If Facebook buys CA's DCIM solution should you?

Facebook’s Tom Furlong announced that Facebook is using CA’s DCIM solution.

CA Technologies Works with Facebook to Help Drive Efficiencies and Reliability in Its Global Data Centers

CA Innovation Helps Provide Power Improvements in One of the Most Demanding IT Environments in the World

SAN JOSE, CA, January 28, 2014 – CA Technologies (NASDAQ: CA) announced today that Facebook, Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) is using CA DCIM (CA Data Center Infrastructure Management) software to bring together millions of energy-related data points from physical and IT resources in its global data centers to improve power efficiency.

Facebook conducted an intensive DCIM vendor review process. CA was one of a dozen considered and completed a proof-of-concept, followed by a more extensive pilot in a 100,000-square-foot data center. Upon completion of the pilot, Facebook worked with CA to create a custom solution to deliver on the energy-related DCIM requirements today and in the future, in terms of technology innovation and CA’s ability to execute with speed and scalability, as well as working together to adjust and fine-tune associated business objectives.

“We are on a mission to help connect the world, and our IT infrastructure is core to our success,” said Tom Furlong, VP, Infrastructure Data Centers, Facebook. “We are continually looking at ways to optimize our data centers and bringing all of our energy-related information together in one spot was a core requirement.

Facebook is in top 10 of data center footprints out there, and with it comes a big budget and high visibility for those who are its suppliers.  This means there is a good chance Facebook is going to get high value from its use of CA DCIM.  

One question to ask is whether you will benefit from Facebook’s use of DCIM?  Do you run your operations similar to Facebook?  The answer is almost universally NO.  So what is the benefit of Facebook using CA DCIM to you?  Does it prove CA DCIM can scale and perform?  Maybe, do you know the hardware required to run CA DCIM?  No.  Will you?  Most likely not. 

The list of companies who can provide a DCIM solution that scales to Facebook’s need is short.  

What would be interesting to know is what other DCIM companies Facebook thought it would use and how they compared to CA DCIM.