Welcome to Let's Get Digital podcast.
I'm Keri Charles and I am so happy that you are with me today.
I got a great guest on the show, Bruno Berti.
He is the Senior Vice President of Global Product Management for NTT Global Data Centers.
Bruno, thanks for joining me today.
I just met you what, three weeks ago?
Three weeks ago, yes, it was a great meeting and thanks for having me on the show.
really appreciate it, Kara.
Good to see you today.
Yes, I'm so excited.
had a great conversation, I believe, at the Infrastructure Summit, Structure Research in Las Vegas.
And I just noticed that there were just some very unique things that you had to say.
And so I'm excited to talk about them um and share them with the audience.
But first, we want to talk about you, Bruno.
How did you get to where you are today?
Tell me about what's your story?
My story, so it's uh an interesting one.
So I started my career, I grew up in Canada.
um So I graduated uh school and took computer engineering and quickly entered the telecommunications world.
And that's kind of where I really started getting experience around data centers and network connectivity and sort of what it takes to really connect the world and have
applications work together.
I was really fortunate.
early in my career that I got to work in a technology group.
So we had a lab and I got to go inside that lab and test different equipment, play with stuff, and just really kind of learn from all the people that I got to work with and some
of the suppliers that were providing equipment.
And as part of that, we selected a piece of technology to roll into the company.
And I got to work with the operations team to roll it out and make sure they had everything they needed in order to properly operate that equipment.
And I got to spend uh months inside of our data center at the time.
And that's kind of where I got the appreciation of what it really takes to deliver services for consumers, businesses, and really kind of got infatuated with just.
technology at that point.
So very early on in my career, I got exposure to data centers and, you know, I won't go through all the little bits and pieces, but basically 13 years ago, I ended up at a small
company called Raging Wire, which was a data center provider in the Americas.
And at the time we were based out of Sacramento, but we had a expansion.
just started in Virginia and we can talk a little bit about the strategic significance of Virginia.
in the data center world, but we had those two locations.
And I was sort of early on in the process of where we really had this aggressive expansion plan.
So we started expanding in different parts of the US, in all kind of the strategic core data center markets in the US.
I really kind of got to see and learn a lot about the data center industry and our clients at that perspective.
And what I do at
NTT or kind of what I've done most of my career is I'm in product management.
So it's a big word, but what that really means for me and just in simple terms is I get to talk to customers, I get to talk to the market, I get to talk to industry experts, I get
to talk to suppliers and hopefully steer our company in the direction that we need to go in order to support those, those, those, you know, different stakeholders as we call them.
So I really kind of got the opportunity to learn and steer our company in the direction um that we are now.
And during that process, Raging Wire got acquired by NTT.
So that really gave us access to capital and kind of more put a global view into what we do.
So, and I was a long short version of my story, but it was kind of sort of how it got into data centers and it's been an amazing.
uh
career I've learned so much and actually still having fun this long into the industry.
It is fun, isn't it?
There's a lot going on right now.
telling you, Kerry, yeah, and you saw it at the conference where we met.
the conference was bigger than it's ever been.
There were people in there that we've never seen before.
And you're right, we're at a point in the industry and data center specifically that, you know, the rate of change and innovation is nothing like I've ever seen in my career.
Yes, so true.
So let's talk about NTT global data centers and uh just a little bit about everything.
um Again, how the company started, where it operates today, and also how it's grown into a global leader.
Yeah, and I think this is one of the unique stories that we have as NTT.
Because I think I mentioned, I started with Raging Wire that got bought by NTT.
So 13, 14 years ago, NTT, which is a Japanese telecommunications company, they really have big visions in sort of providing a global footprint and kind of expanding their presence
outside of Japan.
So they saw the need.
for infrastructure back then.
So what they did was they looked across the markets and they wanted to get into the data center business.
So they looked in the Americas, they looked in Europe, they looked in India and the rest of Asia Pacific, which were the core global markets out there for data centers and
infrastructure in general.
And they ended up purchasing the best of breed, as we call them, local companies.
So they bought Raging Wire, which was just in the Americas.
They bought eShelter in Jyron, which was based out of Europe, and they bought Netmagic in India, and they had their own data center assets in Japan and APAC.
So what they did 13 years ago is they brought those five, four companies together to kind of operate as NTT global data centers.
