- Plug and play solutions are proliferating in response to a lack of skilled workers to install data center networking kit
- Systems integrators are also doing more rack assembly work offsite
- Fiber splicers are in high demand for both data center builds and broadband network expansions
The race is on to build more data centers as fast as possible to support new artificial intelligence and general cloud compute workloads. But the need for speed, combined with a lack of enough skilled workers and an increase in the amount networking kit required, is changing the way companies design and build data center infrastructure, executives from CommScope told Fierce.
Kamlesh Patel, CommScope’s VP of data center market development, and Erik Gronvall, CommScope’s VP of market development, said there are two main ways things are changing.
According to Gronvall, speed is paramount to data center operators building new facilities, meaning that anything that can be done to accelerate construction has become “much more important” to product design and delivery. And easier is better too, given limited access to skilled workers.
That’s why the market is seeing so many plug-and-play connectorized solutions for the oodles of fiber cabling that needs to go into data centers these days. Indeed, the broadband industry has seen a similar influx of easy-to-install fiber cabling designed to accelerate expansion efforts. But in the data center space, it’s also about product packaging and labeling, and how vendors work together, he added.
Meanwhile, Patel noted that the products going into racks are now being assembled by systems integrators like Dell, HPE and WWT before they even make it into the data center. The idea behind this “two-phased approach” is to move more of the splicing work offsite so that construction workers on-site can essentially just plug in a power cord and a data cord rather than doing all the splicing work themselves.
“The goal is to remove the labor pool that did all the patching on-site and place it offsite to a potentially lower-cost area or a skilled area,” Patel said. “There is a vast shortage of people who can put these things together.”
Patel and Gronvall said the two-phase approach is happening both in the U.S. and abroad, though the density of builds domestically means there’s more happening on this front in the U.S.
Labor puddle
Compounding the labor shortage problem for data centers – at least on the fiber front – are ongoing efforts to expand fiber broadband. There’s a sort of tug-of-war happening over fiber splicers.
Patel said the decision by a fiber contractor to take a broadband gig over a data center job likely comes down to worker availability.
While there’s more work to be done in a single location at a data center, hyperscalers and other facility operators tend to be “very demanding” in terms of their service level agreements (SLAs).
“Not that broadband doesn’t have huge SLAs but there are SLAs associated with these data centers where if something goes wrong you have to be on-site within an hour or two hours,” Patel explained. “So I think the size of your organization and the capabilities you have determine” the decision to go with a broadband vs a data center job.
And, of course, there is one other factor, Gronvall said. “Money talks.”
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