Colocation

The rise in the popularity of Colocation data centers over past years has been quite spectacular and is now one of the largest market segments in the IT world. Typically, a Colocation data center provides the premises, power, cooling, bandwidth and physical security while the customer installs its own switching, servers and storage. The white space is generally taken, according to customer needs, by rack units, racks, cages or private suites. In the past, Colocation data centers were almost exclusively used by companies for disaster recovery but the reality of low CAPEX and OPEX has attracted companies of all sizes who deem it more financially beneficial and easier to outsource their data center requirements. For most companies, outsourcing a non-core activity is also part of a risk-reduction strategy, and also alleviates the need to fund, operate, maintain and update an owned facility. This business model has its own particular challenges, with multiple tenants requiring specific and varied space configurations and security demands. Colocation data centers therefore face some unique infrastructure challenges.

Security is a Colocation pre-requisite where private access to server and storage racks is essential. To offer 24/7/365 operation to its customers who demand this level of service, Colocation infrastructure companies rely on high-performing and high quality products that will ensure their services operate efficiently and reliably, around the clock.

Downtime and poor service are unacceptable and Colocation companies pay the price for downtime. In such a competitive market, there is no future for service providers with infrastructures based on anything but the most advanced technologies.