The value and importance of server infrastructure has evolved as organisations become more digital and reliant on technology. While older servers may still function as intended, the worth of these servers diminishes over time, so businesses must evaluate the cost benefits of new servers versus older ones. Many IT leaders believe they can delay server replacements to reduce costs, rely on server virtualisation technologies, or shift to public cloud infrastructure.
However, extensive research from IDC suggests that these approaches are ultimately expensive and risky in the long run.
The economic value of refreshing IT infrastructure
Findings from the Dell EMC Server Upgrade 2020 report, conducted by IDC, found that 16% of server downtime leads to a revenue loss of up to $250,000 per incident.
Organisations with shorter infrastructure replacement cycles experience less downtime and have lower revenue loss. A modelled environment with 27 upgraded servers can generate an additional $13 million in revenue per year.
Enterprises with replacement cadences of four years or more report the most gains. They see a positive impact of 19% revenue growth, indicating that investing in upgraded servers directly contributes to the business’s financial success.
Additionally, business agility is a 15% improvement, enabling organisations to adapt and respond swiftly to market demands.
The reduction of 14% in time to market for new products and services further enhances the organisation’s ability to stay competitive.
Customer-centric factors also receive a significant boost from server upgrades. A 20% improvement in customer experience indicates that upgraded servers contribute to smoother, more seamless customer interaction.
Internally focused factors also benefit significantly from server upgrades. There is an 18% positive impact on IT spending on innovation versus maintenance, indicating that organisations can allocate more resources towards driving innovation rather than simply maintaining existing infrastructure. Employee retention sees a 22% improvement because professionals have confidence in their tools.
Powering ahead with Dell
Dell Technologies offers a comprehensive portfolio of IT products, including servers, storage, networking, and software-defined data centre solutions.
Their PowerEdge servers are designed to cater to various performance- and capacity-optimised workloads, offering compute- and storage-intensive configurations.
Dell EMC PowerEdge servers are complemented by the OpenManage systems management tools, which help simplify and automate IT infrastructure management.
Maintaining a modern server infrastructure is crucial for enterprises, as unexpected outages and downtime can directly impact revenue and customer satisfaction.
Dell acknowledges that maintaining replacement cycles can be challenging due to cost constraints and coordination issues across IT departments and business units. However, the benefits of proactively maintaining a modern server infrastructure outweigh the challenges.
