Fujitsu Offers Green Challenge
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Fujitsu says it will cut data centre costs 40%, or pay £10,000 to Climate Group charity.
Fujitsu Siemens Computers today promised to cut UK data centre costs by 40% - or donate £10,000 to the Climate Group environment charity if it can’t.
FSC’s Dynamic Data Centre Challenge is aimed at UK-based FTSE 350 companies, a community whose average data centre carbon footprint is equivalent to that of a city the size of Leicester. It is offering a free value study that will demonstrate how data centre products, centred on the PRIMERGY BladeFrame server system can reduce power consumption, shrink server footprints and deliver operational benefits that will cut data centre costs by at least 40%
FSC is not the first server maker to play the green card in its attempt to win new data centre business. Sun Microsystems currently employs an environment “evangelist” to promote the power saving potential of its latest Niagara processors, and IBM recently launched a green data centre initiative with the slogan “more than social responsibility: a foundation for growth, economic gain and operational stability.”
So far though, FSC is the first company to put its money where its promotional material is, and pay £10,000 to charity if it can’t completely prove its claims. Theoretically, the Challenge could cost FCS £3.5 million, but the company clearly believes it is a worthwhile gamble as it struggles to compete against the entrenched rival data centre suppliers IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Sun.
Despite its status as Europe’s biggest indigenous computer maker, FSC currently suppliers data centre products to just “20 to 30” of the UK’s biggest companies, a spokesman said. If only 20 or 30 other companies accept the FCS challenge, the company is confident it can convert this interest into sales that could significantly boost its UK market position.
However, it remains to be seen whether FSC’s green challenge is really the kind of incentive it needs to attract new customers. Yesterday, PMR Research said its most recent study showed that 25% of CIOs don’t care about environmental issues, and a third of UK IT professionals said that managing environmental constraints was of little or no interest to their organisation.
Instead of banging the green drum, PMR’s study suggests FSC and other server makers ought to focus on the related but more pressing concerns that a third of CIOs said they have about the lack of sufficient power supply capacity, and that 20% said they have about the lack of free space in their data centres.
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