Covid has dramatic effect on how businesses are planning the future

Covid has dramatic effect on how businesses are planning the future

By Maurice Garvey

COVID-19 has had a dramatic effect on how businesses are planning their digital infrastructure initiatives over the next three years, according to Citywest digital group Equinix.

The latest Global Interconnection Index (GXI), an annual market study published by Equinix, shows that digital service providers, within industries like telecommunications, cloud, IT services, media and technology providers, are forecast to increase private connectivity bandwidth 5x by 2023, driven by greater demands from enterprises to close digital gaps at the edge.

Maurice Mortell Managing Director for Ireland Equinix 2 1

Maurice Mortell, Managing Director for Ireland, Equinix

As the pandemic continues to accelerate the shift to digital, enterprises facilitating more remote working, such as telecommunications and cloud and IT providers, are expected to contribute to 54 per cent of the total interconnection bandwidth growth in EMEA, outpacing other industries in the region.

Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Paris and London are predicted to be the top metros in Europe for interconnection bandwidth growth, with the region as a whole expected to account for 23 per cent (3,782 Tbps) of the projected global installed interconnection bandwidth.

The report also forecasts that overall interconnection bandwidth—the measure of private connectivity for the transfer of data between organisations – will achieve a 45 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2019 to 2023, within the EMEA region.

The expected growth is driven by digital transformation, and specifically by greater demands from enterprises extending their digital infrastructure from centralised locations to distributed edge locations.

This comes as businesses scale and support real-time interactions by strategically interconnecting workflows closer to, and across people, things, locations, cloud and data.

The capacity of this connectivity is equivalent to 64 zettabytes of data exchange, which is enough bandwidth for every human on the planet (7.8 billion) to transmit their full DNA sequence in an hour.

Maurice Mortell, Managing Director, Ireland, Equinix said: “Irish businesses have made rapid progress on their digital journeys since the outbreak of Covid-19, and preparation for a post-pandemic recovery requires continued focus on digital transformation initiatives.

“Adopting a mature, cloud-first strategy that utilises an interconnection oriented architecture, such as Equinix can provide, ensures that a business stays connected with its partners, staff, customers and prospects at any time, anywhere and in any location.”

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