Edge computing a top priority by CTOs in Asia-Pacific

Morgan Duarte, director of Schneider Electric IT Vietnam in charge of APC by Schneider Electric

2021 is expected to be a year of recovery and acceleration for businesses after a long hiatus due to the pandemic. Are these expectations too optimistic compared to the actual situation?

Up to now, COVID-19 has not shown signs of easing. There are new pandemic outbreaks in countries such as India, Cambodia, and Thailand. It is too early to make forecasts about the overall picture of 2021, but its consequences on industries, manufacturing, and services are indisputable: We find the disruption of the supply chain, the stagnation of production, the shortage of working capital, and the decline of businesses due to the pandemic.

The government and enterprises all have strategies to minimise the negative impacts by applying technology to transform their operating and business models. This is proved by the estimated total global IT spending in 2020 of approximately $3.7 trillion, according to Gartner. In fact, the pandemic has made global businesses promote digital transformation more aggressively than ever.

Vietnam is one of the rare exceptions with positive economic growth and stable socio-economic and political environment, and successful pandemic control after the second and third waves. In March 2021, World Bank also shows us very positive signs as Vietnam's economy grew 4.5 per cent in the first quarter, while the industrial production index increased by 6.1 per cent compared to the same period last year.

Overall, 2021 is both an opportunity and a challenge for businesses to restructure and rearrange their models as well as to find new growth drivers with technology, especially in information technology infrastructure construction.

What role will technology, in particular IT infrastructure, play in the new normal?

The new technologies will promote the rearrangement of production, operation optimisation, and end-user experience improvement. Thereby, they can build a durable business model that is ready to adapt to any changes. According to Accenture, six new trends will help businesses shape and build durable models: Anywhere operations, Optimal infrastructure, Operational continuity, Core modernisation, Distributed cloud, Critical skills vs. critical roles. Of this, the trend of Optimal infrastructure will shape the transition from "infrastructure and operation" to "integration and operation". Various infrastructure options such as cloud computing and edge computing can be applied to different locations and workloads to improve resilience, stability, and security for the overall system.

The survey conducted by Tech Research Asia has shown a surprising finding that 1,100 CTOs of corporations and businesses in the Asia-Pacific all choose Edge Computing as the priority task for the next 12 months, which proves the rightness and urgency of this trend in the next normal context.

With extensive experience in energy management and automation, especially in integrated IT infrastructure, how do you evaluate the adoption of new trends, in particular edge computing adoption? Does it suit the needs of Vietnamese businesses?

The strategy of applying edge computing is in a part of the country's overall digital transformation plan with a vision to 2045; in the National Digital Transformation Programme to 2025, with a vision to 2030, and also in the draft of the National Data Strategy for the period 2021-2025, with a vision to 2030.

In the current needs of organisations and businesses, edge infrastructure management tools are essential to a successful digital transformation that retains network reliability and uncompromisingly high standards of security. They serve as eyes and ears in places you cannot be and cannot afford to staff. And the best tools can be quickly and cost-effectively deployed, accelerating mean time to repair (MTTR) for unplanned outages while improving the quality and speed of decision-making.

With real-time data processed by AI, businesses can have insights and data-driven recommendations for predictive and proactive maintenance to ensure efficient operations at the edge. That helps to improve the sustainability of the environment and human resources when every operational decision is precisely and efficiently optimised, as well as minimises waste.

The edge computing adaptation is now thriving in many countries around the world. Now we are seeing some of those technologies in Vietnam, for example, in Long An province, where rice farmers are using drones to automate some of their tasks such spraying pesticides, monitoring of cultivated areas resulting in reducing the loss of rice, reducing the water and energy consumption, as well as better protecting farmers’ health.

How is Schneider Electric implementing its solutions in Vietnam to support businesses in adopting edge computing in IT infrastructure? What are the core points that CTOs need to know to take advantage of this new trend?

With the experience of deploying and managing energy management and automation solutions in many countries around the world, Schneider Electric is always a pioneer in developing and applying new solutions, in which edge computing is one of the strategic offers to support businesses and organisations in many fields including banking, manufacturing, and food and beverage.

The strategy for SE Edge Computing solutions in Vietnam focuses on two factors: simplicity and certainty in the design, implementation, and management of edge systems with key solutions including EcoStruxure Micro Data Centers, APC Smart-UPS Lithium-ion, EcoStruxure IT. Especially, we have just launched our 43U MDC, the latest innovation under EcoStruxure MDC C-series which can be deployed in weeks, not months. The 43U packages power, cooling, security, and monitoring solutions into a single enclosure that eliminates the need for an IT room.

The deployment is quick and costs up to 48 per cent less than typical data centre build, as well as allows for secure management from anywhere. In addition, users can centrally monitor infrastructure devices such as UPS or cooling on a single HMI Display Panel, providing safe management and security.