Hyperscale

Juniper Networks announces enhanced data centre capabilities

Juniper Networks has announced new Juniper Apstra capabilities that enhance operator experiences to facilitate the deployment and operations of private data centre infrastructures. With the introduction of new experience-first data centre features, including simplified data collection and visualisation via graph databases, tighter flow data integration from multivendor switches and automated provisioning via Terraform, Juniper's customers can continue to leverage Apstra as the premier solution for intent-based networking and automated data centre assurance with even more management capabilities, that make private data centres as flexible and agile to operate as cloud-based infrastructures. Budget constraints, skills shortages and increasing complexity continue to drive the need for automated data centre operations. As the pioneer of intent-based networking, Juniper Apstra provides exceptional value by automating and validating the design, deployment and operation of multivendor data centre networks. In addition, it provides a single source of truth for predicting, analysing and troubleshooting ongoing operations. With the latest release of Apstra software, customers and partners get even more value, which includes: Simple data collection and visualisation: Building on Apstra’s powerful, unique graph database, users can now easily customise intent-based analytics probes for telemetry and visibility into network operations, then easily explore and visualise the data using the new database query interface included in Apstra 4.2.0. The easy-to-use, no-code user interface enables new users to easily query and explore the database while allowing experienced users to write customised graph queries. Complete network visibility with integrated flow data: Multivendor flow data through Apstra provides granular visibility for in-depth analysis and insights into the application traffic flows traversing the network without the complexity and cost of a separate monitoring system. When paired with Apstra’s telemetry and analytics features, these capabilities simplify and speed troubleshooting, enable better performance management, capacity planning and cost control, and improve security and compliance - regardless of vendor. Automated and streamlined network provisioning with Terraform: Companies currently using the Terraform Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) platform to automate their public cloud deployments can now use the Terraform provider for Apstra to automatically push configurations to the data centre through Apstra without any API programming. By simplifying network operations, Terraform and Apstra accelerate the delivery of new services, giving organisations a data centre solution modelled after the simplicity and agility of the cloud. When these features are coupled with Apstra’s existing intent-based networking capabilities and Juniper validated designs, organisations can simplify and standardise data centre architectures to achieve hyperscaler-like efficiencies.

Zayo launches new Bordeaux route expansion

Zayo Group Holdings has announced the launch of a new Bordeaux wavelength route connecting Paris and Marseille. The Bordeaux route leverages its extensive fibre-optic network in France and affirms its commitment to delivering infrastructure solutions to customers across Europe and around the world. Bordeaux is a strategic connection for Zayo’s global network due to its central location in the Southwest region of France, thriving technology industry and proximity to cable landing station locations. This provides the opportunities to tap into this growing market and provide critical connectivity infrastructure to support the region's digital economy. The company also provides these regions with access to Europe, the Middle East, and North America. This ensures maximum uptime and minimal disruption to customers' operations, while also providing greater network flexibility and resiliency. As part of the route expansion, it selected Equinix’s first International business exchange data centre in Bordeaux, BX1, as one of its major hubs on the new route. This will act as the connectivity hub for the new Amitié subsea cable, delivered this summer by a consortium of hyperscalers made up of Microsoft and Meta, Orange, Vodafone and Aquacomms. It will play a key role in responding to rapidly increasing bandwidth demand in the region. 

GLP announces new data centre campus in Tokyo

GLP has announced that it has broken ground on Tokyo West 1 (TKW1), its first three-building data centre campus totalling 31MW IT load in West Tokyo, Japan. Building one represents the first phase of the three-building campus and is expected to be ready for service by February 2025. It is designed to meet both hyperscale and enterprise customer requirements for physical and cyber security, safety, reliability, and sustainability. Buildings two and three representing 10MW and 11MW IT load respectively, will be developed in sequence in the vicinity of the same site. Located in an area with low natural disaster risk to promote stable business continuity, the campus is situated within a network-rich environment and is in proximity to some of the largest enterprise, IT and telecommunications and hyperscale companies. The new facility will also feature amenities including private meeting rooms, offices and common rest areas such as a lounge to provide customers with an optimal working environment. Leveraging its existing real estate portfolio and core capabilities of acquiring land for development, GLP has assembled a dedicated global team of trusted data centre industry veterans. Combined with experienced local professionals, the team is well-equipped to provide full-scale data centre technical expertise in design, delivery, and operations. TKW1 will be constructed to LEED Gold certification standards and will benefit from GLP’s renewable energy business, offering clean sources of energy to advance the sustainability objectives of its future enterprise and hyperscale customers. “This ground-breaking marks our first data centre facility in this region and represents a significant milestone as we further establish our digital infrastructure business to be a leading provider in Japan. As a rising data centre hub in Asia, Tokyo is a prime location for our entry into the market and we look forward to serving hyperscale and enterprise customers’ data capacity needs in this region,” says Yoshiyuki Chosa, President and CEO of GLP Japan. “We will leverage our expertise, scale and synergies with our renewable energy business to provide customers with sustainable digital infrastructure to power the future.” Click here for latest data centre news.

