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Cloud computing is one of the latest internet technologies that affords companies the ability to present their data and information within outside sources.  With recent concerns with regard to cloud computing and security, it is no wonder that many businesses may be a bit hesitant to jump on board.

Rackspace is endeavoring to reverse the latest cloud computing intimidation by offering solutions that will enable businesses to move their applications from in-house to the cloud.

Rackspace

Based in San Antonio, Texas, Rackspace started its services in 1998 and has grown to provide enterprise-level hosting services to businesses both small and large all around the globe.  At the latest count, this web hosting solution provider caters to over 70,000 customers of which over 51,000 are cloud computing clients.  The company specializes in managed hosting, e-mail and applications as well as cloud hosting.

New Cloud Products

In a continuing effort to bring companies onto cloud computing, Rackspace has recently announced a new set of product offerings.

The Rackspace Cloud Drive is the company’s solution to file server management.  With this product, customers can store and share files with ease, backup and restore files without a hitch and can be accessed remotely.  Additionally, all files located on this cloud solution can be quickly synced across teams and desktops.

For those in need of an online backup solution, Rackspace offers the Rackspace Server Backup product.  Powered by Jungle Disk (Rackspace sister division), this product works for both Windows and Linux servers.  Users can backup files and directories onto either the Amazon S3 or Rackspace Cloud Files storage services.

A product that has not been released yet (December 2009 release date) is the Rackspace Hosted Microsoft SharePoint solution.  This product will enable customers to utilized a centralized document repository that allows for collaboration, project tracking, content management and other business communication tools.

Best reason to use cloud computing

All online businesses strive to increase their customer base and in doing so, increase the need for resources.  Increased resources means having to purchase and implement new hardware to keep up with the demand and growth.  Cloud computing allows online businesses to increase their productivity and customer base without having to pour out money into either optimizing current hardware or purchasing new equipment.

Rackspace is leading the charge in cloud computing.  With outstanding services the hosting provider already is well-known for, the addition of new cloud computing solutions will place Rackspace as a leader in the cloud.

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A “well-funded, well-known company” is negotiating to build a large data center in central Oregon, and the secrecy surrounding the negotiations has folks in the town of Prineville wondering who it might be. Officials in Prineville have been negotiating with Vitesse LLC, a company performing site selection for the unnamed end user that would build operate the data center, according to local media reports.

The site is several hours from an existing Google data center in The Dalles and a Boardman site where Amazon is said to be resuming construction on a major data center project. Like those projects, the process in Prineville has been cloaked in secrecy.

Google-Style Secrecy
“The only thing I could tell you is this is not unlike what the city of The Dalles went through when Google sited their data center in their community,” Prineville City Manager Steve Forester told the Bend Bulletin. “A very similar process. They had a code name for an LLC that did their preliminary work with the city and the county, and it turned out to be Google. And up in Moses Lake, Washington — where they have several of these things — same pattern.” Local economic development officials told the paper that a non-disclosure agreement prevents them from discussing the project.

Oregon business registration records indicate that Vitesse LLC was registered Oct 21 and shares a San Francisco address with the law firm Paul, Hastings, Janofksy & Walker. Attorneys with Paul, Hastings have data center site acquisition experience, including past engagements with large financial companies and Internet companies.

The proposed facility would be located near the Prineville Airport in an enterprise zone, which allows the city to waive property taxes for eligible projects. Tomorrow the Prineville City Council is scheduled to consider selling a 1-acre piece of property to Vitesse for $50,000, annex two adjacent properties to the city and approve a 15-year property tax exemption for the company that would operate the data center.

Oregon’s Lure for Data Centers
The project is the latest indicator of the growing appeal of the northwest as a destination for companies seeking the lowest operating costs for their data centers. The region’s abundant supply of affordable hydro power is a major factor in its appeal, as are tax incentives like the tax exemption being discussed in Prineville.

Who is the mystery user? The existing Google and Amazon projects in Oregon would seem to rule them out. But one possibility is Yahoo, which has publicly discussed the possibility of shifting some of its data center development to Oregon in the wake of a tax dispute with officials in Washington state, where the company built a large data center in Quincy.

Washington Repeals Tax Break
In late 2007 Washington State ruled that data centers aren’t manufacturers and were no longer covered by a state sales tax break for manufacturing enterprises, and thus must pay a 7.9 percent tax on data center construction and equipment. This prompted protests from Microsoft and Yahoo, who said they had relied upon the tax break in their decision to build facilities in Quincy.

In a letter to legislators, Yahoo co-founder David Filo said the withdrawal of the sales tax incentive “swings the decision strongly in favor of freezing construction in Washington, and building instead in Oregon (which has no sales tax), as some of our competitors are already doing.”

Microsoft subsequently migrated its Windows Azure cloud computing infrastructure from its data center in Quincy to another Microsoft facility in San Antonio.

Photo of Prineville, Oregon from wka via Flickr.

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Company X Plans Oregon Data Center

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Microsoft’s cloud container continues to evolve. The company has unveiled the next generation of its data center container at its Windows Professional Developers Conference, and it includes significant design advances over the existing containers deployed in Microsoft’s Chicago data center.

