FOCUS COLOCATION
Issue 17, August/September
STANDING OUT FROM THE REST
Not content with your usual data center colocation sell, these data center operators have gone for a location with a diff erence so they can stand out from the rest THE BUNKER, UK
SUPERNAP WEST US
With a clientele of celebrities and industries keen to invest in high- security technology solutions, The Bunker’s key colocation sell is obvious. Its data center outside London is said to be one of the most secure in the UK – housed inside an old World War II military bunker.
The Bunker COO Simon Neal said the fi rm chose the site because of its protection from environmental, terrorism and fl ooding dangers. Its depth below ground means it is also cool and the bunker also came with great satellite connectivity. “We are 100ft underground and we have no solar gain and high network connectivity because of the nature of what the Ministry of Defence did inside the Bunker,” Neal says.
The Bunker data center was built in the early 2000s. Building in a bunker did come with a few challenges. Neal says it had to work with what reinforced walls were available, which means it does not lend itself well to the data center warehouse environment where racks are stacked upon racks.
PIONEN, SWEDEN
To put it short and sweet, Switch’s SuperNAP Campus is a colocation behemoth in the famous desert gambling mecca of Las Vegas. It spans more than 2.2m sq ft and can hold more than 31,000 cabinets.
It holds 400,000 sq ft of data center fl oor and uses about 100MW of power. This alone is impressive but then try enter Switch without prior permission and you could fi nd yourself up against a small army. Ex -US Marines patrol it on foot and in Humvees – enough to send anyone to the roulette table for a bet rather than try their hand at data theft.
SuperNAP caters to some of the biggest fi nancial services and technology companies in the world including Cisco, eBay and many companies handling transactions for the gambling giants in Las Vegas.
To look at, the data center appears like a Legoland apparition coming out of the desert – quite impressive and done in true Vegas larger-than- life style.
Run by internet provider Bahnhof, the Pionen data center in Stockholm has gained most of its attention in recent times for storing the Wikileaks documents and for being one of the most spectacularly designed data centers out there. Simulated daylight, light mist and waterfalls make it a camera favourite. Looking more like something out of a sci-fi movie, it even has space-themed conference rooms. It is also technically impressive — German submarine engines are used for the data center’s back up power.
Bahnhof CEO Jon Karlung says humans have been the focus of this design. He says the unique location called out for a special design
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focus which just so happened to allowed him to play out some earlier fantasies, born from his love of science fi ction movies and James Bond fl icks.
This site also makes use of a bunker, this time nuclear and sitting 30m below central Stockholm. Built in 2007 to 2008 it spans more than 4,000 sq m. Pionen houses the network operations for Bahnhof and offers hosting and colocation services.
If nothing else, the look of the data center design gets it a lot of free press and great marketing for the team at Pionen.
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