12 Days of Data Centre Christmas: January 2024
Google started 2024 by buying land in multiple locations worldwide to advance its data centre development. Here, the tech giant bought roughly 500 acres for a planned data centre development in Kansas City's Northland, Missouri in the United States.
The land was reportedly the same plot previously under contract to data centre company QTS and is located several miles away from a site where Google has been planning a separate campus. As a result, Google held more than 800 total acres of land in Northland alone.
Advancing innovative data centre solutions
Google, alongside hyperscalers, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure, continues to dominate the data centre landscape with massive infrastructures that provide scalable computing power, storage and services on demand. These facilities ultimately enable businesses and individuals to access and deploy applications, store data and harness the potential of big data analytics.
Over the last five years, the company has invested more than US$37bn in its offices and data centres in the United States, according to AI Business. In addition, US$40bn was put into research and development (R&D) in the US for 2020 and 2021 alone, also creating more than 40,000 full-time jobs.
When it comes to its data centres, Google has been very clear about its sustainability goals. In 2020, the company set a goal for its sites to run on 24/7 carbon-free energy on every grid where it operates by 2030.
Modernising the Data Centre with Vodafone and Microsoft
To accelerate digital transformation and efficiencies in data centre migration, Vodafone & Microsoft partnered to improve overall data centre strategies.
With generative AI (Gen AI) and the cloud vastly revolutionising the global data centre landscape, Vodafone signed a 10 year strategic partnership with Microsoft to bring Gen AI, digital services and the cloud to more than 300 million businesses and consumers across Europe and Africa.
Both companies aim to transform customer experience using Microsoft’s Gen AI, in addition to Vodafone wanting to scale its new standalone Internet of Things (IoT) business.
Moving towards the virtual data centre
With the data centre market expanding in 2024 in line with Gen AI demand, businesses around the world had to keep pace with innovation and the growing importance of reliable and scalable data infrastructure.
With this in mind, Vodafone was eager to accelerate its cloud transformations by modernising its data centres via the Microsoft Azure platform. The goal is to improve its responsiveness to customers and simplify and reduce IT operational costs. As a result, Vodafone will be able to replace multiple physical data centres with virtual ones across Europe, as well as reducing energy requirements and helping deliver its sustainable business strategy.
Both Vodafone and Microsoft stated they would apply the Microsoft Azure OpenAI platform to deliver real-time and hyper-personalised experiences across all customer-facing services, including its digital assistant TOBi. As a result, Vodafone employees would be able to leverage the AI capabilities of Microsoft Copilot to transform their working practices and boost their digital productivity.
Margherita Della Valle, Vodafone Group Chief Executive, said: “Vodafone has made a bold commitment to the digital future of Europe and Africa. This unique strategic partnership with Microsoft will accelerate the digital transformation of our business customers, particularly small and medium-sized companies, and step up the quality of customer experience for consumers.”
See also in January 2024
Hiranandani Powering Data Centre Expansions in India
The Edge of Innovation and Digital Transformation
AI Boom Will Cause Data Centre Electricity Demand to Double
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