PEER 1 Hosting launches Largest Data Centre in Toronto

PEER 1's President and CEO: Fabio Banducci -" “The Internet is a vital platform for our customers, and it continues to grow,”PEER 1 Hosting, Inc. a global online IT hosting provider announced the opening of its US$40 million data centre, located in Toronto, Ontario. At more than 40,000 square feet, this new data centre is more than twice the size of a professional hockey rink and marks the first time PEER 1 Hosting is offering all three hosting solutions – colocation, dedicated hosting and managed hosting – in Canada.  The centre will be open for sales beginning February 1st, and will be operational for customers to start moving their equipment in March.

The opening of the flagship data centre is also the first time PEER 1 is offering all three hosting solutions under one roof, enabling small- and mid-sized enterprises (SMEs) to conveniently choose the right solution for their business.

“The Internet is a vital platform for our customers, and it continues to grow,” said Fabio Banducci, president and CEO for PEER 1 Hosting. “Our new state-of-the-art Toronto data centre ensures we stay current and provide the fastest and most reliable network to serve our customers, now and in the future, while providing PEER 1 with enhanced flexible capacity to support its own growth.”

This is the most efficient data centre PEER 1 Hosting has built to date, with increased power densities, high reliability, and robust security. Building it in four sections, with each section built as a separate Performance Optimized Data Centre (POD), enables customers to expand their data centre capacity faster than ever before, while allowing PEER 1 to cost-effectively manage growth.

PEER 1 was the chosen hosting provider of Web 2.0 behemoth YouTube. While PEER 1 focuses on small to medium sized businesses, they assisted YouTube during its growth when the need for hosting, bandwidth and scalable solutions exploded with the video website' sudden popularity. Robert Miggins, PEER 1's  VP for business development recalled that PEER 1 stepped up to provide solutions for YouTube's unique and sudden demand.

The new data centre utilizes some of the most efficient products and technologies on the market. This includes a redundant critical cooling infrastructure using both a local well for primary water supply and a connection to the city’s water system.

“We’re also using redundant high-efficiency Variable Frequency Drive centrifugal chillers to reduce cooling costs and condenser towers with economizers,” adds Ryan Murphey, vice president of facilities and data center operations for PEER 1 Hosting. “This enables PEER 1 to lessen the environmental impact of the data center by taking advantage of “free cooling” when the temperature drops below 10C.”

Each of the four PODs has the capacity for approximately 270 cabinets, equivalent to roughly 7,500 servers.  The first POD, built at an estimated capital cost of US$10 million, will include 7,500 square feet of data center space and an additional 8,000 square feet of office space, and inventory, network and storage areas to support the data centre.

SMEs can start purchasing space as early as February 1, 2010, and begin moving in their equipment in March 2010. The remaining three PODs (22,500 square feet) will be dedicated to additional data center space and infrastructure to be built out in future phases based upon customer demand.  The new data centre will be built to a Tier II specification with the option to become Tier III when additional PODs are added. 

PEER 1's Senior VP for business development Robert Miggins

This will be PEER 1 Hosting’s third data centre in Toronto and the company’s 17^th worldwide, adding to its managed network spanning 13,000 route miles of fibre.