Interaction - Vinita Gera, Senior Director, IT Infrastructure, Dell

Vinita Gera, Senior Director, IT Infrastructure, India, Dell Technologies speaks to us about the evolving Cloud and hardware infrastructure.

What are the new developments taking place in the IT hardware and data centre infrastructure space in last 2 years?

Vinita Gera - The last few years have been game changing for modern data centers that have now become smart data centers which have evolved considerably on all fronts. The primary drivers for this have been the converged and hyper convergence infrastructure – which essentially converges all operational layers including compute, network and storage into a single box.  This paired with virtualization brings efficiencies, reduces costs and increases monitoring capabilities. Self-service, self-healing, automated failover are some of the key advantages that the modern data center provides. The industry is now moving towards self-service and as-a-service model.

What are the challenges in developing new infrastructure? How do you strategise to meet these challenges?

Vinita Gera - The challenges have been the technical debt that many organisations carry, owning to older applications and older hardware. Despite the technological progress and transformation, it is complex and hard to upgrade, replace or move to newer technology frequently. As a result, it is always work in progress and gives most IT Infrastructure leaders the feeling of upgrading a plane while it is flying. Keeping the lights on while adopting new technology is the top priority of all infrastructure teams.

Are there security concerns while developing IT infrastructures? 

Vinita Gera - Security has become an increasingly important topic and must be in-built at every layer and needs constant progress and effort. Establishing a good security strategy is extremely important part of every organisation’s goal. The growing complexity of Enterprise IT, the increasing number of connected devices to the network, along with an increase of data layer and its access makes security of the data and IT infrastructure an ever-evolving topic.

It is predicted that 18 billion devices will be connected to the internet just by end of this year. Cybersecurity threats are ever increasing with bad actors ready to break into an organisation’s systems where each device is a window for these criminals to break through. As we secure our infrastructure, the attackers are also rapidly improving their attack plans and ransomware is an example of that. Securing our digital environment, faster response and a defensive game plan is therefore the number one topic for every CIO and IT organisation.