Network World recently included Vigilent in an article showing how “Machine learning gives data center operators a better handle on cooling, power and performance.” Here is the excerpt about Vigilent:
Vigilent is a leader in dynamic cooling optimization. Its technology works to optimize the airflow in a data center facility, automatically finding and eliminating hot spots.
Data center operators tend to run much more cooling equipment than they need to, says Cliff Federspiel, founder, president and CTO of Vigilent. “It usually produces a semi-acceptable temperature distribution, but at a really high cost.”
If there’s a hot spot, the typical reaction is to add more cooling capacity. In reality, higher air velocity can produce pressure differences, interfering with the flow of air through equipment or impeding the return of hot air back to cooling equipment. Even though it’s counterintuitive, it might be more effective to decrease fan speeds, for example.
Vigilent’s machine learning-based technology learns which airflow settings optimize each customer’s thermal environment. Delivering the right amount of cooling, exactly where it’s needed, typically results in up to a 40% reduction in cooling-energy bills, the company say.
Beyond automating cooling systems, Vigilent’s software also provides analytics that customers are using to make operational decisions about their facilities.
“Our customers are becoming more and more interested in using that data to help manage their capital expenditures, their capacity planning, their reliability programs,” Federspiel says. “It’s creating opportunities for lots of new kinds of data-dependent decision making in the data center.”
