Employing an IT consultant to advise on the construction of a datacentre may not prevent it being overspecified and underused, Sentrum has claimed.

According to the datacentre specialist’s research, firms that employ consultants are just as likely to experience problems associated with overspecification and underuse as firms that do not.

Andy Ruhan, chief executive officer at Sentrum, said: “Many consultants are clearly not helping – and are sometimes even hindering – the process of datacentre construction.

“Almost a quarter of the organisations interviewed said their latest datacentre development was overspecified and underutilised, and we know that overspecification results in higher power costs.”

A hundred senior IT specialists were interviewed for Sentrum’s research, which was carried out on behalf of the firm by Dynamic Markets.

A quarter of those questioned said they believed consultants deliberately overspecified systems to drive up fees.