Monday, June 10th, 2013

Time	Event
1:30p	Google Plans Double Decker Design in the Dalles Denise Harwood of Google’s Technical Operations team works inside the company’s data center in The Dalles Oregon. (Photo by Connie Zhou for Google) Google plans to expand its data center presence in Oregon with a new two-story building at its campus in The Dalles. The company has filed plans with local officials to build a 164,000 square foot data center on its 37-acre property in The Dalles nestled alongside the Columbia River. Google built two single-story data centers at the site in 2007, which were refurbished last year with a “rip and replace” upgrade of its power infrastructure to support additional equipment. Google wants to build a third data center on an open parcel of land between the two existing buildings. It’s a seeking a zoning variance for the new project because the two-story design would result in a building height of between 75 and 80 feet, higher than current 55 foot limit for  industrial properties in The Dalles, according to The Dallas Chronicle. Most of Google’s data center properties are single-story buildings, but the company has used two-story designs in the past. An example is Hamina, Finland, where the company is taking advantage of huge ceiling heights by using a mezzanine to build a second story. Adding a second story can expand the server capacity of a facility, and in some cases enables shorter runs for power and fiber cables, which can create cost savings. The expansion in Oregon is the latest in a series of major data center investments for Google, which this year has committed to pumping $2 billion into new facilities existing data center campuses. The expansion announcements include: A $600 million expansion in Berkeley County, South Carolina. $390 million in new data center construction in St. Ghislain, Belgium. Another $400 million in construction in its campus in Lenoir, North Carolina, announced on Friday. $400 milllion in additional expansion spending in Council Bluffs, Iowa. As we’ve previously noted, Google’s 2013 building boom represents the largest investment in data center infrastructure in the history of the Internet, eclipsing the company’s initial burst of projects in 2007, including the opening of the campus at The Dalles. (Comment on this)
2:32p	A Race To The Finish: The Final Phase of Construction On A Data Center Facility Chris Curtis is the co-founder and SVP of Development for Compass Datacenters. We are publishing a series of posts from Chris that will take you inside the complexity of the construction process for data centers. He will explore the ups and downs (and mud and rain) of constructing data center facilities and the creative problem-solving required for the unexpected issues that sometimes arise with every construction process. For more, see Chris’ previous columns on the start of construction, weather woes and the planning process. CHRIS CURTIS Compass Datacenters As I mentioned in my previous entry, we are down to the wire on our delivery schedule. Times like these require decisive action and I am nothing if not decisive. What this means for all you junior developers out there is that you get out from behind your desk and get to the job site fast. You probably will want to pack a little extra clothing because this is going to be your home until the project is done. This is primarily due to the fact that although you can attempt to move things along by being a raving lunatic on the phone, but nothing beats the visceral effect of being a raving lunatic on-site. Down to the Wire on the Schedule A tight schedule tends to add a degree of intensity to things. People are focused and the inter-dependencies of various operations become even more critical. I won’t lie to you — tempers can flare. I don’t know what would have happened to that lunch truck driver who ran out of Tater Tots if I hadn’t intervened. When folks are working around the clock to finish the job, the ready availability of complex carbohydrates can make all the difference. Fortunately, I was able to convince the inflamed parties involved that onion rings can be a nice change of pace and the tension level dissipated dramatically. Exercise in Applied Psychology At these critical times, a big part of a developer’s job is to know when to use the whip and when to use the carrot. (Before you get the idea that I’m out there verbally abusing some poor helpless electrician, let me say that I use the term “whip” metaphorically.) I’m actually a pretty easy-going guy. But you do have to know when to push the right buttons. It’s really an exercise in applied psychology. For example, when the guy installing the conduit fell behind I didn’t threaten to beat the crap out of him. That would be counterproductive. I did tell him that the electrician who is waiting for him to finish would beat the crap out of him. Since the electrician resembled a building with feet, this proved to be an effective motivator. Conversely, when the painting guys finished early, I bought them all the hot tots they could eat. Sometimes it’s the little things that help get the job done. Working with the Project and the Customer One of the most important elements of a developer’s job is being the liaison between the project and the customer. This is especially true in situations when you are coming down to the wire. For some strange reason customers don’t have a lot of interest in