Schneider Electric Debuts Mission-Critical Data Center Services Unit

Data center power, cooling, and energy management provider Schneider Electric Tuesday introduced its Schneider Electric Mission Critical Services & Software Division.

The new division will bring to solution providers and their customers a full range of energy management and data center life-cycle services, said Domenic Alcaro, vice president of mission critical services and software at Schneider Electric.

"Customers are asking for this," Alcaro said. "They want more than a hardware solution. They want help with the rest of it."

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Schneider Electric's new Mission Critical Services & Software Division is based on Schneider Electric's 2011 acquisition of Lee Technologies, a former solution provider that had partnered with the vendor for about 25 years as a reseller and provider of data center services.

Rob McKernan, senior vice president for Schneider Electric's IT business, said it took two years for the company to transform its services business after its acquisition of Lee Technologies.

Schneider Electric had multiple services organizations over time focused on various parts of the data center, McKernan said. "Now we can have a complete package for the customers, not a disjointed approach," he said.

The new organization includes more than 7,000 trained specialists including technicians, program managers, support staff and solution architects, Alcaro said. It also includes 9,000 R&D personnel and works with more than 5,500 solution providers, he said.

Together, they give partners the ability to provide such data center services as assessment, planning, design, building, commissioning, maintaining, operating, monitoring, and optimization, he said. Those services are part of the integration of Lee Technologies, he said.

Schneider Electric also unveiled a new data center service provider team to help customers take advantage of its global capabilities for co-location, hosting and cloud businesses, said Chuck Buckley, vice president for the company's data center solutions.

The new data center service provider team was formed in response to customers who are struggling with both demand for their data center services and finding the capital needed to invest in providing those services, Buckley said.

Data centers for such customers are typically custom deployments, Buckley said. However, he said, customers want to standardize the deployment to increase the speed and flexibility of their data centers, optimize their investments, decrease operating costs and reduce risks.

NEXT: Partners And Schneider Electric's Data Center Strategy

McKernan said channel partners are integral to the success of both the new Mission Critical Services & Software Division and the data center service provider team.

Partners can bring Schneider Electric's services to customers on the vendor's behalf or can do those services on their own, he said.

"We still realize, and I personally realize, if we go to this landscape without partners, it will be very difficult for us to succeed," he said.

PUBLISHED MARCH 12, 2013