Much of UPS's data center investment involved storage, which grew sixfold from 50 Tbytes in the early 1990s. Medeiros says the emphasis for storage is on reliability, cost management, and managing floor space.
UPS avoided the need for expanding the data centers to accommodate the growing storage needs in several ways, including switching to a SAN architecture two years ago. Now, UPS has 90 percent of its storage in a SAN, reducing the number of direct-attached storage (DAS) frames it operates from 165 to 130.
UPS used hardware and software from EMC Corp. and IBM Corp. for its SAN, which runs on Fibre Channel over Escon. "Our strategy is wherever possible to use two vendors," Medeiros says. "And EMC and IBM have software tools that manage their hardware."
In another move to reduce cost and floor space, UPS implemented a virtual tape solution from Storage Technology Corp. (StorageTek) over the past year. The network now has 105,000 cartridges on 24 StorageTek silos, saving 5,000 square feet in each data center and allowing Medeiros to reassign 20 technicians who were involved in managing disk storage.
Medeiros says DR/VFI (Disaster Recovery/Virtual File Identification) software from 21st Century Software also helps save money while providing business continuity. DR/VFI automates the disaster recovery process by determining critical files that must be backed up, and then carries out the backup.
To realize the benefits of cloud-native software, an application must actually be cloud-native—designed to run in the cloud, interacting with disaggregated cloud services, fully manageable as code—to deliver the expected benefits.
By combining resources and expertise, the AI-Enabled ICT Workforce Consortium will offer a blueprint for how industries can adapt to an AI-dominated future.
IT leaders should heed the guidance of cybersecurity insurance providers who think businesses should prioritize security education, incident preparedness, regular internal audits, and ongoing vulnerability scanning and patching.
