Data centre business gaining foothold

With the growing internet userbase and the adoption of massive digitisation by banks, financial institutions and large corporate houses, data centre business is forging ahead at an exponential rate in Bangladesh.

Industry insiders say the demand for data storage and IT security solutions has increased mostly after the outbreak of pandemic as local business firms are shifting their attention to adopting technology-based services.

Data centre service providers say their clients include banking and securities, financial institutions, pharmaceuticals, research organisations, communications, media and entertainment, healthcare providers, manufacturing industry, insurances, retail and wholesale trade, transportation, energy bodies and various other business entities.

The nationwide digitisation with 123.82 million internet subscribers is a kind of forcing the business entities to embrace tech-based services alongside creating the need for storage and management of data on cloud servers.

At least 15 privately owned data centres which run collocation services alongside data storage facilities are providing data storage and IT supports for their clients.

The list of data centres include Metro Net, Brilliant Cloud, ColoBD, CoLoCity, Dhaka Fiber Net, Dhaka Colo, ColoAsia, Felicity BigData, Pace cloud, etc.

Some big companies like bKash Data Centre ST, Al-Arafah Islami Bank Limited, Prime Bank Limited, Dutch Bangla Bank Limited, etc. maintain their own data centres.

Local data centre companies are embracing off-premises cloud computing services as, they say, cloud data centre minimizes costs at a great degree and is flexible to data use from any internet connections anywhere while MertoSky, Brilliant Cloud, DhakaColo, ColoCity, PacECloud are giving cloud services to their customers.

The data centres provide multiple IT services including collocation service, Cloud service, VPS service, e-mail service, hardware installation and maintenance, managed power distribution, backup power systems, data backup and archiving, managed load balancing, controlled internet access, managed E-mail and messaging, managed user authentication and authorisation, diverse firewalls and anti-malware programmes, managed outsourcing, managed business continuance, and efficient technical support.

Data and server issues

Let’s rethink what actually happens when one searches something on the web. It off-course shows something on-screen, which for now is called internet data served from the other end. Who is on that end? It’s data server.

Whatever results from the search have been stored in data centre, more specifically in a solid state device within a server. The server owners also let users use space on their data centre at individual level.

Cloud Computing is defined as storing and accessing data and computing services over the internet. It doesn’t store any data on personal computer. It is the on-demand availability of computer services like servers, data storage, networking, databases, etc.

The main purpose of cloud computing is to give access to data centres to many users who can also access data from a remote server.

For example, when Google is browsed, it offers the browser to use Google contents and store the contents in Google storage in a limited scale for free and charges fee for additional data storage.

Google gives you 15GB of free space in Google Drive. The 15GB limit includes Gmail account -- messages and attachments--- and Google Photos.

Similarly, a single user can post or store contents in Facebook or YouTube servers for free up to a fixed limit.

Data centres and cloud computing in Bangladesh

With an increase in computer and Mobile users, data storage has become a priority in all fields. Large and small businesses are thriving on their data and spending a huge amount of money on data maintenance, creating a huge need for IT support and a storage hub -- both at and abroad.

As the country’s local data centres are newly launched and are lacking in publicity, the four big international cloud service providers -- Amazon Web Service (AWS), Google and Microsoft Azure and Oracle, are gaining the upper hand over local firms.

According to Microsoft Bangladesh, it is providing server supports to more than 500 companies, most of which are big in size operating in Bangladesh.

Partner Business Manager of Microsoft Bangladesh Aleya Shahnaz, said: “The cloud growth in Bangladesh has reached almost 200 per cent year on year and opportunity is much more than that.”

“We are now focusing on market to let people know our service, and hopefully in the next financial year our growth will be 300 per cent.”

Oracle Bangladesh’s Managing Director Rubaba Dowla said, a good number of public and private sector companies, including readymade garments (RMGs), healthcare, fast moving consumer goods businesses, are now receiving Oracle’s cloud-based services.

“Companies here have realised that depending on a single cloud infrastructure provider is neither wise nor practical and are adopting a multi-cloud approach to access the different features, underlying infrastructure, security, and other elements specific to the vendor’s offerings, we see the use of cloud is increasing at good rate, and a greater level of benefits gained”, she said.

Atik Ullah Sayeed, assistant vice-president of Metro-sky (20116), a sister concern of Metronet (2000) data centre, said they are providing services to banks, financial institutions and corporate houses.

“We have 6,500 customers who get services from our Metronet data centre of which 3,000-3500 customers receive various cloud services from MetroCity.”

