Vertical partners with Uptime Institute

Vertiv has launched prefabricated modular (PFM) data centres which have been awarded Uptime Institute’s TIER-Ready designation of performance resiliency. 

Use of TIER-ready designated PFM models from Vertiv are a customer’s assurance that once deployed, these infrastructures can quickly and easily earn the coveted TIER Certification of Constructed Facility (TCCF). PFM solutions from Vertiv which carry the TIER-Ready designation are now available in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), with the aim to extend the TIER-Ready program globally later in 2020. 

The TIER-Ready Partnership is a strategic agreement under which specific models of Vertiv’s PFM designs are reviewed by Uptime Institute during the engineering development process, to assure that those solutions meet the stringent requirements of the globally recognised TIER Standard of Topology. Vertiv PFM products which carry the TIER-Ready designation directly support the availability and uptime requirements of demanding customers who have chosen to strategically implement TIER Certified digital infrastructure. As part of the partnership agreement, Vertiv has completed Uptime Institute’s TIER-Ready III design review for its SmartMod™ PFM infrastructure for up to 10 racks and 80kW of IT load. Facilities deployed using TIER-ready designated SmartMod solutions will be able to quickly and easily earn Uptime Institute’s TCCF. 

A PFM approach is an agile and efficient way for new data centre whitespace to be deployed with significantly less on-site installation required than traditionally-built data centres. PFM deployments are gaining significant traction – especially in developing economies – as a way to quickly build out new capacity, including at the edge, without the impediments of a traditional construction process and with improved system integration, testing and commissioning. According to industry analysts 451 Research, the market for PFM data centres is set to expand at a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 14.4 percent through 2021, when it will have reached $4.4bn. 

“This agreement with Uptime Institute ensures that facilities that utilise Vertiv’s PFM data centres which carry Uptime Institute’ TIER-Ready designation are not only agile and efficient to deploy but also demonstrably resilient and robust”, said Viktor Petik, vice president of Integrated Modular Solutions, Vertiv. “Vertiv and its partners can now support customers to build-out new, highly reliable and available capacity using our Uptime Institute TIER-Ready III designated SmartMod system. Once installed, these solutions can quickly and easily achieve full TIER Certification of Constructed Facility”.

The Uptime Institute TIER Standard of Topology is the industry de facto standard for data centre reliability and resiliency, and assures customers that TIER Certified data centres will perform in a definable and predictable fashion under a wide-range of operating conditions, including complete utility power failure. Uptime Institute introduced its TIER-Ready design review program to enable PFM suppliers to provide solutions which can achieve the same levels of reliability and resiliency already attained in thousands of TIER Certified data centres worldwide. The TIER-Ready program streamlines the process of earning TCCF by reducing the engineering review time that typically must be done for each specific data centre installation. As a TIER-Ready PFM solution, the Vertiv SmartMod 80kW enables savings in time and installation review costs which can be passed along to the consumer.

“We are thrilled that Vertiv is taking a leadership approach to the prefabricated modular marketplace by working with Uptime Institute to deliver TIER-Ready products. These solutions are differentiated in the PFM market by their proven ability to meet the same resilience demands seen in larger data centres, but in a modular format”, said Chris Brown, CTO of Uptime Institute. “Vertiv SmartMod solutions which bear the TIER-Ready designation can perform at the same level of TIER resilience as larger facilities, but in a smaller form-factor. This is essential to building distributed critical digital infrastructures”.