And for a number of years, they had let us operate.
uh independently in those local regions with sort of the NTT kind of parent company as the funder and the ability for each of those different regions to expand locally.
So that gives us a bit of a unique uh market presence since we started as a local company in those key regions.
We started as a local company.
So we had the relationships, we had the, um you know, the presence and sort of the understanding of what it took to be
local.
So, and then what we've done over the last 13 years is kind of brought those companies together to really leverage our global strategy.
So now we're a global company, but we've got that local expertise.
So we tend to have, you know, a bit of a different perspective in the market because we, you know, kind of grew up in each of those individual markets, but now we have the ability
to leverage.
what we've learned in each of those markets in other markets as well.
So we can take some of the things that we've done in the Americas, for example, and leverage it in Europe.
And one of the things that's changed in this industry is we kind of talked about is there's no such thing anymore as a local company, right?
Most of the customers that we service are global in nature or have global requirements in nature.
So that really gives us a bit of a unique perspective because we have a company or a customer in Germany
that need some capacity in Japan or a customer in Malaysia that needs some capacity in South Africa.
So with that kind of relationship and the fact that we have those local relationships, we're able to leverage that globally and service them globally and let them buy what they
get in Japan is gonna be the same product and the same service that they get in Germany.
So it's actually really, um I feel it's one of the unique things we offer as NTT.
So let's talk a little bit more about that local first approach and growing in the regions because it's a hot topic right now with data centers and communities.
And there's certain communities that are rejecting new data center builds and there's just a lot of chatter around it.
So how would you say that NTT has approached because they've grown up in these communities, how have they approached the partnership with the community?
and working together and uh I guess creating a happy community that the data centers are there.
Yeah, no, and I think that's one of the changes that we've seen in the industry.
I think with that local approach from an NTT, GDC perspective, we've always been involved in the community.
knew, or we know, we understand, in order to get a data center into a community, it really does require a lot of outreach, a lot of education, a lot of local support.
So what I'm pretty excited about in most of our developments.
there's always some community engagement that we include.
We've got parks that are part of our facilities in Phoenix.
We've got um community outreach that's done in Germany quite a bit.
And we can talk a little bit about some of those community projects in which we actually integrate some of our um systems into the rest of the community to provide some benefits.
But that community outreach is critical.
And I think...
not to understate again the value of we grew up in those communities, right?
We started in Germany with E-Shelter.
We started in London with Jyron.
We started in Sacramento with Raging Wire in India with Netmagic in Mumbai.
we had a lot of that local presence.
We live in those communities.
So we know what it takes to be a good steward of the community.
And I think that's one of the things that, you know, in the...
conversations with data centers.
Five years ago, data centers weren't a topic.
Now they are.
So part of our job is to be more engaged with the community.
I think one of the things I'm even excited about is we built a data center in Texas, um you know, back in 2013 or 15, I believe.
And one of the things that we did was we put in a conference center um into that facility and we allowed community um
know, groups to actually use that facility.
So we had, you know, local bodies come in and use that conference facility for 150 people that they could actually leverage.
Because we know bringing people inside the data center is the best way to educate them on, you know, what the data center is.
And in Virginia, we've always been a part of the local school systems.
And we bring students in during.
certain parts of the year where we actually let them see what our operations staff actually do inside the data center because we want to make sure that we're creating a
place where people want to work as well.
So we work with universities and that and those are the community things that I think are very critical for us to educate what the data centers, the data centers really are versus
what they are not.
Take me inside of a data center.
Let's step inside.
What actually happens day to day behind the walls?
How are your teams using innovation, research to really deliver for customers?
So that's my favorite part, And I think anytime I walk into one of our data centers, I have the biggest smile on my face, because that's where I really, excuse the expression,
but that's where I geek out, right?
So I want to separate the inside of the data center in two big pieces, right?
There's what we do inside the data center, which is exciting.
But then for me, it's what our customers do inside the data center, which is probably what most people are aware of.
But I'll start with what we do.
um If you look inside a data center, I always try to simplify it.
From an NTT Global Data Centers perspective, we really do five things.
We do them very well, but we do five things.
We provide power to the equipment that our customers install.
And we do that in a very important way, right?
We provide power redundantly.
