News on 06 October 2000
Telehotels, or large-scale data centres, have become big business almost overnight as companies build their global networks on the back of internet technology.
These ‘black box’ buildings host a whole range of customer services by providing access to all the necessary power and communications technology in a controlled, highly secure environment.
One or two specialist providers have in fact been around for quite a while, joined now by a series of new players. These range from the predictable utility and telecoms companies to the perhaps more surprising - property developer Marylebone Warwick Balfour, for example, announced this week that it intends to set up a £500m pan-European network of such centres. The attraction is clear. Global Switch, a company launched only a couple of years ago, is already valued at about £750m and plans to go public next year.
Technology market research company Ovum projects that overall the co-location market could be worth as much as $60bn within five years.
A race for space is underway, says Ovum, with companies
on the demand side having a seemingly unlimited appetite for web hosting
and application service provision, as well as back-up and disaster recovery
facilities. Right now, location of the centres remains crucial to ensure
that users have access to the networks and services they need. But as
competition increases, providers will have to win business on other factors,
including quality of service and added value.
