eBay
eBay improves the visibility of its data centers with AVEVA PI System
eBay manages billions of listings and millions of transactions every day, and needs real-time information on its data centers to maintain availability and anticipate future demand. The company lacked a global real-time view of operations, relied on outdated and disconnected spreadsheets, and could not forecast its capacity needs with confidence. Deploying AVEVA PI System and AVEVA PI Server made it possible to integrate a DCIM tool with operational data to create a unified "cockpit" view of the data centers. The benefits are substantial: a better understanding of power and cooling status, the ability to predict future capacity needs, faster, data-driven decisions on multimillion-dollar infrastructure investments, and improved forecast accuracy for equipment and space planning. eBay now has management capabilities that match its massive traffic, with a smartphone sold every five seconds and more than 170 million active buyers on its platform.
FAQ
How does AVEVA PI System bring a "cockpit" view to data center operations?
AVEVA PI System collects real-time data from the power, cooling and infrastructure equipment of eBay's data centers. Combined with a DCIM tool, the platform builds a unified "cockpit" view that gives operators global visibility across all sites worldwide. This approach replaces outdated, disconnected spreadsheets with modern industrial supervision, essential for running a platform that handles billions of listings and millions of transactions every day.
Why replace spreadsheets with AVEVA PI Server in a data center?
The spreadsheets used by eBay were disconnected, outdated and unable to reflect the actual state of operations in real time. AVEVA PI Server centralizes and historizes operational data, ensures it is up to date and accurate, and automatically feeds decision-making dashboards. For a data center operator, this transition is crucial: it avoids manual entry errors, makes internal reporting more reliable and speeds up the detection of power and cooling anomalies.
How can a data center's capacity needs be forecast using AVEVA data?
AVEVA PI System historizes load, consumption and cooling profiles over long periods. eBay uses these time series to model traffic growth (a smartphone sold every five seconds, 170 million active buyers) and accurately predict future needs for power, space and equipment. This data-driven foresight avoids both costly overinvestment and capacity shortfalls, two major risks in the data center industry.
What business benefits has eBay gained from deploying AVEVA PI System?
With AVEVA PI System and PI Server, eBay speeds up its multi-million-dollar infrastructure investment decisions by relying on factual data rather than estimates. Equipment and space forecasts are more accurate, service availability is better controlled and operations teams finally have a consolidated view. It is a direct ROI on the industrial performance of a company whose business depends entirely on the reliability of its data centers.
Why has AVEVA PI System become a standard for data center operators?
The data center sector faces an explosion in demand (AI, cloud, e-commerce) and growing pressure on energy efficiency. AVEVA PI System collects millions of data points per second, historizes them and makes them usable for engineering, operations and finance teams. This ability to turn real-time data into strategic decisions explains its adoption by companies like eBay, which must simultaneously ensure performance, scalability and cost control.