We provide power that never goes down.
We provide power in a way
that really optimizes the equipment that our customers install inside the data center.
So that's kind of the key thing we do.
The second thing we do is we cool that um power, that data center, because basically when you're powering equipment and equipment is running, that equipment gets hot and it gets
hot pretty fast and it gets hot directly based on the amount of power that is consumed.
So we got to get that heat out of the building.
Some people call it cooling, it's really, we got to get the heat out of the building.
So we do that for most of our customers.
And that's probably some of the innovation that's happened recently is, you know, we used to just push cold air over these servers and then the cold air would turn into hot air.
And then we would basically get that hot air out of the building.
So there's been a lot of innovation in cooling and sort of being more efficient, but also some of the projects we've done is we take that excess heat.
And we actually deliver that excess heat to the community so we can heat office buildings, we can heat homes, we can heat swimming pools.
And we're doing that at a large scale in our Germany facilities.
So we're really excited about that.
We want to deploy that a lot more.
We can talk about that some more when we do talk about sustainability, because that's critical.
So power, cooling, obviously space.
provide space for the customers to put their equipment in.
physical security because it's really important.
You know, one of the statistics I throw out there is um for every megawatt, and that's a power unit that we sell to our customers, they spend $50 million to use that megawatt.
So they're buying equipment, they're buying racks, they're buying infrastructure.
So they make a significant investment of equipment to put into our data center.
So we need to make sure
that we've got physical security that nobody that's not authorized goes into that data center.
So physical security is an important aspect.
And then the one that a lot of people forget is connectivity.
We need to be able to provide connectivity to that equipment so they can get data in and out of that data center.
So connectivity is also a very critical service.
and component that we provide to our customers and give them options to.
So that's simply what we do inside the data center.
So we have a staff, we've got significant staff inside of those data centers that work for NTT Global Data Centers.
We were happy to share that, you know, all that staff, you know, wears NTT GDC shirts and are proud to be part of the company, but they are basically responsible for making sure
that that equipment, the power, the space, the cooling, the connectivity,
is available to our customers 24-7, uh 100 % of the time.
We do not allow those systems and those servers and that power to ever go down.
That's one of the things that the staff is really focused on making sure that those pieces inside the data center are there all the time.
So that's what we do.
But then I geek out a lot because then there's what our customers are doing, right?
So they're installing, they're
buying equipment, they're installing that equipment, they're putting it in the data center.
But always impresses me.
Cary is kind of the applications or sort of what's actually happening on their side, right?
Everyone's aware of the typical things that we all do, right?
We all have phones, we're all accessing applications on our phones, we're texting, we're emailing, we're taking pictures, we're doing mobile banking.
So that stuff all happens inside the data center.
And I walk through our...
customers in areas and I get to see where that happens, right?
Social media, there's a lot of things that we understand as users that we do every day on the data center side.
But there's also things that are a little bit less known that happen inside the data center, especially in today's day and age, right?
Where everything is digitized, everything is automated.
Cars.
um
People don't probably understand how much telemetry and how much information is being stored and collected when you're driving your vehicle.
EV vehicles are one thing, but even non-EV vehicles are storing and collecting a lot of data.
That data gets uploaded and stored into data centers.
That then that information can be used to improve the cars.
That information can be used to design and build better cars or even for insurance purposes.
But all this automated driving, ah know, everyone, hopefully everyone's gotten into a Waymo or one of these self-driving um taxis, but all that automation and self-driving
technology lives inside a data center.
The other piece that, you know, people probably forget is that, you know, the government, a lot of the intelligence, a lot of the research that's being done in the government, that
happens inside of a data center.
Education.
all the online learning, all the courses, that's all inside of a data center.
And the part that excites me, and I know we're going to probably touch on AI, but even medical and financial, right?
You look at all the research, all of the data points that is being collected for any kind of research that's going on, be it cancer, be it heart, all that research and data lives
inside of a data center is being processed inside of a data center.
I know there's those applications that we all understand, but then there's also all the other things that we rely on as a community that we probably don't know that it is
happening inside of a data center.
Wow, that was the best explanation of what goes on inside of a data center I've ever heard.
oh No, that's great.
And I was just sitting here thinking, anyone who is listening that wants to educate their team or new people or young people or anyone on that topic, have them listen to this
episode for sure.
