivity. New Zealand’s geographic isolation, in my opinion shapes our approach to data sovereignty. Local business decision-makers are naturally cautious when it comes to data security and as geopolitical uncertainties grow, this ‘Kiwi’ mindset increasingly favours the security and control offered by local data centres governed by robust privacy laws. This focus on sovereignty is likely to drive continued growth in the local data centre industry as New Zealand businesses seek reliable, secure options for their data.
With global hyperscale cloud providers poised to enter the New Zealand market, the appeal of local data centres offers an added layer of reassurance for businesses looking to maintain sovereignty over their information. Also the implicit proprietary nature of their offerings could restrict client’s ability to change if trading circumstances become unrealistic. The combination of a strong local framework for privacy and a culture of prudence around data governance makes New Zealand uniquely positioned to thrive in this space even as international competition intensifies.
W.Media: What are your next big NZ DC sector challenges?
Ryan: The NZ data centre industry is undergoing a significant maturity transition. What was once a sector dominated by computer rooms operated by IT providers is now evolving into a sophisticated, standalone industry with specialised data centre operators. Moving forward, clients whether they’re businesses, tech providers, or IoT innovators will increasingly expect to select their data centre services with the ease, like ordering off a menu.
Just as quickly as overseas monster companies are arriving in New Zealand, if they were to leave at the same speed (decisions made overseas) then New Zealand could be faced with its sovereign data being out of its jurisdiction. Local data centre providers should complement to provide a more equitable outcome.
To meet this demand, data centre operators will need to offer flexible, tiered service levels tailored to varied needs. From uptime requirements to varying server power draws and regional location preferences, (especially as IoT grows and drives demand for local data processing). The challenge is for industry leaders to anticipate these high expectations by setting new standards for flexibility, service tiers, optional power consumption environments and geographic diversity. This means not only responding to client needs as they arise but being one step ahead of the curve to shape the future of data centre services in New Zealand.
[Interview & Article by Simon Dux]
Read more about the Awards here:
AUSTRALIA & NEW ZEALAND AWARDS: WINNERS ANNOUNCED AT CDC NEW ZEALAND