visiting the site when you’re putting up walls or adding the DX units to the roof, but once you are within a couple weeks of your completion date — suddenly everybody wants to see what’s going on. People you’ve never seen before start showing up every couple of hours-—“Just thought I show my wife the site”, “I went to high school with this guy and he wanted to see the data center” or “I was a little bored so I’d thought I’d swing by and see how things were going.” When these “drop ins” occur you immediately have to put on your tour guide hat and escort them through the facility and be able to provide them with answers to some very probing questions. Reassurance is Important The first thing to remember in these situations is that in most instances the customer is just as worried about things as you. Chances are they are the ones that picked you for this multi-million dollar job so they have as much to lose as you do if you slip your date. Reassurance is the watchword here. If they ask why the data center doesn’t have any doors you calmly reply that the airflow helps expedite the paint drying process. Inquiries as to why the lights aren’t working should be deflected with a detailed, and incomprehensible, discussion about arc flash testing and the lack of PDU’s is merely due to the fact that you’re using a new method of sequencing. Will this alleviate a customer’s fears? Maybe not, but the goal here is to make sure the customer knows that you’re on his side and would never let anything bad happen to them. Which you are, and you never would. Turning a completed data center over to a customer is a combination of pride and relief for a developer. I know that’s how I felt when we turned the site over to our customer. It also tends to evoke feelings of nostalgia. I thought about all of the council meetings I attended just to get the project started, all the conference calls with architects and contractors, and finally the days spent at the site with mud oozing into my loafers. I can’t say that it was all good times but that’s just part of the job. I hope that you’ve found these diary entries to be a little helpful and enjoyable. As for me, I’m preparing to meet with another planning committee for our next project. A developer’s job is never done. Industry Perspectives is a content channel at Data Center Knowledge highlighting thought leadership in the data center arena. See our guidelines and submission process for information on participating. View previously published Industry Perspectives in our Knowledge Library. (Comment on this)
2:39p	Video: Mission Impossible in the Data Center Musicians loose in the data center? Violinist Lindsey Stirling (above) and The Piano Guys used a Utah data center as the setting for a music video. Data centers have been used as the setting for music videos over the years, but never as successfully as in the recent collaboration between two masters of viral video. The Tonaquint Data Center in Utah served as the setting for “Mission Impossible,” a collaboration between The Piano Guys and Lindsey Stirling that combines classical musicians with a familiar theme and a cloak-and-dagger storyline. This fusion of pop and clasical training has helped The Piano Guys (pianist Jon Schmidt and cellist Steven Sharp Nelson), earn more than 130 million views on YouTube. On this project they teamed with Stirling, a violinist/dancer whose “Crystallize” video has accumulated 63 million views. In addition to the data center, parts of the video were filmed in an auto dealership and community college. But the key setting was the Tonqauint facility, which the artists said provided the video with “the cool ‘Mission Impossible’ feel.” Hat tip: We discovered this video at last week’s “How Green is the Internet” video at Google, where it was playing on one of the video screens showcasing data center photos and video. Interested in other data center videos? You can find Gangnam Style, along with many tours and technical videos, on our Data Center Videos channel. (Comment on this)
3:00p	HP Achieves FedRAMP for Cloud Services HP, CenturyLink and NOVA all announce the ability to service U.S. government agencies: HP achieves FedRAMP JAB for managed cloud services.  HP Enterprise Services announced that the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) has granted HP Enterprise Cloud Services – Virtual Private Cloud (ECS-VPC) for U.S. Public Sector a provisional Authority to Operate (pATO). The FedRAMP pATO represents the most rigorous standard for cloud service provider security as three of the largest federal agencies have scrutinized and provisionally authorized HP’s compliance with FedRAMP standards. The managed cloud services give public sector agencies consumption-based cloud computing, that can be managed by the requesting government agency, or by HP.  The HP ECS-VPC offering provides a robust security model for the underlying Cloud Support System and extends that security model to client systems through well-established, secure configuration baselines. “The high sensitivity of the data stored in the cloud requires government CIOs and IT managers to adopt cloud solutions that are trustworthy, reliable and consistent,” said Marilyn Crouther, senior vice president and general manager, U.S. Public Sector, HP Enterprise Services. “FedRAMP authorization represents a critical milestone in HP’s efforts to deliver a secure converged cloud to our U.S. government clients, helping us establish strong partnerships and increase clients’ confidence in the security of their cloud systems.”