Google data center in Australia? Speculation over the possibility of Google (GOOG) building a data center in Australia has picked up again.  ZDNet Australia reports that there is “intense interest” in Google’s Application suite and quoted Google’s Deepak Ramanathan, head of Asia-Pacific market development as saying that the “search giant was not ruling out an Australian data centre for services like Gmail, and that discussions were ongoing.”  Global IT outsourcer CSC is pushing into cloud computing opportunities in Australia with Microsoft products and a recent strong interest in Google Apps from Australian enterprises and public sector organizations. ZDNet Australia also recently reported on IT services company Infosys opening an $8 million Melbourne data centre.

VISI expands Minnesota data center. Data center services and hosting company VISI announced initiation of its demand-driven expansion of their St. Paul data center.  The 7,000 square foot expansion project will bring the downtown St. Paul facility to 18,000 net square feet when completed.

Active Power reports 2009 results. Critical power systems manufacturer Active Power (ACPW) announced results for its fourth quarter and fiscal year ending December 31, 2009.  Active Power received more than $8 million in PowerHouse orders in the second half of 2009, exceeding all of the company’s containerized sales in 2008.  They also shipped 86 flywheel based UPS systems at an average selling price of $90,000 per unit during the fourth quarter of 2009.  Fourth quarter revenue increased 64 percent to $14 million and gross profit margin was 19 percent.

Level 3 expands Florida presence.  Level 3 (LVLT) announced it has expanded operations and is enhancing its local presence in Central Florida, including the Tampa-St. Petersburg and Orlando metropolitan areas.  Scott Turner, Level 3’s general manager for Central and Northern Florida said “Mid-market enterprises need a communications provider that knows the local marketplace and can provide the expert insight into how today’s network solutions – such as unified communications and collaborative technologies – can benefit their businesses.”  Level 3 reported fourth quarter and full year 2009 results last week with positive free cash flow of $44 million for the year. At the end of 2009 Level 3 had cash and cash equivalents of approximately $836 million. “In 2010, while we are still cautious about the effect the economy will have on our business, we believe it is the right time to increase our investment for growth,” said Sunit Patel, executive vice president and CFO of Level 3.

• Peak 10 selected for Private Cloud. Peak 10 Inc. announced the signing of Pure Fishing, Inc. to a multi-year contract to use managed services delivered via the company’s private enterprise cloud.  Critical systems from Pure Fishing will use Peak 10 services for Enterprise Resource Planning and back-office application infrastructure.  “Being able to integrate from a virtualization, storage, network and security standpoint without having to differentiate between our physical servers and the computer resources we have contracted from Peak 10, took a lot of the complexity out of the solution,” said Larry Pritchard, vice president of information technology for Pure Fishing.  Earlier this month Peak 10 expanded its credit facility from $60 million to $95 million.
• NaviSite Announces Hosted Lotus Services. NaviSite (NAVI) announced Hosted Lotus Services powered by NaviCloud at IBM Lotusphere 2010.  Solutions that will be hosted include Lotus Notes, Domino, Sametime, Quickr and Connections.  The hosted services give customers on demand access to the latest Lotus software for predictable monthly fees, skipping the up-front capital expenditures.  Services are hosted in NaviCloud which is powered by Cisco’s Unified Computing System, VMware’s Virtual Infrastructure 3.5 and vSphere 4.0, and IBM XiV SAN.  NaviSite CTO Denis Martin said “our latest platform is a culmination of that experience and includes the latest Lotus Email and Collaboration Applications, best of breed Compliance Archiving, Anti-Virus and Anti-Spam solutions, and support for virtually every smart Mobile device in the market, all of which are sold on a simple, easy-to-understand per user basis.”  Also announced at the Lotusphere 2010 conference, IBM detailed the technology and business expansion of its LotusLive cloud collaboration platform.  LotusLive cloud services provide integrated email, Web conferencing, social networking and collaboration with IBM’s focus on security, reliability and enterprise integration.
• Level 3 Delivers High-speed Internet to Pan-Asian network. Level 3 (LVLT) announced an agreement with the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) that allows PLDT use of Level 3’s landing station connectivity at the Asia America Gateway submarine cable system.  The cable landing station connectivity provides a critical component of the global network architecture for international carriers. “In an increasingly connected world, Level 3 provides reliable network infrastructure and services for global carriers to extend their networks around the world,” said Andrew Crouch, president of Wholesale Markets for Level 3.  “Level 3 is proud to support PLDT as they continue to transform their next generation network and set new standards for global communications.”

