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Roundup: Michigan, Massachusetts, Juniper

A look at government-backed data center projects: Michigan seeks feedback on plan for 100,000 square foot data center, while Massachusetts outlines details of $110 million state data center project in Chelsea.

Here’s a roundup of some of some of this week’s headlines from the data center and hosting industry:

Michigan releases shared data center RFI. The Michigan Department of Information Technology (MDIT) in conjunction with the state's Department of Treasury and Department of Management and Budget, issued a request for information (RFI) seeking feedback on forming a public-private partnership to build and operate the facility.  In September 2009 Michigan CIO Ken Theis detailed the plans for what could be a 100,000 square foot facility to run cloud services not only for the state government but for the public sector as well.  The RFI released on January 7th looks for "input from companies or teams of companies that are interested in financing, building and operating the new facility, as well as providing shared IT services to state agencies and others."  The project is being positioned as a magnet for technology-related economic development and is expected to break ground in October 2010.

$110 million state data center for Massachusetts. A $110 million state data center will be built in Springfield Massachusetts to serve as a backup facility to the main data center in Chelsea. The 115,000 square foot facility is scheduled to be completed in May 2012. Stuart D. Lecky, of the state's Information Technology Division, said that the data center will be "a critical backup facility that we don't have today."  Claiming 50 to 70 percent more energy efficiency than any state facility, great importance is being placed on making it a showcase green data center.  Thirty-five people will be employed at opening, with 70 estimated when fully staffed.

Juniper in SSL VPN magic quadrant. Juniper Networks announced they have been positioned in the 'Leaders' quadrant of Gartner's recently published Magic Quadrant for SSL VPNs.  Evaluation and placement in the quadrant is based on the ability to execute and completeness of vision.  Juniper's vice president and general manager of the Access and Acceleration Business Unit Sanjay Beri said "Juniper has a long history of delivering competitively disruptive solutions in the marketplace. By aggressively innovating and delivering market leading functionality and reliability on our SSL VPN product line for all use cases—from remote access to partner access to disaster recovery to mobile access—we continue to stay ahead of the curve in delivering a superior remote/LAN access solution for our enterprise and service provider customers worldwide."

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