Pulsant delivers cost savings for LinkPool crypto ecosystem

LinkPool has reduced memory, CPU and disk costs by 85%, while delivering higher network performance, following its move to platformEDGE, which is Pulsant’s multiregional UK edge infrastructure. Having previously operated on hyperscale cloud infrastructure, the combination of cost inflation and performance limitations led LinkPool to seek a solution that offered lower latency and expense without sacrificing scalability. platformEDGE was chosen to compose the infrastructure it needs to support its business-critical global workload. In moving to a regional data centre network offering edge colocation, hyperscale cloud access, and distributed compute – all available in a high-performance package – LinkPool has been able to make huge cost savings while improving performance. It has done so in an infrastructure capable of scaling to match the company’s success and growth over time. Pulsant's regional network also meant that Sheffield's data centre was ideally placed to personally oversee the build, onboarding its infrastructure in a matter of days rather than weeks. Continued investment has also seen a recent upgrade to 380kW from 176kW processing power (+114%), ensuring all businesses in the region can benefit scalable, high-performance, low latency edge application delivery. As part of the edge platform, Pulsant's Milton Keynes data centre delivers resiliency via dedicated links over its high-performance, secure, national network. “As the first third-party team creating products and services specifically for the Chainlink network, we’re in a unique position to further its use cases and adoption, and Pulsant is enabling us to do that at scale,” says Jonathan Huxtable, Founder, LinkPool. “LinkPool is committed to lowering the barrier of entry to meaningfully contribute to the Chainlink Network. Pulsant is doing the same for edge computing, making sure regional businesses like us can drastically reduce costs and improve performance,” Jonathan adds. Click here for latest data centre news.

Accelevation acquires Instor Solutions

Accelevation Holdings has acquired Instor Solutions to integrate Instor’s data centre white space installation and project management expertise with its data centre containment and caging solutions business, Conatech, to form the Accelevation Data Centre Business Unit. The acquisition has established a new, vertically integrated data centre business unit comprising both brands to create a single, customer-facing entity and forming the USA’s large integrated data centre services solutions provider. Together, the Accelevation Data Centre Business Unit will solve key challenges for hyperscale, colocation and enterprise customers, including faster product design, manufacturing and supply chain capabilities, with dedicated white space integration, services and project management expertise. By combining both leading brands, it has created the only organisation within the US market capable of providing fully integrated, data centre infrastructure product manufacturing, with self-performing, fit-up solutions design and project delivery. This comprehensive services offering will propel hyperscale, colocation and enterprise data centre operators to benefit from speed and efficiency, offering enhanced value throughout the entire lifecycle and delivering data centre environments at accelerated pace and scale. Through its integrated sales, manufacturing and operations teams, for example, Conatech’s customers now have immediate access to the data centre white space design, build and integration services. In turn, Instor has secured access to the vertically integrated manufacturing capabilities used by Accelevation to produce its Conatech data centre products. Accelevation President and CEO, Michael Rubiera, says, “We are thrilled to welcome Instor to the Accelevation portfolio of innovative companies. Combining Instor’s 40+ sales and project management professionals to our Accelevation portfolio creates one of the most comprehensive and all-encompassing solution providers of data centre products and installations in the world. We couldn’t be more excited about the possibilities and growth this acquisition provides.” Click here for latest data centre news.