“The high sensitivity of the data stored in the cloud requires government CIOs and IT managers to adopt cloud solutions that are trustworthy, reliable and consistent,” said Marilyn Crouther, senior vice president and general manager, U.S. Public Sector, HP Enterprise Services. “FedRAMP authorization represents a critical milestone in HP’s efforts to deliver a secure converged cloud to our U.S. government clients, helping us establish strong partnerships and increase clients’ confidence in the security of their cloud systems.” CenturyLink to resell Blue Ridge Networks to government. CenturyLink (CTL) announced that it has signed an agreement authorizing it to sell Blue Ridge Networks, Inc. trusted access cybersecurity solutions to its federal, state and local government clients. Sold via several contract vehicles, the Blue Ridge solutions are integrated within the infrastructure of Savvis, a CenturyLink company that is a global leader in cloud computing and managed hosting solutions for enterprises. ”This sales agreement allows CenturyLink to offer an even wider array of cybersecurity solutions—including Blue Ridge’s customizable, fully managed network security systems—to our government clients,” said Diana Gowen, CenturyLink Public Sector senior vice president and general manager. “Through our relationship with Blue Ridge, CenturyLink can now offer government agencies our comprehensive portfolio of secure data, cloud, network and integrated managed solutions coupled with more all-encompassing protection against cyber attacks.” NOVA wins DISA contract.  NOVA Corporation, an IT company owned by the Navajo Nation, announced that it has been selected as one of four firms awarded the DISA IT Enterprise Support Services (DESS), Infinite delivery / indefinite quantity (ID/IQ) contract. It was also awarded Task Order 0001-Operations, a contract worth $111,276,828.  ”NOVA understands the Mission critical nature of services that DISA provides to our nations warfighters and we are pleased to support DISA through the DESS contract,” said NOVA CEO John Snider. “The contract work will take place at Fort George G. Meade, MD, providing a full range of IT services for DISA employees at the DISA Headquarters building. The contract will also support additional DISA employees accessing the enterprise via Local Area Networks (LANs) located within the continental U.S. and overseas Department of Defense (DoD) locations. DISA is anticipating numerous IT infrastructure consolidation initiatives across the DoD and anticipates other DoD organizations acquiring IT services from the DESS contract.” (Comment on this)
4:12p	IRS Review Puts REIT Conversions on Hold Are data centers real estate? That question is being examined by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) as it reviews its guidelines for real estate investment trusts (REITs). The agency has formed an internal working group to define its standards for REIT status, and will not approve any new applications for REIT status until the process is completed. That news hit the stock prices of Equinix (EQIX) and Iron Mountain (IRM), which have both applied to convert to REIT status. Shares of Equinix fell more than 5 percent on Friday after the company disclosed the IRS review, but bounced back 2 percent in early trading Monday. Iron Mountain shares slumped 16 percent Friday. The review follows a New York Times story last month that raised questions about data center operators seeking conversion to REIT status, characterizing it as a tax avoidance strategy that “creates the image of a loophole.” It also raised questions about the inclusion of leased property in a REIT. Precedent for Data Center REITs A REIT is a corporation or trust that uses the pooled capital of many investors to purchase and manage income property. Income comes from the rent and leasing of the properties, and REITs are legally required to distribute 90 percent of their taxable income to investors. Four of the largest data center developers – Digital Realty (DLR), DuPont Fabros (DFT), CoreSite Realty (COR) and CyrusOne (CONE) – are organized as REITs. Equinix believes there is a clear precedent for data center developers as REITs. “Equinix cannot predict when the IRS working group will complete its study or what the outcome of the study will be,” the company said in a statement. “However, Equinix continues to believe, based on both existing legal precedent and the fact that other data center companies currently operate as REITs, that its data center assets constitute real estate for REIT purposes.” QTS (Quality Technology Services) declined comment on whether it was considering a REIT conversion, but said it was an appropriate business structure for data centers. “As a privately-held company, QTS maintains the right not to divulge financial information,” said a QTS spokesperson. “However, data centers at their core are real estate enterprises and are well within the framework of REIT rules.” The executive team at Iron Mountain seems confident that the delay won’t the company’s share price for very long. President and CEO William Meaney bought 12,000 shares of the stock after its decline, while several directors also were buyers of the company’s shares. Are data center development companies appropriate to operate as REITs? Share your opinions and insights in our comments. (Comment on this)
