Data Center Pulse, Green Grid to Collaborate

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Two of the leading data center industry groups said today that they will work together to better connect their vendor and end user constituencies in confronting the challenges facing data center operators.

Data Center Pulse said it has entered into an agreement with The Green Grid to "further enhance their ability to influence the industry via collaboration on Data Center challenges." The announcement was short on details of the collaboration, but notable for bringing together groups with very different origins and constituencies.

The Green Grid was formed in 2006 by a consortium of industry vendors, including Dell, HP, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, AMD, APC by Schneider, Sun Microsystems, and VMware. The group has had notable successes, especially in boosting use of the Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) energy efficiency metric. After a slow start, the group has worked hard to boost participation by end users, who now represent more than 175 global companies.

Data Center Pulse is a vendor-neutral group launched in September 2008 using social media tools such as LinkedIn and a YouTube podcast. its mission is to bring together global data center owners and operators to discuss best practices and industry trends. The group - which is restricted to users, with no vendors or consultants allowed to participate - has grown rapidly and now has 1,350 members in 55 countries.

Connecting End Users and Vendors
The groups said the new relationship will enable The Green Grid to quickly and effectively reach a significant end user population, while allowing Data Center Pulse members a "direct conduit" into the work being conducted by The Green Grid.

"This relationship allows Data Center Pulse to continue our mission to influence the industry through the consumers of Data Center products and services while maintaining the anonymity of our members," said Dean Nelson, chairman and founder of Data Center Pulse. "Our focus is to drive efficiency and performance gains in the data center because we are the customers. This relationship will accelerate that agenda, ultimately helping Data Center users and the industry as a whole."

"When we started exploring the opportunities, we realized that our efforts were complementary," said Kathrin Winkler, a director of The Green Grid. "We expect our relationship to accelerate the work each organization is pursuing and also to strengthen our output with a larger audience of end users participating and validating our energy efficiency efforts."

The Green Grid has an established Advisory Council (AC) made up of end users from eight of their primary member companies, which will work directly with Data center Pulse. The council includes AT&T, ADP, eBay, Nationwide, Strato, The Walk Disney Company, Tokyo Electric Power Company, and Verizon.