Continuum to Open Chicago Data Center

Colocation provider Continuum Data Centers, LLC will open a new data center in Lombard, Illinois this month. Continuum said today that it has chosen AboveNet, Inc. (ABVT) to provide the backbone for its high-bandwidth transport from its 20,000 square foot data center in Lombard to AboveNet’s Oak Brook, Illinois point of presence (POP).

The new facility is the latest opening in an increasingly active Chicago data center market. “This data center has been specifically designed to give organizations the service, support and pricing that has been missing in the Chicago suburban colocation market,” said Tom Chaffin, Managing Partner of Continuum. “We feel AboveNet is a key ingredient to the success of our data center. AboveNet provides exceptional services and is the backbone of our transport network.”

Inside Allstate’s New Data Center

Allstate Insurance Co. recently completed a 50,000 square foot data center in Rochelle, Ill., a western suburb of Chicago. The company has put together a video providing a tour of the facility, highlighting some of the energy-efficiency measures and offering a brief look at the equipment area. This video runs about 2 minutes.

Check out our Green Data Center Channel for more on this topic. For additional video, visit our DCK video archive and the Data Center Videos channel on YouTube.

SingleHop Expands with ServerCentral

The DuPont Fabros CH1 facility, where SingleHop has leased space from ServerCentral.

Managed hosting provider SingleHop has expanded its footprint within ServerCentral’s 10,000 square feet of colocation space in Elk Grove Village, Illinois. SingleHop says it entered into a $2.5 million agreement with ServerCentral, which is a tenant in the DuPont Fabros Technology CH1 data center.

The new space can support power densities of 12 kilowatts per cabinet (210 watts per square foot). Its the second data center for SingleHop, which also operates a facility in downtown Chicago housing 2,000 servers. SingleHop was founded in 2006 by Chicago entrepreneurs Dan Ushman and Zak Boca and says it has annual revenue of $4.5 million.

“The additional space enables geographic redundancy and disaster recovery capabilities,” said Brandon Ewing, SingleHop’s Senior Network Engineer. “Customers will benefit as they have more room for growth and more options for redundancy. The new data center gives SingleHop a platform from which to continue heavily investing in a wide and robust network both at our original data center and the new facility.”

Ascent Plans Major Chicago Data Center

Developer Ascent Corporation is building a second huge data center in Northlake, Il., a western suburb of Chicago, the company said today. The new 250,000 square foot facility is being built adjacent to Ascent’s first Northlake property, an enormous Microsoft Corp. data center. Ascent said the new project, known as CH2, will be completed by the end of 2009.

The CH2 project represents a huge vote of confidence in the strength of the Chicago data center market, which has seen strong leasing downtown but uneven uptake in several new projects in the Western suburbs. That includes a large facility built in Elk Grove Village by another wholesale data center provider, DuPont Fabros Technology, which opened in mid-2008 and is presently 17 percent leased. Equinix also built a large colocation center in Elk Grove Village last year.

But Ascent hit a home run with its first Northlake property, which was announced in 2007 as a multi-tenant speculative project but by the end of the year was fully leased to Microsoft. The developer believes its delivery model, known as Dynamic Data Center Suites, will prove to be a winning approach, combining colocation space with custom data suites featuring dedicated tenant infrastructure.

“The new Northlake data center, CH2, is designed to be a completely flexible environment, enabling customers to choose the most appropriate option for their needs,” said Phil Horstmann, the CEO of Ascent Corporation. “Dynamic Data Center Suites represent the future of the data center – this is the first time customers will have the option to fully customize their infrastructures. Planning the new data center geographically near the 707,000 square foot facility we developed last year in Northlake also enables customers to take advantage of the same power and connectivity capabilities.”

ServerCentral Expands in Chicago Market

The DuPont Fabros CH1 data center, where ServerCentral has leased space.

ServerCentral is expanding its operations with a new data center in the Chicago market, leasing space in DuPont Fabros Technology’s new CH1 data center in Elk Grove Village, Illinois. The colocation provider has opened a 10,000 square feet facility at CH1, which includes 6,200 square feet of space on a 42-inch raised floor that can support up to 210 watts per square foot of power density.