The New Zealand project is one of three new IBM computing facilities in Asia that were announced today. IBM is also building a new data center in Seoul, South Korea and a cloud computing lab in Hong Kong.

The Auckland data center will include a free cooling system which will leverage outside air during colder months, reducing the need for chillers.

“This is a highly significant investment in New Zealand’s future technological infrastructure,” said Jennifer Moxon, Managing Director of IBM New Zealand. “It is the result of long term strategic planning and signals IBM’s commitment to enable New Zealand to become a world class technology center and advances the growth of the digital economy.”

“IBM’s new facility is core infrastructure for the 21st century digital economy that the Government and ICT industry are mutually striving to develop,” said Brett O’Riley, Chief Executive Officer, NZICT Group. “It heralds the explosion of software as a service and cloud enabled computing which will drive a step change in productivity and innovation, while its design establishes the benchmark for green ICT in this country.”

• ACTIV expands to Equinix Singapore.  Equinix (EQIX) announced last week that ACTIV Financial, a provider of market data content and technologies, will expand operations to Equinix’s Singapore International Business Exchange (IBX) data center as a part of its global expansion.  Being in close proximity to the major trading venues and exchanges in Asia allows ACTIV to provide customers with low latency access to its high-volume market data services.  ACTIV currently leverages Equinix facilities in Chicago, New York, Frankfurt and London.  “ACTIV delivers more than one million updates per second including hard to process content such as equity options depth feeds, order book data, and the latest feeds from exchanges around the world,” said Timothy Neo, Managing Director, Asia Pacific, ACTIV Financial.
• Photo tour of the Polaris Data Centre. Australian iTnews has a photo gallery of the Polaris Data Centre, built in the newly-developed town of Springsfield, Queensland.  The five story, $241 million data centre is among five data centres shortlisted by the Australian Federal Government.  The facility opened in January 2009 and houses equipment from companies such as NEC, HP, Suncorp and others.  Polaris was designed for 20 megawatts at full capacity, holds 1.5 million litres of water in onsite water tans, and is served by a dual ring of diverse dark fibre.  The iTnews article contains photos inside the Queensland data centre.
• PIPE International selects Equinix Sydney.  Equinix (EQIX) announced that PIPE International has selected it as a key interconnect provider for its new PIPE Pacific Cable (PPC-1) undersea cable.  PIPE is also currently located in Equinx data centers in Tokyo and San Jose.  The newly laid PPC-1 undersea cable runs 6,900 km from Guam to the Equinix Sydney campus and has a capacity of 2.56 terabits per second.  “The new PPC-1 cable system will also enable our customers to increase the resilience of their international network and provide additional redundancy,” said Samuel Lee, President, Equinix Asia Pacific.
• TeleHouse launches data center in South Africa. TELEHOUSE Europe, a subsidiary of KDDI announced that they will open the data center TELEHOUSE CAPE TOWN in Cape Town, Republic of South Africa.  KDDI is a large Japanese telecommunications provider that has been growing its business in developing countries; including a recent partnership with Bangladeshi bracNet.  TELEHOUSE Europe is a part of KDDI Group’s European local subsidiary and will be the first data center opened by a Japanese telecommunications carrier in Africa.  The new data center is based on a partnership between TELEHOUSE Europe and Teraco Data Environments, the first carrier-neutral data center in South Africa.