CtrlS and EECO plan Thailand's hyperscale data centre

CtrlS has signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) with EECO (Eastern Economic Corridor Office) to lease a 10ac land parcel for 50 years, located in Chonburi province. The land will be used to build a 150MW data centre in the Greenfield campus and mark its first international market expansion and hyperscale data centre in Thailand.   At a time when digitalisation across Thailand, deployment of 5G, and improved connectivity with highly efficient submarine cables, with countries such as USA, China, Japan, Singapore and Taiwan, is making the country an attractive hub for digital infrastructure, the data centre development in the EECO will attract both international and domestic hyperscale and enterprise customers. Speaking on the MoA, Sridhar Pinnapureddy, Chairman, CtrlS Datacenters, says, “Through this collaboration, we aim to serve customers’ needs for digital services, both domestic and international. The data centre is designed to meet hyperscalers’ needs in addition to serving high end IT/compute needs of domestic enterprises.” He adds, “We see this data centre as a unique opportunity to contribute towards development of Thailand’s eastern region and offer a robust diverse option for international customers and partners for establishing their footprint in the country and region. Thailand is strategically well positioned at the centre of Southeast Asia and we strive to bring investments and international customers to the country through our data centre.”        The site also offers proximity to submarine cable landing stations for AAG (Asia America Gateway) and ADC (Asia Direct Cable) systems, making this data centre a point of connection equipped with submarine and terrestrial cable networks to connect to other data centres and industrial estates. It is also close to the EECO startup incubator and is elevated relative to flood prone areas, with mean sea level > 40m. The EECO is geographically diverse from Bangkok and is at the intersection of multiple fibre paths north and south.

NTT launches hyperscale data centre campus in Chennai

NTT has announced the launch of its latest hyperscale data centre campus, Chennai 2, and the arrival of its subsea cable system, MIST, in the city. The campus, located in Ambattur and spread across 6 acres, is a project with a total planned capacity of 34.8MW critical IT load from two data centre buildings. The first facility has a 17.4MW IT load capacity. MIST subsea cable, constructed by consortium members including NTT Communications India Network Service and Orient Link, is the first cable system for the company to directly provide connectivity to and from India. It spans an impressive 8,100km and will connect Malaysia, India, Singapore and Thailand, offering cutting-edge connectivity capabilities. The system also represents India's first cable landing of a 12 fibre pair capacity, capable of carrying more than 200TBPS of data.Chennai’s location has opened three distinct opportunities for these projects. The first is addressing the demand for high quality data centre infrastructure driven by its digital ecosystem that includes traditional and new economy businesses; the second is positioning the state as a disaster recovery (DR) site for enterprises with primary IT infrastructure in other cities; and third is leveraging global connectivity to offer data centre capacity to markets in South East Asia, where capacity is in short supply. These capabilities will transform it into the digital gateway connecting the country to the world.Adding further, Shekhar Sharma, CEO and Managing Director, NTT Global Data Centres & Cloud Infrastructure and NTT Communications, says, “The launch of the state-of-the-art data centre campus along with the MIST cable system in Chennai mark major milestones in our journey in India. These projects are perfect examples of Japanese design quality and global expertise, tailored to the Indian market. They have reinforced our position as the leader for data centre services in India and helped transform Chennai into the new destination for data centres in South East Asia. We’re glad to be able to play a part in making Chennai the gateway connecting digital businesses across India, South East Asia, and the world. With our capabilities, we’re eager to help our clients unlock greater value from their digital transformation efforts.”

BDC expands data centre in Kuala Lumpur

Bridge Data Centres (BDC) has announced that it will expand its hyperscale data centre campus, MY03, located at MRANTI Park, Kuala Lumpur. This expansion provides an additional 48MW of IT power to hyperscalers and enterprises in Malaysia and Asia Pacific.   BDC has signed an agreement with Malaysian Research Accelerator for Technology & Innovation (MRANTI) to develop three buildings and a 132kV substation. With the expansion, MY03 will offer a total IT power capacity of 64MW. The expansion project comprises two phases. Phase one is planned to be ready for service with 16MW by Q3, 2025. Phase two is scheduled to begin operations by Q4, 2027. BDC and MRANTI held a signing ceremony in Kuala Lumpur which was witnessed by Dzuleira Abu Bakar, Chief Executive Officer of MRANTI; Khairil Anuar Sadat Salleh, Chief Commercial Officer of MRANTI; and Dz Shing Lim, President, Bridge Data Centres. The establishment of the data centre campus entrenches Malaysia as a desired destination for data centre investment in the Asia Pacific region. Located strategically in the vicinity of central Kuala Lumpur, the park spans across a vast area of 686ac and supports the entire innovation process with a focus on driving the commercialisation of ‘impact technologies’ in key industry sectors to foster sustainable development. “Last year, we introduced a comprehensive and integrated approach to transform MRANTI Park from a property-focused sector into a leading 4IR hub in Malaysia. This master plan aims to achieve a gross development value of RM20bn, land leases worth RM2.8bn, and the creation of 8,000 jobs by 2027,” says Dzuleira Abu Bakar, CEO of MRANTI. “We recently launched the country’s national testbed for 5G through the government-led MRANTI 5G Experience Centre to fast-track new innovations in a more enriching data-driven future. Today, we are excited to announce the expansion of Bridge Data Centres within MRANTI Park, aligning perfectly with MRANTI Park’s expansion strategy,” says Dzuleira.