By the way, this episode is being recorded and stored in a data center as well.
It sure is, isn't it?
Our whole lives are being recorded and stored in a data center.
The sustainability, let's go there.
And it's definitely a major focus right now.
So what is NTT doing to benefit both uh customers, communities, everything when it comes to sustainability?
Yeah, and I want to break sustainability up because the one thing that data centers have always been, you know, I've been on the design side or working on the product side of data
centers.
We've been designing the most efficient data centers that we can since we've built them because for us, efficiency and sustainability actually does result in a bottom line
savings, right?
So most people think sustainability, they think power.
renewable energy, renewable uh green power, be it from solar, wind, nuclear, different options.
And that is a critical aspect of sustainability.
And that's something that obviously I'm excited about because there's so many innovations happening right now on the power and renewable energy side, because obviously this
industry right now has a great demand for additional power.
The one thing that I'm excited about is if you look at some of those new sources of power, you know, we are investing, we are focusing, and we are kind of innovating in that whole
green and renewable um power um piece of it, which is exciting for me.
But sustainability goes beyond power carry.
And I think that's one of the things that, you know, I love to talk about.
So NTT has made uh a commitment globally to focus on sustainability.
So we have a net
um 2030 goal where everything we do and we control is going to be net zero carbon free by um net zero emissions by 2030 and then extended to our customers and supply chain by 2040.
So we're pretty excited about that goal and we've been making significant progress.
I think we have a green report that we submit every year.
So if anyone wants to see those specific statistics, um
I'd love to direct people to read that report because it's exciting when we write that report because we get to see all the commitments that we've made through the years or
through the year, we get to put all the results in that report.
And we're ahead of the game in getting to that 2030 with our carbon emissions and the other programs that we're running towards.
But that's the easy side of sustainability.
Then there's the other piece.
sort of the sustainability projects that we're doing.
we're continually looking at ways to build our data centers more efficient.
um know, AI has actually allowed us to innovate in the cooling side and do some more efficient cooling technologies and deploy them, which is actually improving the ratio of
power being used versus power required to deliver.
So that's a term we use in the industry called
PUE or power usage effectiveness.
What that really means is for every electron or kilowatt I deliver to my client, how many more electrons or kilowatts do I need to support that?
So that's lighting, cooling, everything else that supports that.
The lower that number is or the less I have to do outside of that one kilowatt, the better.
So liquid cooling is allowing us to really improve that ratio.
But the other thing, and I touched on it,
earlier, it's how do we take what we do and leverage it outside the community?
So we talked about, you know, one of the core things inside the data center is to get the heat out of the data center.
We're doing projects in Berlin where we're taking that excess heat and we're actually bringing it into a heat recovery system that's part of the community and we're able to
take that heat and distribute it through a
cooling system or a water system that gets delivered to office buildings and communities.
So we're delivering free heating or call it free heating, but it's basically being able to leverage a waste product from our data center and drive it to the community.
And those to me are the types of projects that we need to do more of and set up infrastructure more of, because that's actually where one plus one equals three, not to...
Sound cliche, but now what we do is actually improving and providing more benefit to communities.
And there's a lot of these little projects that are going out there that are really headed towards that sustainability world.
So just when you think sustainability, it's more than just power, it is how do we take what we do and do it better?
How do we make it more efficient?
And then how do we actually um invest in technologies that are going to improve?
um
know, life and communities going forward.
So you are with customers a lot.
And how are you working with these customers to meet their changing needs?
mean, AI is, gosh, it's changing.
It's changing our lives every second, right?
Business, personal lives, every single thing we do, everything that we touch.
So edge computing, cloud, it's driving the demand for smarter, faster, more efficient data centers.
So tell me how you're working with those customers as things are just moving as fast as a freight train.
Yeah, freight trains, that's a good example, or a good analogy.
um Yeah, the interesting thing um as NTT, we really have the top of the top customers inside of our portfolio.
So we spend a lot of time talking to them, um strategically, also during times when they have needs.
So we get a lot of time to learn from them.
And the one thing that's interesting is our
Most of our business now globally is from our existing client base.
uh So we get to learn and work with them a lot to make sure that what we're doing in new data centers as well as globally kind of aligns with their needs.
