Under the wave of enterprise digital transformation, more and more enterprises turn to the hybrid cloud deployment mode for the consideration of business privacy and data security, while server device hosting can further effectively control the operation and management costs of the self-built data center. Due to the lack of perfect equipment monitoring system, the traditional data center hosting mode is easy to lead to the problems of inaccurate resource information management and low operation and maintenance efficiency.

In order to solve such problems, UCloud recently launched the intelligent management service of data center assets based on RFID technology. Through the RFID tag pasted on IT equipment, IT can locate the location of managed assets in real time, automatically count the real-time capacity and utilization rate of the rack, and quickly check the asset information. Provide accurate and timely asset management data for the hosting users who access the service, and help realize the intelligent operation and maintenance management of IT infrastructure.

Challenges faced by traditional data center managed assets

According to Gartner’s survey, less than 25% of companies around the world have a reasonable IT asset management plan, and most of them use complex manual tracking and monitoring methods. With the passage of time, the increasing number of managed equipment, IT is easy to produce IT equipment positioning difficult, difficult inventory, difficult planning, difficult safety supervision, serious space fragmentation and other drawbacks, the specific performance is:

  • IT asset management basically relies on manual management and spreadsheet management, and every equipment change needs manual modification in the system. However, manual error prone, change is not timely, so that the maintenance cost is higher, the asset information error rate is high, resulting in the overall capacity of IT asset data chaos.
  • Manual inventory of equipment assets takes a long time, which often fails to match the rapidly changing business needs, and changes in IT assets brought by business changes cannot be synchronized in the asset statistical results in time. In this way, the accumulated hidden dangers are increasingly increasing and eventually become problem assets that are difficult to solve.
  • In the face of a large number of equipment information, such as the server maintenance time, whether on shelf, whether in use and other situations can not be effectively grasped in real time, resulting in infrastructure management disorder, loss and other situations occur from time to time, the lack of IT assets full life cycle management means.
  • The lack of equipment asset management process leads to the chaos of the entire operation and maintenance management system; In addition, the lack of effective positioning technology means, equipment search and deployment are more difficult and error-prone.

As many enterprise users can not grasp the relevant information of their own IT equipment in a timely and effective manner, IT leads to the loss of time, capital and system performance in the process of business development. According to the latest “China Intelligent Operation and Maintenance Market Guide” released by Gartner, a considerable number of Chinese enterprises have begun to use ALOPS tool to conduct intelligent operation and maintenance management of IT infrastructure, especially focusing on the strengthening of AIOPS monitoring platform integration ability and data monitoring ability. As an important part of the information collection of the underlying physical equipment, RFID technology is the key to help enterprises realize the intelligent operation and maintenance management of IT assets.

2 UCloud realizes intelligent management of managed assets with the help of RFID

RFID is a kind of non-contact automatic identification technology, it automatically identifies the target object and obtains the relevant data through the radio frequency signal, the identification work does not need the manual intervention, can be remote, automatic batch collection of physical information, is the basis to ensure the accuracy and integrity of equipment information. RFID technology is mainly composed of electronic tags and read-write devices, between the two through the radio frequency signal automatically identify information such as the model and location of IT equipment, and the collected information will be transmitted to the application system for summary analysis.

RFID-based intelligent asset management services mainly include:

  • RFID asset tag: each asset tag is initialized through the RFID card issuer. After initialization, the data in the tag is associated with the device information, which is used as the device identification and is bound to the device for life.
  • RFID Handheld Inventory Equipment: This device runs asset management APP application, which is used for mobile operation of assets or supplementary business to ensure the management of the whole process;

For the IT equipment hosted by enterprise users in UCloud data center, UCloud makes full use of the advantages of RFID in device data collection. It can be used with the positioning module by pasting the RFID tag on the managed physical device. It can automatically identify the SN information of IT managed equipment in real time, a specific rack where IT is located, the specific U bit number in the rack, the capacity data of U bit occupied on the rack, the status of whether or not in place and other basic information, and upload IT to the visual interface of the console in real time through the network, so as to realize the whole life cycle management of the managed equipment.

3 RFID intelligent asset management service improves the operation and maintenance efficiency in an all-round way

Compared with traditional hosting equipment manual management mode, UCloud RFID intelligence asset management services combined with multiple state custom management, position change automation management to achieve zero error, and can also be generated automatically by the visual tracking total assets life cycle analysis report, implement intensification of resource management and its advantages are very obvious, mainly reflected in the following:

1. Planned fast U bit resource visualization and refined spatial resource management, made capacity utilization visible in real time, and supported efficient deployment of IT equipment; Remote one-key query, data collection of ten thousand devices in seconds, accurate capacity analysis, to provide accurate data for capacity expansion.

2, on the shelf fast asset label structure is simple, a stick to use, tool free installation, convenient and does not affect the operation of the equipment; The device information can be scanned by the handheld terminal. The traditional manual input needs 20 seconds, while the automatic input only needs 1 seconds, saving 95% of time cost.

3. Through automatic inventory, abnormal position warning, background U-position accurate positioning and on-site sound and light prompt, help operation and maintenance personnel to quickly find the target equipment, which can reduce the operation and maintenance labor cost by 50% on the basis of pure manual inspection; It only takes 3S for automatic inventory of tens of thousands of assets and equipment, saving 90% of time cost.

4 categories, space utilization high integrated frame space, server, equipment, other factors, such as high capacity model was constructed, the equipment model, such as high dimensional into the equipment matching requirements, space utilization to the cabinet U real-time monitoring, automatic monitoring equipment shelves, shelves and mobile, compared to more profligate program can increase 5% 20% space utilization.

5. High return on investment The on-demand installation, flexible expansion and pay-as-demand data asset service model can reduce the initial investment cost, reduce the equipment vacancy rate and investment risk.

4 summarizes

UCloud provides intelligent resource management services for access users based on RFID technology, and carries out all-round automatic monitoring and management of important IT equipment hosted in the data center, greatly improving the efficiency of operation and maintenance and asset security. At present, the first deployment of UCloud RFID intelligent asset management service will be completed in Shanghai Zhuanqiao machine room and Beijing Changping machine room. Later, more self-built UCloud machine rooms will be covered to completely solve the user’s managed asset operation and maintenance management problem.