The percentage of aging and obsolete devices in today’s corporate networks around the globe is at its highest in six years, signaling that the global financial crisis of recent years still has a lingering effect today. That’s according to Dimension Data’s annual Network Barometer Report 2014.

More than 51% of all devices assessed are now aging or obsolete. In addition, 27% of all devices are now ‘later’ in their product lifecycle and at the point where the vendor begins to reduce support. First published in 2009, this year’s report was compiled from technology data gathered in 2013 from 288 technology assessments covering 74,000 technology devices in organisations of all sizes and all industry sectors across 32 countries. In addition, data was gathered from 91,000 service incidents logged for client networks that Dimension Data supports.

Manage technologies’ lifecycle

Paul Carvill, Dimension Data Luxembourg’ Network and Security BDM (photo) comments: “This years’ network barometer report is confirming what we have suspected for a while now; companies have been forced to put on-hold their network infrastructure spending and as a result we see an aging installed base. The good news is, we find no significant correlation between this aging installed base and an associated, increased risk exposure.

However, we see current industry trends motivating an increase in upgrades to support advanced features not available on these aging devices, such as PoE, 10G interfaces, support for converged infrastructures as well as IPv6, advanced security and QoS. The Dimension Data Technology Lifecycle Management Assessment (TLMA) gives clients the visibility they require to better manage their technology lifecycle process.”

Time to refresh the technologies

Raoul Tecala, Dimension Data’s Global Business Development Director for Networking says, “Over the past few years, we’ve seen the proportion of ageing and obsolete devices steadily increase, and the conventional assumption was that a technology refresh cycle was imminent. However, our data reveals that organisations are sweating their network assets for longer than expected.”

Tecala says there are three main drivers behind this trend. Firstly, following the economic crisis, organisations are keeping a sustained focus on cost savings – particularly reduced capex budgets. Secondly, there’s a growing availability and uptake of as-a-service ICT consumption models which reduce the need for organisations to invest in their own infrastructure. Finally, we believe that the advent of programmable, software-defined networks may be causing organisations to ‘wait and see’ before selecting and implementing new technology – a factor we expect will become more influential in the next 18 to 36 months.

“We expect that growth in cloud computing, mobility and the number of connected ‘things’ will put additional strain on the network and that clients will have to re-look their network architecture, not the individual devices,” explains Tecala.

And refresh the management

“Overall, we’re seeing organisations becoming more economical in their approach, and more willing to risk getting by with ageing equipment for the sake of running lean – and sometimes avoiding capex at all costs. Generally speaking, there’s nothing wrong with organisations sweating their assets for as long as possible, subject to organisational standards and compliance policies as well as architectural plans to meet business requirements.

“The single most important thing organisations can do to ensure their networks are able to support business is to invest in their operational support tools and processes,” says Tecala and points out that problem and change management are particularly important…However, it’s best if business needs drive changes in a network’s architecture, rather than refreshing technology simply for the sake of avoiding obsolescence,” he concludes.

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Other interesting statistics around ageing and obsolete networks in the Network Barometer Report include:

Three verticals showed large increases: financial services (+13%); government, healthcare, and education (+11%); and service providers and telecommunications (+33%). In the financial services; and government, health care, and education sectors, the increase in the percentage of ageing and obsolete devices supports Dimension Data’s view that the global financial crisis of recent years still has a lingering effect today. The result is a tendency to sweat network assets for longer in these verticals, due to a lack of funds for technology refresh when it’s not seen as critical.

In the service providers and telecommunications vertical, the substantial ageing of assets could be due to various factors. Service providers and telecommunications companies are typically massive organisations with significant operational staff complements and relatively mature support processes to manage their networking infrastructures. These organisations can therefore afford to take on the greater risk of ageing networks.

Service providers may also be sweating the assets they’ve deployed on clients’ premises. In many cases, this equipment serves primarily as a point of demarcation, or as ‘network termination units’, for the network connectivity provided by the service provider. So the service provider may not require the advanced features of newer devices, which would be the primary motivation to refresh or upgrade equipment.

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