So we learn a lot from our existing clients.
And I think you touched something that is interesting is that the data center industry has been uh pretty consistent over the last, say 10, 20 years.
with, you we build that data center, customers look at it afterwards and bring in their equipment and we've been able to meet their needs.
But if you look at what's happening with the equipment that they're buying, em anyone that's following NVIDIA and listening to Jensen's em keynote speakers, you see all the
innovation that is currently happening in that side.
So we are actually talking to clients.
before they even buy that equipment.
Now we're talking to the NVIDIAs, the AMDs, before they release that equipment, because now the data center, as opposed to afterthought, the data center now is becoming a
forethought, or uh part of the conversation, because we need to make sure that as they innovate their equipment, as our customers innovate the applications that they're
deploying, we have to make sure that data centers can support them, because there has been so much change.
The amount of power
The amount of equipment, the amount of technology that they're deploying is nothing like we've ever seen.
So to answer your question, we're having conversations with the customers before they buy data centers.
We're having conversations with the manufacturers a lot earlier in the process.
So now the data center is part of the conversation as opposed to, know, where do I put this equipment after I've bought it?
Which is actually giving us that ability to be a little more innovative and look at things a lot differently.
The interesting thing for us is everyone's talking about AI and our customers are deploying AI.
We actually get to use AI to help us design our data centers as well and test things before we actually construct them.
um So we're using AI to help us in the construction and even during the construction process because we have all of our designs digitally done in what we call a BIM model.
we can actually start using some AI now to take a look at what's happening during the construction process and make sure we're not making any mistakes or we're not missing
things.
So we're able to get real time information during the construction process.
And then obviously we're able to use AI during the operation process to maybe see some trends that we normally wouldn't see a lot sooner.
So it is a...
I know you asked about the clients, but it's kind of all integrated now with what the clients are doing and sort of being able to adapt.
And I don't think we know yet um what's going to happen in the next three, four years with equipment.
So one of the things that we hear clearly from our customers is that we need to maintain some level of flexibility and adaptability in our designs so that the next generation of
uh
GPUs that are going to come from Nvidia, which is probably only six months or a year away, is probably going to be a little different than what they're looking like today.
So we need to make sure that our data center can adapt.
So we've built some flexibility into our design so we can modify and adapt the existing data centers and not have to start from scratch.
So those are the things that we're hearing from them and some of the ways that we've been able to adapt to adhere to what our customers are doing.
I think that's applicable for every single business.
Anyone who's listening right now is listen to your customers and be involved in every stage, not just that little piece of what you do.
And I think that's brilliant advice.
more critical now than ever.
And I think that's kind of one of the things that, you our CEO always tells us that we have to have a client first mentality.
And that doesn't mean do everything the client wants.
It really means listen to the client, hear what they're saying and make sure that we are anticipating and sharing all that information internally.
There's nothing better.
I got the chance to meet a client this week and they shared some information that I wasn't aware of and
I distributed that through the whole organization because I thought it was important enough for us to know.
So the more you talk to clients, to your point, having that client first mentality is really critical to stay on top of things.
Yes, for sure.
You said this earlier about how the data center industry has just changed at lightning speed really in the last decade or so.
It's just mind blowing.
So what is the next generation of NTT look like?
That's something we think about um quite often.
I think we're trying our best to address the needs that our clients have today.
um So we're trying to build faster, we're trying to build more flexibility, we're trying to stay ahead of where the demand curves are.
So it's causing us to...
have different conversations.
We're working a lot closer with power companies.
We're talking to different suppliers.
We're trying to stay ahead of the supply chain and ordering equipment, anticipating some of that need.
it's a lot more, you know, it's a lot less of, let's just build it and sell it.
It is now a lot more of, you know, planning and talking and trying to stay ahead of things a lot sooner and having conversations with people we never used to have conversations
with.
So I think what you've seen even with us, we're building bigger data centers.
um We've traditionally stayed in locations where there is existing data center demand and existing data center capacity globally.
So we're in, we've got about 170 data centers across 20 countries and five major regions of the globe.
So we try to make sure that we are...
um
building the right capacity and building the right products in those markets.
So we've stayed in those traditional data center markets.
We've not necessarily built um in remote locations just to try and get some power.
