Learn ten steps to succeeding at a data center infrastructure management (DCIM) project.

1. 10 Steps to DCIM Success
Richard May
Country Manager UKI & Nordics, Raritan Inc.
RaritanDCIM.com
13th March 2014
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential

2. Agenda
Who is Raritan?
What is DCIM?
Do I need DCIM?
dcTrack
Key project considerations
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary 3 and Confidential
Case Studies

3. Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential

4. What is DCIM?
In a nutshell
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential

5. What Does an Enterprise Data centre
Look Like?
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
Asset Tracking:
Spreadsheets,
Homegrown DBs
Floor Plan:
AutoCAD, Visio
Monitoring:
Sitescan, Foreseer,
Raritan, etc.
Cable/Net Tracking:
Spreadsheets,
Homegrown DBs
Configuration:
CiscoWorks, etc.
Monitoring:
HP OpenView, IBM
Tivoli, Solarwinds
Asset Tracking:
Spreadsheets,
Homegrown DBs
CMDB:
HP OpenView, BMC
BladeLogic, etc.
Monitoring:
HP Insight Manager,
IBM Director
Tools
Facilities Networking Systems
Domains
Raised Floor,
UPS, PDU/RPP,
Rack PDUs
CRACs, Sensors
Mainframe,
Servers, VMs,
Storage,
Apps
Networks
Fibre
Structured Cabling,
LAN, SAN, WAN

6. How is the Data centre Operations Model
Evolving?
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
Asset Tracking:
Spreadsheets,
Homegrown DBs
Floor Plan:
AutoCAD, Visio
Monitoring:
Sitescan, Foreseer,
Raritan, etc.
Cable/Net Tracking:
Spreadsheets,
Homegrown DBs
Configuration:
CiscoWorks, etc.
Monitoring:
HP OpenView, IBM
Tivoli
Asset Tracking:
Spreadsheets,
Homegrown DBs
CMDB:
HP OpenView, BMC
BladeLogic, etc.
Monitoring:
HP Insight Manager,
IBM Director
Tools
Facilities Networking Systems
Domains
Raised Floor,
UPS, PDU/RPP,
Rack PDUs
CRACs, Probes
Mainframe,
Servers, VMs,
Storage,
Apps
Structured Cabling,
LAN, SAN, WAN
Domains
Data centre Operations
Executing Work Orders
Racking and Stacking
Power Rack Connectivity
Fiber and Copper Cable Patching

7. Do I need DCIM?
Or is it not the right time to deploy?
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8. Vendor agnostic reporting
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9. User Configurable Dashboards
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10. User Configurable Energy Dashboards
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11. ‘Smart Rack’ Views
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12. Asset specific power reporting
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12

13. Raritan dcTrack
In 2 slides
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential

14. What Can dcTrack Do for Me?
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
 Asset Management
 Automated
 What do I have, where is it & who owns it?
 How is it configured and connected
 Maintenance history & schedule
 Capacity Management
 How much space, power and network do I have
 Where do I have capacity
 How do I optimize my current capacity
 Connectivity Management
 Connectivity for data & power
 Trace circuits end-to-end
 How do I quickly find infrastructure to
application to business dependencies

15. What Can dcTrack Do for Me?
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
 Change Management
 How do I manage moves, adds, and
changes (MACs)
 Who does the work
 When will the work be done
 How do I know it’s done correctly

16. Key Considerations
for a successful DCIM Project
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10

17. 1Be clear on problems
prioritize over time
Identify business critical data centre
operations problems
Focus on solving top 1-2 most important
problems
“Must Have” as opposed to “Nice to
Have”
Avoid doing to much too soon
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18. 2 Understand current processes
and desired outcome
Map current processes
Define desired process state
Identify gaps – systems, resources, information, etc.
Select project resources
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19. 3 Don’t get caught in the
feature comparison trap
Evaluate two to three DCIM
products/vendors
Challenge vendors to show how your
objectives can be achieved
Focus on those features that address
your pain points
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20. 4 Partner with peers in other functions
and gain alignment
Identify and engage impacted organizational
functions
Get cross-functional alignment
Appoint a cross-functional and
empowerd project manager
Project cost sharing model
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21. 5 Identify a team
to own and maintain the system
Establish a DCIM team
Identify one or more DCIM system administrators
Ensure defined processes are followed
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22. 6 Start small and
expand over time
Remember: Rome wasn’t built in a day
Understand whole life costs – up
front
Phased project implementation
minimises disruption
Constrain initial project complexity
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23. 7
Expect integration
make sure the platform is open
Identify existing systems, processes and
databases
Choose an open platform to facilitate
future integration
Avoid unnecessary start-up
complications
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24. 8 Take advantage of
expert services
Ask your vendor for help and
guidance
Your vendor should offer services
that will pave the way
Vendor experience with scores of
existing customers will make a
positive difference
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25. Ensure people are trained and
regularly monitor usage
Team members should know his/her role and
responsibilities
Consider ease of use during vendor selection
Assign one system administrator to
monitor DCIM usage
Consider joining vendor user groups
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9

26. Partner with a
trusted, reliable and
experienced vendor
Endorser of the EU Code of Conduct on Data Centre Energy Efficiency.
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10
Select a vendor that is prepared to
run the marathon with you
Look for a vendor that has data centre expertise beyond DCIM alone
Choose a vendor that is there for you
– today and in the future
Raritan have pledged to implement the Code’s ethos through devising products and
services that help organizations to bring their data centres into line with its best practice
recommendations, reduce energy consumption while ensuring business objectives
continue to be met.

27. Case Studies
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
4

28. Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
Unilever
► Use Case
 Key requirement today for the business to
understand the DC capacities
 Reporting on a monthly basis is a core requirement
for DC staff and is Time consuming and costly plus
wrong data can lead to wrong assumptions.
 Service Impact Information
► Project Driver
 Operational efficiency – ‘freeing up time’
 Managing DC growth without an increase in
headcount
► Main Benefit
 “dcTrack saves 1 week per month”
 Increased capacity utilisation
• Products are sold in
more than 190
countries
• 171,000 employees

29. Bank of Canada
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
► Use Case
 Managing a full data centre move
 Efficiently facilitate moves, adds and changes (MAC) in
the data centre
 Capacity management for space, power and
connections. .
► Project Driver
 Closing down their current data centre. Moving to 2
new data centres.
► Previous Tool
 Proprietary Built System – MS-SQL Backend with
coldfusion front end, not graphical based.
► Main Benefit
 Operational efficiency ,automation of tracking,
visualization & color coding, auditing, void trips to the
data centre, Management of lights out data centre
 Increased capacity utilisation

30. British Airways
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
► Use Case
 Efficiently facilitate moves, adds and
changes(MAC) in the data centre
 Capacity management for Space, Power and
connections. Need to run data centre capacity
reports
► Project Driver
 Used Aperture Vista, high cost of maintenance and
professional services. Were keen to move before
maintenance renewal.
 Data centre due to grow and licensing a concern
► Previous Tool
 Aperture
► Main Benefit
 Operational efficiency
 Lower and fixed DCIM costs
Worlds 3rd Largest Airline
with 58,000 employees

31. Royal Caribbean
Raritan, Inc. – Proprietary and Confidential
► Use Case
 Efficiently facilitate moves, adds and
changes(MAC) in the data centre
 Capacity management for Space, Power and
connections.
 Power Monitoring
► Project Driver
 Proactive data centre manager
► Previous Tool
 Spread sheets and Auto Cad
► Main Benefit
 Operational efficiency
 True lights out data centres
Physical access
can be a problem!

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Click Here to Take DCIM for a Spin
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