7:23p	Best of the Data Center Blogs for June 10th Here’s a roundup of some interesting items we came across this week in our reading of data center industry blogs for June 10th: Where is the Rack Density Trend Going ? – Here’s some interesting data in density from Jan Wiersma at Data Center Pulse: “So what is the trend in energy consumption on a rack basis ? Readers of my Dutch data center blog know I have been watching and trending energy development in the server and storage industry for a long time. To update my trend analysis I wanted to start with a consumption trend for the last 10 years.” The Large Print Giveth… - At the Compass Points blog, Chris Crosby wonders whether data center tax incentives can be trusted. “Pay attention to the atmosphere surrounding the negotiations surrounding your would be benefactor’s decision to entice you into their warm embrace. Read what the papers and blogs are saying. Does the majority of opinion feel that it is a good deal or is your new site being viewed by the masses with the same level of enthusiasm as if you were planning to erect a leper colony on Main Street? If your prospective reception leans toward the latter somebody is ultimately going to pay, and more likely than not, that’s going to be you.” The 10 Deadly Sins Against Scalability – At High Scalability, scalability maven Sean Hull “has come up Five More Things Deadly to Scalability that when added to his earlier 5 Things That are Toxic to Scalability, make for a numerologically satisfying 10 sins again scalability.” How a Modular Data Center May Lower Your Tax Bill – The Schneider Electric blog looks at how accounting issues may improve the economics of modular deployments. “In many cases, for accounting purposes companies can treat these modular systems as “business equipment,” rather than as part of the building in which the equipment is installed. This new classification is the direct result of scalable, modular and factory tested systems that require little or no field wiring other than the power connection.” Schneider is offering an online class with details. (Comment on this)
8:23p	AST Deploys Micro-Modular Data Center In Haiti Prefabricated, modular data centers are an especially beneficial deployment model for emerging economies. Take Haiti, for example, a country with limited resources and a history of natural disasters. Modular data centers are a way to bring in services quickly and without a heavy capital investment burden. AST Modular, the Spanish modular data center player, is deploying micro-modular data centers in Haiti through IT service provider DMS International. The companies announced successful delivery of one of AST’s Private Cloud Box (PCB) units, with DMS providing hosting and outsourcing services to private and public customers across Haiti. This adds some plug and play capacity, with the PCB housed at Caracol Industrial Park, a $300 million, 600-acre manufacturing facility built by the Inter-American Development Bank, the U.S. government, and the Haitian government to create sustainable jobs in one of Haiti’s poorest regions. Caracol Industrial Park is also home to a state of the art disaster recovery data center. Quick Deployment, Cost Effective It’s an interesting example of using modular, portable technology in disaster areas and/or emerging economies. DMS is renting the PCB in a three-year contract, a business model AST Modular refers to as CDCaaS (Cloud Data Center as a Service) that also includes support services, SLA and insurance. In Haiti, this is probably a good idea given its disaster history. It helps DMS avoid significant capital expenditure, yet allows it to grow the business. Haitian organizations gain access to IT services quickly, and with less capital expense. “PCB is a very cost effective solution in terms of Opex because of its open source cloud platform,”  said Daniel Silva, COO at DMS International. “The Micro Data Center approach also reduces CAPEX dramatically in comparison with traditional brick and mortar DC construction and it will enable our current and future customers to access the cloud easily and benefit from a resilient and fully supported infrastructure.” The PCB is “the little box that could.”  It features 85 virtual machines in a 42U Micro data center footprint. It’s based on AST’s, Smart Bunker, and includes Dell hardware, Citrix virtualization, and AST’s Cloudtimizer software for monitoring energy efficiency and the work load of the PCB. Not a pushover, a  PCB also features autonomous DX cooling, rackable UPS, and several security features. Security includes biometric access, remote monitoring, CCTV, fire extinguishing system, anti-seismic features, and 2 hours of protection against fire. “It is a very important day for AST Modular as we are making our first step into a new Data Center paradigm which will integrate both physical and IT infrastructure in the same solution,” said Guillermo Entrena, Micro Datacenter Division Manager, AST Modular. “Furthermore, PCB is a perfect fit for businesses in emerging markets who want to build their private cloud or disaster recovery datacenter based on a fully Opex financeable model.” A look at one of AST’s Private Cloud Box micro-modular data centers, which are being deployed in Haiti. (Photo: AST Modular)   (Comment on this)

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