So we're trying to stay ahead of those and maintain that flexibility.
But if you look at sort of what the data center of the future is gonna look like, which we don't know yet, and we're trying to stay ahead of them, but flexibility is critical.
I think size and scale is critical.
I think location.
is critical as well.
So you're going to see more data centers in locations where the, you know, some of those applications I talked about are going to be required.
I think the infrastructure, meaning what our customers are putting into the data center are going to be a lot more integrated with the data center as opposed to separate.
um So you're going to see a little more of those in different type locations.
And I'm very optimistic as well, Kerry, that you're going to see
data centers become more part of the community.
they're going to look a lot better than some data centers look today.
We've always focused on making sure there's some aesthetics to our data center, but making it part of the community, making it part of the architecture is something I think you're
going to see not only from us, but from a lot of other companies as well.
I can't wait to see that.
Hahaha.
gonna be interesting.
So Bruno, I wanna ask you, I guess more of a personal professional question.
You've led product development, I saw, isn't it over 30 years I saw on your LinkedIn?
Is that a long time?
I mean, you look so young, how did you do that?
Did you start when you were four?
um But I'm just curious, so what's the formula for success when it comes to designing products that actually solve those real world problems for customers?
Yeah, so I'm glad you asked that because I think that's one of the things that I love about my job.
I've if you've looked at my LinkedIn, I've been a product manager pretty much since uh I graduated uh university just a couple of years ago.
um But the the the one thing that I learned and I always tell this story um because it was a bit of an eye opener for me.
So I told you I started telecommunication and I was a user of systems and technology and I got hired.
um by one of the systems that we were actually using inside the data center to manage the product.
And I thought, you know, I was a user, I was the smartest person, I deployed it, I knew exactly what was wrong with the product and what was not wrong with the product.
So I worked with the development team, you know, as the product manager, because I knew everything.
And I basically, you know, said, build this and do that, add this feature, take this feature away.
So we worked on a development project for about six months.
And at the end of the six months, we were happy to release it and it fell flat.
I honestly admit that I made a mistake.
I actually released the wrong product.
Customers didn't like it, so a lot of customers didn't buy it.
And I think that's kind of where I learned, Kerry, that what I know, what I think is irrelevant, honestly.
And I think it's really the more customers we speak with, the more suppliers we speak with, the more industry we speak with.
personally as a product person, the better I can understand the real pervasive problems that exist, not just my problems, but it's the pervasive problems.
for me, the one secret, or it's not even a secret, but the one tact I've always taken is speak with as many customers as possible, stay on top of what their problems are, because
if we can solve what they're looking for, that's the key.
And I think
The more customers you speak with, especially in our industry, there's common threads in what they're looking for.
There's common threads in what they're deploying.
there's common, even though everyone's a little unique, ah I think the value we provide is really having that customer centricity.
So that's always been my favorite part of the job.
You put me in front of a customer and my face is beaming.
You put me in meetings all day, I start to hunch over, but.
speak with as many clients as possible and then just be passionate.
And I've always taken that approach to be open to different options and ideas.
There isn't always one best idea.
It's kind of coming through with many, but then test them.
And I think this is what I love about AI.
We can test ideas, we can test solutions, we can talk to clients.
Clients are gonna give you their thoughts and opinions.
So you can kind of get that instant feedback.
And with AI, you can test and fail a lot quicker than
know in the past where you just you know build something for six months and then realize oops made a mistake.
That is gold right there, Bruno.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
uh How do we learn more about NTT, Global Data Centers?
Yeah, our website, ah LinkedIn, reach out to all of us, go to our website, uh and I think we'll post the website here, but we have a lot of information, but you're going to notice
anyone at NTT Global Data Centers, we love to speak with clients, speak with prospects, educate the community, so reach out, some of us will, or someone will reach back out um
and speak with you.
yeah, our website, LinkedIn, reach out to anyone you know that's within the GDC.
We're happy to speak to anybody.
Bruno, this has been a pleasure.
Thank you so much.
I'm just thrilled that you came on.
I know I learn a lot in every episode, but I think I definitely learn more than usual in this one.
So I sure appreciate you.
thanks, Kerry.
Anytime.
I appreciate it.
Take care.
Okay, don't move.
Don't move because it's got a download.