“I’m excited to find a Chicago-area facility that will allow us to truly meet customer needs both present and future,” said Jordan Lowe, ServerCentral President and CEO. “While many options exist in the market today, the technical leadership exhibited by DuPont Fabros in this facility really impressed me. Significant efforts were made to choose environmentally conscious technologies in the design of the building, including UPS systems free of chemical batteries, advanced mechanical system automation and higher voltage throughout the building’s power distribution.”

HSBC to Exit Upstate NY Data Centers

Global banking giant HSBC, which once planned to build a huge data center complex in upstate New York, will instead shift the work from its Buffalo-area data centers to facilities in Chicago. Buffalo was the home base for Marine Midland, which maintained data centers in the region for decades before being was acquired by HSBC in the 1990s.

The decision to consolidate in Chicago, reported today by the Buffalo News, marks a dramatic reversal for the region. In 2007 HSBC announced plans to invest $139 millionin a new 275,000 square foot facility in a farm field in the small town of Cambria, N.Y. The decision was driven by a commitment from the New York Power Authority to allocate 11 megawatts of cheap hydro power from the Niagara Power Project as part of the financial incentive package.

CRG West Positioned to Host Derivatives Hub

427 South LaSalle, the former Western Union building in Chicago.

Nestled amid a hub of commodities exchanges in downtown Chicago, the former Western Union building at 427 South LaSalle Street bumps up against an alphabet soup of high stakes financial activity. The Chicago Stock Exchange and Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) are immediately across LaSalle Street, while the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) and Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) frame the north side of the building.

When CRG West bought 427 South LaSalle last May, the building’s focus was primarily  telecom. The company has invested $20 million in infrastructure upgrades to make the building more attractive to web hosting and financial companies, which are keen on its extraordinary proximity to the exchanges. One of its new customers could position the site as a key exchange for financial derivatives trading.   

It’s not the first time that an aging Chicago landmark has been transformed into a  data center hub. A decade ago CRG West’s parent company, The Carlyle Group, worked with Core Location to redevelop 350 East Cermak into the city’s largest data center facility. The former printing plant now has more than 70 tenants, including many key players in the Chicago commodity exchanges. 

CRG West’s makeover of 427 LaSalle has gotten off to a strong start. The building has numerous telecom tenants (15 carriers offer service), and CRG West is converting all unleased space into raised-floor data centers. The company has filled about 70 percent of its first phase, with tenants including Layered Technologies’ FastServers unit and SkyCreek Corp., which provides automated customer support for enterprise customers.  

CRG West recently announced a deal providing a beachhead in the lucrative financial hosting market. The International Derivatives Clearing Group (IDCG) has chosen 427 South LaSalle for a new electronic marketplace to make it easier to price and trade derivatives.

Chicago’s Data Fortress for the Digital Economy

The huge building rising above Lake Michigan was built as an icon of the Industrial age, but has been transformed into a lynchpin of the 21st century digital economy. 350 East Cermak Road in Chicago is a historic landmark that serves as a modern information fortress. Its halls are defined by elaborate Gothic architecture dating to its 1912 construction. But open any door - most of which are secured by keycards or biometric security - and you’re likely to walk into a data center managing high-value bits pulsing through the heart of the Internet economy.

The 1.1 million square foot facility is owned by Digital Realty Trust, the nation’s largest operator of data center facilities. Originally developed by the R.R. Donnelley Co. to house the printing presses for the Yellow Book and Sears Catalog, 350 East Cermak was converted to telecom use by the Carlyle Group in 1999, and owned by El Paso Global Networks from 2001-2005. In May 2005 Digital Realty bought the building, then known as the Lakeside Technology Center, for $140 million.

Today it is one of the world’s largest carrier hotels and the nerve center for Chicago’s commodity markets, housing data centers for financial firms attracted by the wealth of peering and connectivity providers among the 70 tenants. 

More than 90 percent of the building is occupied. In November, Digital Realty Trust negotiated an agreement to reclaim 120,000 square feet of unused space from Qwest, which is now being redeveloped as Turn-Key Datacenter space, providing additional inventory in a high-demand market.