The Uptime Institute and the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) are collaborating in an effort to reconcile and rationalize their respective data center infrastructure benchmarking systems. According to a press release, Uptime and TIA will establish “a clear and concise lexicon for the design of data centers as they are planned, constructed and operated worldwide.”
“Both the Uptime Institute and TIA believe that it is in the best interests of the industry to permanently differentiate their respective data center infrastructure benchmarking systems,” they state. Among other steps, that includes TIA revising its ANSI/TIA-942/TIA942-A standard to remove the word ‘tier.’”
Uptime created the standard Tier Classification System in the mid-1990s, providing a method for comparing individual data center facilities based on “expected site infrastructure, performance, or uptime.”
“TIA and the Uptime Institute share the vision of greater efficiency to data center designs. TIA’s TR-42 Engineering Committee will continue to establish and improve voluntary consensus-based standards that enable the data centers which our consumers and businesses demand,” TIA president Grant Seiffert commented. “Working with the Uptime Institute on this and other issues demonstrates the best aspects of what TIA can do to help the communications industry meet tomorrow’s challenges.”
Added Uptime Institute COO Julian Kudritzki, “We appreciate the willingness of TIA and the TR-42 Engineering Committee to work together on this matter. Clear ownership of a benchmarking system is key to its utility, consistency, and accountability.
“By disentangling our respective terminologies, both TIA and Uptime Institute are better able to pursue the independent development of standards and programs as each sees fit. We are confident that this is the lasting and public solution for the issue.”
