At the recent Fall 2018 7x24 Conference in Phoenix, held October 21-24, Dave Schirmacher, president, Reset Advisors, LLC; and president, 7x24 Exchange International, presented the keynote on Tuesday, October 23, titled, “Unleashing the Metrics of Cost and Performance,” which was the debut of a new data center metric.

According to Schirmacher, “The industry is good at solving technical problems,” and this metric — the data center unit cost (DCUCTM) metric — is designed to measure overall data center expense as a unit of measure, including IT and facility CAPEX, IT and facility OPEX, and energy expense. The goal, according to Schirmacher is to reconcile fixed expenses (CAPEX) with continuing expenses (OPEX).

The core objectives of the DCUC include, according to Schirmacher, are:

  • Define a unit of measure that accurately captures the TCO of an existing or new enterprise data center facility
  • Create a metric that is easy to understand and communicate
  • Establish equivalent internal and market comparables
  • Support of forward looking analysis

In addition, the DCUC will define internal and market comparables. Schirmacher, during his presentation, used the example of the global wholesale colocation market to create a market comparable that included a market lease analysis example of Northern Virginia, which extrapolated aggregate market lease rate with target and actual total expenses. Schirmacher used the resulting figure to determine costs over a 10-year span.

Look for more on this metric in the coming year in Mission Critical Magazine.

The Fall 2018 7x24 Conference was held October 21-24 at The JW Marriott in Phoenix. The theme of the event was “Metrics of the Future” and featured exhibits from sponsor companies and presentations on industry topics. The 2019 7x24 Spring Conference will be held June 2-5, 2019 at the Boca Raton Resort & Club in Boca Raton, FL.