Cologix announces a new data centre in Northern Virginia

Cologix has announced the completion and pre-lease of its new 120MW Scalelogix data centre in Northern Virginia. Built within seven months, from permitting to commissioning, the three-story, 455,000ft2 Scalelogix ASH1 data centre, located in Ashburn, Virginia, is designed for hyperscalers’ massive capacity and edge traffic demands from the ground up. This facility has been pre-leased by a major global technology company and went into service in May 2023. “We are aggressively expanding our hyperscale edge portfolio across North America in response to growing demand from major global cloud providers and large digital enterprises,” says Chris Heinrich, Chief Revenue Officer, Cologix. “With their massive scale and top-tier performance, our data centres provide high-speed, ultra-low latency and highly secure access to fixed, 5G and public cloud networks that today’s businesses require for success.” The Scalelogix ASH1 facility is located in a global corridor known as ‘Data Center Alley.’ The city of Ashburn is an interconnection hub for the eastern US and a gateway to Europe with the concentration of cloud computing infrastructure. Colocation and connectivity in this area provide a strategic advantage to customers who want easy and secure access to a critical global data corridor. ASH1 is one of three new Scalelogix data centres to be launched in the next year, including facilities planned in Columbus, Ohio and Montrèal, Canada.  “Many positive factors contributed to the project’s successful and efficient timeline, including transparent partnerships and communications with all parties involved every step of the way,” says Cologix’s Chief Development Officer, Nathan Hazelwood. “I am so proud and appreciative of the entire team, our invaluable partners and vendors, as we’ve built a superior facility that will provide exceptional capabilities for our customers doing business at the digital edge.” The company’s new facility is designed with the following features: The cooling system is designed for maximum energy efficiency complete with free cooling capability designed and built-in day one. It also includes hot aisle containment with up to 35 cabinets per row. The facility provides Ashburn Meet-Me-Rooms (MMRs) designed for hyperscalers and customers. It is also part of its interconnection ecosystem of 700+ network providers, 350+ cloud providers, 30+ public cloud onramps and six internet exchanges. It includes multiple physically separated, diverse and secure MMRs while offering multiple diverse fibre entrance vaults to the campus. Its security office includes an anti-intrusion system, CCTV system, biometric scanners and badge access. 30% of the building is programmed for customers’ needs inclusive of dedicated office space, storage and other amenities. It is built with MERs, which are prefabricated modular assemblies built out with electrical infrastructure that can be rapidly deployed at a data centre facility. MERs support a wide range of equipment with varying contents dependent on customer needs and electrical topography. The facility will have several EV charging stations available for all customers, employees, vendors and partners to use while at the data centre. The majority of copper, steel, refrigerants and concrete from the prior structure that was in place while constructing ASH1 has been recycled, reducing the use of new materials and disposing of other materials in an environmentally conscience way. 

Cirion strengthens with new data centre facility in Peru

Cirion has announced that it has started construction on a new 12,000m², 20MW carrier-neutral data centre in the industrial district of Macropolis in Lurín, Peru. The new data centre is expected to open in the first quarter of 2025 and will be well-equipped to meet the needs of hyperscale cloud service providers, carriers, content providers, and enterprises that require scalable infrastructure. The facility will have access to a business-friendly environment, renewable energy, diverse metro and long-haul connectivity to major cities and tech hubs in the region, and proximity to international subsea cable networks to facilitate minimal latency between Latin America and other regions. In line with the company's Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) strategy, and its commitment to technological innovation, the new facility will be one of the energy efficient data centres in the region, with PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness). “The development of this new data centre is another important step in our journey to grow our platform of low-latency, interconnected data centres and establish a thriving digital ecosystem across Latin America,” says Facundo Castro, CEO for Cirion Technologies. “In a world where data-driven and multi-cloud technology is advancing the way we work and live, and data is the pillar for ground-breaking business decisions, it’s important for data to be properly stored, processed, assured, and analysed. The surging popularity of IoT, 5G, AI, networks, and streaming content has fuelled an unrelenting demand for capacity, and data centres are critical to keeping these services running.” The Lurín-based data centre will be directly connected through redundant fibre to Cirion’s existing ecosystem-dense data centre in Lima, located only 35km away, and integrated into the company's broader carrier-neutral platform comprising 18 data centres across Latin America.