The view of the Sydney Opera House is obscured by red dust from a major dust storm that has engulfed the city.

The downside to free cooling? It’s problematic in a major dust storm. Data centers in Sydney and Brisbane have shut off external ventilation systems after a major dust storm swept across both cities, reports Australia’s IT News. The red dust obscured visibility and coated the cities with dust.

Macquarie Telecom said it has shut off its ventilation systems to prevent dust from entering the data center, and also made some changes in the management of its fire alarm systems to prevent dust in the air from triggering a deployment of fire suppression gas. Colocation provider ac3 said it had also limited access to its loading dock to prevent dust from blowing into the facility.  Several providers said they expected to be thoroughly cleaning air conditioning equipment to address any dust accumulation. See IT News for the full story.   

Photo from Andy Tyler/ via Flickr (CC BY-ND 2.0)

• Equinix sees potential in Thailand. The Bangkok Post has an article on the potential of Thailand becoming the next new market for an Equinix data center. Equinix CTO Lane Patterson is said to see Thailand “following the evolution of Japan and Korea with a local internet for local language content while another track sees faster and better international links for companies to do business and drive the economy.”  With only a 2% broadband penetration in Thailand, a carrier-neutral data center has the potential to kick-start the Internet ecosystem in the area and drive down prices for everyone.  The article continues to describe the Internet ecosystem of companies and players that make up Equinix customers and enable their facilities to be such a success.  Equinix recently hosted its annual Asia Peering Forum in Bangkok.
• Clearview completes Waco, Texas data center. Clearview Managed Services announced Wednesday the completion of a unique, multi-purpose data center in Waco, Texas. The new Information Technology Gateway (ITG) will be a 43,000 square foot facility focusing on disaster recovery and business continuity services. The facility features diverse fiber paths to a carrier hotel in Dallas with access to more than 200 carriers. Real estate development company Paul Kite Co. partnered with Clearview as developers of the facility and said that this development was part of a nation-wide data center development initiative for them. The data center is a repurposed nuclear fall-out shelter, providing a great deal of physcial security. Check out the July Data Center Knowledge post on the data bunker boomlet for this growing niche.

• CNet News profiles IBM deep green data center. Cnet has a photo gallery of the IBM data center in Southbury, Conneticut, where IBM tests energy-efficient techniques with millions of dollars’ worth of IBM hardware.  IBM’s cool blue portfolio is displayed as well as sensor networks, rear-door heat exchangers, prototype equipment and an Emerson power distribution unit.
• Fujitsu’s Total CO2 and Value Analysis solution. At the European Technology Forum in London Fujitsu Laboratories of Europe announced the launch of its latest Green Data Centre development.  The Total CO2 and Value Analysis solution was a research and development project with the Carbon Trust, a UK company setup by the UK Government to accelerate the move to a low carbon economy.  The Fujitsu solution provides a holistic analysis of energy usage within a data centre environment to be captured, quantitatively analyzed and profiled.  Hugh Jones, Director at the Carbon Trust said “Controlling energy use and its attendant costs is increasingly a corporate priority, especially now that governments around the world are legislating to reduce carbon emissions.”  The Fujitsu solution will be available for a range of data center applications from planning, reporting and optimization, up to a complete CO2 management service.  It is scheduled to be deployed in trials at Fujitsu data centres during 2010.

