This week Vertiv, previously Emerson Network Power, made its second acquisition in as many weeks.
Even without going into the specifics, the deals are important in terms of proving that Vertiv’s new owner Platinum Equity is serious about investing in the equipment supplier’s future growth.
Drilling in deeper, the latest acquisition of PDU-specialist GEIST was important for a number of specific reasons:
- There is increasing demand from hyperscales and large colos for integrated racks with power distribution, monitoring and other capabilities built in. The Geist purchase adds to Vertiv’s capabilities in this important and growing area.
- Geist also has an innovative approach to manufacturing with production times cut down to less than a week for custom equipment. That fast turn around of custom kit is also important for large operators.
- Geist also has existing customers including large hyperscales and colos which Vertiv has now got access to and should be able to sell additional products and services into.
All of these factors are important in the short term.
But it’s also interesting to think about how Vertiv will use, or enable its customers to use, data from PDUs and other equipment it has acquired and developed internally.
More on what that might mean and how some suppliers such as GE may have got it wrong over at my Critical Thinking column for Data Center Knowledge: There’s more to Vertiv’s Geist acquisition than PDUs and engineers.
EARTHED-TECH 