MetroCity started with giving server support to banks with fiber connectivity. During the Covid-induced lockdown, Metronet’s two wings -- cloud and IT telephony and SMS service – played a very important role which removed IT apprehension among people and created a good fortune for data centre business.

“We have 300-Terabyte storage. The price range per Terabyte is between Tk 5,000 to Tk 10,000 depending on other services taken,” Atik Ullah said.

“Due to the central bank’s directives, banks cannot directly receive our cloud services, but our customers range from small software companies to large corporate houses and garment industries.”

“If any small company wants to set up individual server, it initially costs minimum Tk 5 lakh. The small firm can do the same thing in cloud with merely Tk 10,000,” he continued.

Metrosky has employed 20 people -- all from Bangladesh. The mother company Metronet has 350 employees.

Metronet revenue increase from 2020 to 2021 is around Tk 1.5 crore while only Metrosky’s increase is around 26 lakh and it’s growing faster.

Md Firoj Alam, business manager of MIR cloud, a sister concern of ColoAsia data centre, said they provide infrastructure as well as platform as part of their services, and they will launch another new service software soon.

“People are much more interested in our colocation service as it lets their data server shift to our local cloud server” he said.

“Maintaining an individual data centre is highly costly and complicated for a small company. Therefore, they can collocate with our data centre,” he suggested.

“People can rent our rack or servers to store and manage their resources and shift their data centre to our centre. We have five data centres across the country including two in Dhaka where we have 300 42 U racks servers.”

The local companies would take the same service from global cloud companies like Microsoft Azure, AWS oracle. Recently they are also moving to local servers or data centres, said Firoz.

“We along with a few other companies are the precursors of data centre business in the country and are receiving huge customers as per our expectation.”

“What we need now is publicity and earning trust in big companies. But small and medium companies are turning to us more than our expectation. As we are in a growing phase now, big companies are testing our service and hopefully they will come in large numbers soon and our growth will be unlimited day by day.”

Firoz said they have 50 plus employees and 150 clients. The clients are taking full IT solutions.

“We have given a portion of our data centre to them. Our server collocation service growth is 30 to 40 per cent during the pandemic as a new service -- cloud computing -- has not turned that much popular now, but is on the rise,” explained the businessman.

The state-owned data centre Tier III National Data Centre provides data storage services and cyber security to the government data only.

“We have 20 TB data storage capacity in our tier III data centre, of which 12 TB has been already stored with the government data. We can expedite our server capacity anytime on demand,” Tarique Barkatullah, director of National Data Center Bangladesh told The Business Post.

Tarique said they are going to construct an all bank-centric big data centre in Jashore.

Asked about whether any prior approval is necessary, he said: “No approval is needed to start a data centre as it is a business entity. Approval issues may impede the industry’s grow smoothly.”

The government set up the Tier-IV National Data Centre on a 7-acre land in Kaliakair, which is the world’s 7th largest data centre with 99.995 uptime.

Alongside ensuring the security of the country’s data, the Tier-IV Data Centre is now saving Tk 353 core annually as Bangladeshi firms don’t need to preserve their data in foreign lands, according to officials of Bangladesh Data Centre Company Limited (BDCCL).

AKM Latiful Kabir, company secretary of BDCCL, said: “Now any organisation of Bangladesh can store their data in the Tier-IV National Data Centre. Even foreign organisations are showing their interest to store data in the heart of Digital Bangladesh.” It is the host of everything, including 55,000 websites, 11 crore National Identity Cards, e-Nothi, Surokkha and registration system according to the ICT Division.

Where the world is now

“Global Cloud Revenue will reach around $474 billion in 2022, up from $ 408 billion in 2021,” said a US-based market research firm Gartner Inc.

By 2025, half of cloud data centres will deploy advanced robots with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) capabilities, resulting in 30 per cent higher operating efficiency, according to Gartner, Inc. The market will hit $ 1.95 trillion by 2032.

The Asia Pacific market is estimated to grow at the fastest CAGR over the forecast period.

The global cloud computing market is projected to reach a valuation of $ 1.95 trillion by 2032, according to a new report from the market intelligence firm Fact.MR.

Many companies, particularly those that have large userbase, are embracing the cloud to stay ahead in this digital era.

Businesses that are not moving to the cloud are limiting their chances of growth, according to Gartner, Inc.

Very soon a corporate “No Cloud” policy will be as rare as a “No Internet” policy, it said.