• DataPipe rolls out 3PAR services. Utility storage provider 3PAR announced Monday that Cloud-Agile partner DataPipe now offers differentiated virtual private array (VPA) and disaster recovery (DR) services as a part of their Stratosphere cloud services, which are powered by 3PAR Utility Storage.  DataPipe’s cloud platform leverages VMware and 3PAR to offer a managed, secure virtualized service. “We now have the opportunity to expand our cloud service offerings in the areas of security and compliance to increase the value we offer our customers,” said Michael Parks, Chief Technology Officer for DataPipe.  The 3PAR ASSURED product allows DataPipe to use remote copy, data replication, DR and automatic data backup to end users.  The 3PAR SECURED product offers isolated, secure virtual private array servies.
• Peak 10 deploys VMware vSphere 4.  Data center operator Peak 10 announced the delivery of Private Cloud Infrastructure Solutions, via VMware’s vSphere 4 platform.  The platform offers customers pools of virtualized resources that federate between on and off-premise environments on-demand and with ease.  By using vSphere 4 Peak 10 customers can maintain the integrity of their data and applications, while migrating to the cloud platform.  Peak 10’s leadership team are in San Francisco this week attending the VMworld 2009 conference.  Enhancements allowed from Peak 10’s vSphere 4 platform include twice as many virtual processors per virtual machine, four times the memory, three-times increase in network throughput, and additional SAN tiers available for high-end databases.

• Equinix hosting annual Asia Peering Forum. Equinix announced Monday that it is hosting the annual Asia Peering Forum in Bangkok, from August 31st to September 2nd.  The south east Asia market has been growing in popularity and the peering forum offers a place to match network service providers with content providers, looking for interconnection strategies.   A key speaker at the event will be former Equinix senior network engineer Louis Lee.  Lee is the Chairman of the Address Council, The Address Supporting Organization, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ASO) and he will provide an update on the current global policy proposals that relate to IP addresses and AS numbers.
• APC by Schneider Electric joins Microsoft System Center Alliance. APC has joined the Microsoft System Center Alliance to enhance and provide support for critical physical infrastructure monitoring and management through the integration of APC InfraStrucXure Central with System Center Operations Manager 2007.  The integration of the two products will give managers the ability to view and manage physical infrastructure, including power, cooling, physical space and security, as well as a comprehensive view of servers, applications, and clients within the data center.  APC’s Alistair Pim said ”Linking the physical and server environments with the APC Management Pack through Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 allows customers to better understand the impact of physical layer changes on business applications.”

Primus said the power backup systems didn’t work as intended after a utility outage. “One of the emergency diesel generators failed to start due to a synchronization processor failure,” the company said in an email to customers. “Contents of the synchronisation processor’s register are being analysed to ascertain the true cause of failure.”

The Whirlpool site summarized the impact of Sunday’s outage. “The power dropped around 3:45PM and caused Victorian and Tasmanian customers from ISPs such as Exetel, iiNet, Internode and Netspace to lose their broadband connections,” Whirlpool reported. “Internode was able to route around the problem by 4:15PM, while the other ISPs were back online around 5:30PM.” A forum thread on the outage runs 24 pages.

Equinix said its expansion in Singapore is being driven by growth in demand from
the company’s existing customer base of carriers, content providers and enterprises. The company said that the new center’s location near one of the key submarine cable landing stations in Singapore will support future growth of its peering business.

“Singapore is a strategic market to Equinix and the company’s SG1 center is the most
network-dense data center in the country,” said Steve Smith, president and CEO of
Equinix. “We’ve seen continued strong demand in the region and even with the recent
completion of the phase 4 expansion of the SG1 center in Q2 2009, SG1 is reaching
maximum capacity. Today’s opening of the SG2 center will enable Equinix to continue
to meet customer demand while planning for SG2’s second phase, with construction
expected to start in Q2 2010.”

“Equinix’s investment reinforces Singapore’s position as a global IT hub
and home for businesses seeking to expand in Asia,” said Mr. Leo Yip, Chairman of the Singapore Economic Development Board. “There is a rapidly growing market
for connectivity and data hosting in Asia. The opening of Equinix’s second data
center is therefore timely as more companies choose Singapore as their data hub to
leverage on new growth opportunities in the region.”

Elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific region, Equinix has recently opened a new SY2 center in Sydney, and the fourth phase expansion of the existing HK1 center in Hong Kong will be opening soon.