The 20-foot container on display at the PDC is an example of Microsoft’s Generation 4 Modular Data Center design, which abandons the raised-floor architecture that has been a staple of modern data center design in favor of a container-based model. Microsoft says the use of server-packed containers – known as Pre-Assembled Components (PACs) – will allow it to slash the cost of building its new data centers, which will have no roofs.

Optimized for Outdoors?
The Generation 4 container on display at PDC looks to be completely optimized for outdoor use, with a design that relies upon fresh air (”free cooling”) rather than air conditioning. While we’re not on-site at PDC and haven’t been able to inspect the container, it features louvers on the exterior of the container to draw fresh air into the cold aisle and expel hot air from the rear of the hot aisle. Here’s a look at a video of the container shot by a PDC attendee:

The container features the branding for Windows Azure, Microsoft’s developer-focused cloud computing platform. Windows Azure will run at facilities in Chicago, San Antonio, Dublin, Amsterdam, Singapore and Hong Kong.

This is a departure from the current Microsoft container design, which features one container filled with IT gear and another holding the power and cooling infrastructure. Here’s a look at one of the double-decker data center containers currently in use at Microsoft’s  Chicago data center:

Microsoft’s $500 million Chicago facility uses a hybrid design built around data center containers. The lower level is a vast space with a high ceiling and diagonal parking spaces for the 40-foot container stacks.

The first phase of the 700,000 square foot facility can hold up to 56 containers, and a second phase (currently shell space) offers identical capacity. That gives the Chicago facility a total capacity of 112 containers holding 224,000 servers.

In laying out its Generation 4 design, Microsoft said its future data centers would require no water and have no roofs. The company says the new design may reduce capital investments by 20 to 40 percent by creating a “competitive and innovative supplier landscape.” It is also designed to accelerate Microsoft’s data center deployment process, shrinking the timeline from 18 months to as little as three to six months.

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Microsoft’s Windows Azure Cloud Container

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Economic development officials in San Antonio have been touting the city as a data center destination for years. The game-changing moment arrived in 2006, when Microsoft was scouting locations for a $550 million data center project. Local officials retooled their incentives, hoping to present Microsoft with an offer it couldn’t refuse.

“We were very aggressive,” recalls Mario Hernandez, who heads the San Antonio Economic Development Foundation. “We knew we had to be more aggressive because we needed a data center anchor, and we saw Microsoft as that anchor.”

Building A Data Center Cluster
The city won the project, and has used the Microsoft win to attract other data center projects, including projects from Stream Realty and Power Loft on nearby tracts in the Westover Hills section of the city. Frost Bank, Valero, Lowe’s and Christus Health Systems also operate data centers in the city, which is also home to a major cloud computing player in Rackspace (RAX).  

San Antonio offers one of the best examples of an economic development official’s data center dream scenario: one major project prompts other companies to follow, opening the floodgates for an influx of investment.

There are key differences between San Antonio’s assets and approach, which won’t work for every region. But the city’s approach offers insights for other areas seeking to attract data center projects.

San Antonio offered Microsoft a 10-year property tax abatement, making an exception to rules that limited abatements to six years unless the project created 500 jobs. Although Microsoft would need just 75 workers to staff the data center, the 10-year abatement was approved – along with a recommendation that city-owned utility CPS Energy foot the bill for $5.2 million in power transformers for the Microsoft data center.

Goal: A ‘Must See’ for Site Location
“It was a very unusual move,” said Hernandez. “But we knew that project would put us on the map, and it has. It has sent a very clear message. When Microsoft makes a decision for you, it gets attention. It has provided us the leads for most major data centers that can operate in this part of the country. We have become a ‘must see’ for most data center projects.”

San Antonio is the seventh-largest city in the U.S. with more than 1.3 million residents, according to the latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Affordable land is plentiful, and the city has a favorable profile for natural disasters, with no history of earthquakes and an average of one tornado a year. San Antonio is about 120 miles inland, blunting the potential impact of all but the most powerful hurricanes. 

Power Usage Benefits City 
The city also owns the local power and gas utility, and makes 14 cents on every dollar spent on power by large users. ”We’ve always been an attractive community for power-intensive operations,” said Hernandez. “We have an added incentive to attract data centers because of the unique ownership structure, which justifies targeting data centers. You can see the impact that it has on the financing of government.”

A key factor for Microsoft was the availability of recycled water for use in its cooling towers. The San Antonio Water System has been offering recycled water to its industrial customers since 1996. Recycled “grey” water isn’t fresh or drinkable but is not contaminated by any toxic substances or toilet wastes, and is considered environmentally friendly because it reduces demands for fresh water.

Water Availability During Drought
Hernandez says recycled water is also more available then fresh water in a crisis. “It saves money on price, but it also guaranteed a supply in the event of a drought,” he said. “You’ve got to be able to provide that predictability.”

While the long-term economic benefit remains unclear for some states that have used incentives to attract large data center projects, Hernandez says the strategy has been a  winner for San Antonio.

“We’re convinced that if you want to have part of the ‘home of the Internet’ in your community, you have to make sure that you’re a player,” he said.

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San Antonio: Microsoft Put Us on the Map

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