Skip navigation

Another Data Center for Birmingham, Alabama

Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Alabama announces the third significant data center project this month in Birmingham, Alabama.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama plans to invest $55 million to build a new data center in Birmingham, according to local media. The new facility is the third significant data center project announced this month in Birmingham, the largest city in Alabama with a population of approximately 250,000.

Blue Cross/Blue Shield plans to buy 25 acres in Jefferson Metropolitan Park Lakeshore, a deal that was authorized by the Jefferson County Economic and Industrial Development Authority board of directors. The company plans to build a 55,000-square-foot center in Birmingham's Oxmoor Valley, with plans to occupy the building in 2010.

Birmingham is one of the most affordable markets in the U.S> to operate a data center, according to a recent study by The Boyd Company, which found that it costs approximately $12.6 million in total operating costs to locate a data center facility in Birmingham, placing it 11th on the list of most affordable markets.


The Blue Cross/Blue Shield announcement follows two Birmingham data center projects announced earlier this month:

  • AT&T has announced that it will invest $40 million to upgrade its data center in Hoover, Alabama. The renovation process will take approximately 20 months, according to a company spokesperson. The upgrade is part of an ongoing expansion of AT&T's global data center network.
  • The Southern Co., the Atlanta-based parent of Alabama Power Co., said that it will invest approximately $20 million to build a new data center in Birmingham to support its operations across the Southeast. The 72,000 square foot facility will be located at a site in Jefferson Metropolitan Park Lakeshore in the Oxmoor Valley.

Birmingham's largest data center tenant is Wachovia Corp., which built a $400 million data center in Jefferson Metropolitan Park in 2006.