Independent research released by Volta Data Centres has revealed that 56 percent of IT decision makers in the UK say they have experienced downtime from their data centre provider in the last six months – despite over half (53 percent ) saying constant uptime was a top priority for their CEO.
According to a new report with the catchy title ‘Data Loss and Downtime are putting Hybrid and Edge Computing Strategies at Risk’, just under half of IT decision makers reported their businesses had experienced data loss as a result of downtime, with businesses suffering from an average of 3 hours and 45 minutes of downtime over the past 12 months.
The research, conducted by independent research provider Sapio Research, found that over half of IT decision makers said guaranteed uptime was important when selecting a data centre provider. Despite this being a top priority, over a quarter said they have had to make compromises on system uptime to meet budget restrictions.
Jon Arnold, Managing Director at Volta Data Centres, said: “This research has helped identify two fundamental concerns: the quality of service being delivered to UK businesses and an apparent disconnect between business priorities and IT infrastructure planning.”
Looking into the impact of downtime on businesses, the research found that 29 percent of respondents had suffered one or two events of data loss as a result of their data centre provider letting them down – with 18 percent stating they had suffered data losses on three or more times during the past 12 months.
Arnold said, “Outages and data loss can be due to a variety of factors such as network glitches, human error or inadequate maintenance, but whatever the reason, organisations need to be taking a far more robust approach to data centre due diligence.
“Where is the guarantee of 100% uptime? What power resilience is in place? How many different connectivity options are available – and do they run across different networks for greater contingency? These are all questions businesses need to ask when choosing data centre providers or face the risk of more downtime.”
