Many of us spend time reflecting this time of year. At least I
do. And while there are certainly times we need to evaluate, learn,
and grow from the various challenges we face, at year's end I like
to celebrate the positives and remember all the hard work our
extended teams contributed to make them possible.
I'd like to share a list of some of the big moments from my
perspective - through the lens of the support the Global Foundation
Services' team provided to manage Microsoft's growing cloud
infrastructure. These were big moments in how they influenced our
business and the lasting impact they will have on the company.
Microsoft
Windows 8 launch: The arrival of Windows 8 ushered in a new
ecosystem
for Microsoft and the industry. Consumers purchased sleek new
Windows 8 Surfaces, PCs, and Windows Phone 8 smartphones and began
lighting up new Microsoft services - all of which are being hosted
and delivered through our data centers. Our team put in
numerous hours to prepare for that magical moment. From streaming
music through Xbox Music, storing and sharing important family
photos on SkyDrive, or catching up with far-away family members
over e-mail and Skype, Windows 8 became a critical entry point for
consumers to access Microsoft services. At the same time,
developers created apps on Windows Azure then delivered them to
Windows Store for all to enjoy. Many pieces came together and
it was a remarkable moment in Microsoft's product launch
history.
Carbon Neutrality:
Environmental sustainability is a key consideration for Microsoft
in the design and operations of our data centers. On July 1,
Microsoft took a major step by committing to achieve carbon neutrality. Our team in Global
Foundations Services plays a critical role in helping achieve this
goal. We're now operating with a measurement and chargeback model
that allocates expenses to business units based on energy
consumption. We are tremendously supportive of this goal as it
establishes not only thoughtful accountability, but appropriate
incentives for the company to design for efficiency.
Office 365 for Government: With
the introduction of Office 365 for Government, we began offering a
cloud-based service for the U.S. government. This service stores
government data in a segregated community cloud, including e-mail,
calendars, scheduling and collaboration tools. We're well aware of
how big a role security and privacy play when customers consider a
move to the cloud, and we couldn't be more thrilled to see U.S.
government organizations like the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (600,000
users) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (25,000
users) both announce they would begin using Office 365 for
Government and the Microsoft cloud.
EPA Green Power Award: Back in
April, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) first
listed Microsoft as the third largest (out of 50) purchasers of
green power. Then in October, Microsoft was recognized as one of
four organizations honored to receive the EPA's Green Power Partner
of the Year award. The award recognizes the country's leading
green power purchasers for their commitment to helping advance the
development of the nation's voluntary green power market. As
we continue evolving our strategy in the operations of data centers
around the world, we will continue making sustainable energy
sources a key criterion in the siting process for locating data
centers.
Global Foundation Services
Wyoming Data Plant: The
first time I spoke publically about this idea was in 2010 at a
conference in Crete. Then in 2011, I wrote the first blog
about the
Disappearing Data Center to shed some light on our Data Plant
concept. Then in November, we
announced that we will build a R&D pilot project of the
Data Plant in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The Wyoming Data Plant is designed
to be the first zero carbon data center ever built that is
independent of the grid. We'll place a containerized data center
(ITPAC) at the Dry Creek Wastewater treatment plant to demonstrate
the potential of using Methane to power data centers. The
Data Plant enables simplicity in data center designs in that we can
eliminate the need for the entire grid infrastructure, as well as
all the backup systems traditionally required. This
drives substantially lower costs and much improved efficiency since
power does not have to be transported and is consumed at the spot
where it is generated. While Wyoming is a pilot project, the
promise for the Data Plant is significant as we look to implement
this type of project at scale.
-
Cloud Growth: To help
meet the growing customer demand for more cloud-based services, we
completed expansion projects of several existing data centers and
announced a new data center. We finalized the expansion of
our Dublin, Ireland Data Center, now over 400,000 square
feet. Also, in August we completed a new expansion of our
Boydton, Virginia data center to over 260,000 square feet. Both
Dublin and Boydton make use of air-side economizers to improve
cooling efficiency, and the expansion at Boydton was also built
without backup power generators. Depending on Service Level
Agreements for cloud services delivered, building data centers
without generators is an emerging trend for us as we scale and move
more of the resiliency into the software managing our cloud
services and data centers. Lastly, together with Wyoming governor
Matt Mead, we
announced that we will build a new data center in Cheyenne to
support the western region.
SOC 2 Type II Audits:
Protecting both physical and logical access to our cloud
infrastructure is critical for our customers and business. To
demonstrate our commitment to security, in June we became one of
the first in the industry to complete
SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 audits. The SOC 2 report for service
organizations contains rigorous standards for security,
availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy.
Guided by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants
(AICPA) Trust Services Principles, SOC 2 reports are intended to
establish trust and confidence with external customers regarding an
organization's service delivery processes and controls. The SOC 3
report essentially summarizes the SOC 2 audit.
Hurricane Sandy: On
October 29, Hurricane Sandy left a devastating trail across the
eastern region of the United States, and tested the IT industry's
capacity to maintain connectivity. In the days leading up to
Hurricane Sandy, our team launched our rigorous emergency response
plan to ensure uninterrupted service to customers served on the
East Coast. A key part of Microsoft's cloud infrastructure
strategy involves deep business continuity management planning,
policies, and best practices that include globally dispersing data
centers. In case of a natural disaster like Sandy, we have the
ability to move information and traffic to other data centers in
unaffected regions. Many on our team members spent countless hours
working to execute the processes we established, monitor and
evaluate our infrastructure, and provide situational updates. When
Sandy hit, our pre-planning was invaluable and together with the
industry, we'll learn from the event to prepare for future
disasters.
We've come a long way since building our first data center in
1989, and I'm continually amazed at the passion and dedication of
our team. We are committed to improving everything we do in
the design and operation of Microsoft's cloud facilities.
This was a monumental year for Microsoft in many ways, and we
look forward sharing more big moments on our journey in 2013 and
beyond.
I wish you all a happy New Year.
//cb
Christian Belady is General Manager of Data Center Services at
Microsoft and manages a team tasked with developing, researching,
engineering, constructing, and operating Microsoft's worldwide data
center facility portfolio.
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