Enabling Businesses to stay ahead of rapid change, technology and growth
The data center industry continues to see explosive growth, driven by an increase in overall Internet traffic and businesses that are increasingly migrating their internal IT systems to third party data center providers. One key reason for this shift toward outsourcing is that businesses are adapting their IT strategies to take advantage of new technologies (the Cloud) while protecting maximum flexibility to adjust vendors or technologies over time. This concept of IT future-proofing has become a hot topic amongst CIOs, many of whom agree that flexibility, scalability, choice of network providers, choice of cloud providers and geographic reach are keys to success in today’s environment.
Cologix, Inc. is one of the world’s preeminent network neutral interconnection and data center companies that on-ramps enterprises, financial services providers and media companies to an expansive neutral choice of more than 450 network carriers and more than 200 cloud service providers to ultimately enable future-proofed IT deployments. Their data centers enable providers to bring content closer to the consumers who have a seemingly insatiable appetite for content and applications.
Providing infrastructure and connectivity choice in key strategic markets enables optimized network performance resulting in greater quality, reliability and speed; often at a significant cost savings.
Cologix provides massively scalable interconnection services and secure, reliable colocation services to over 1,600 Customers from 24 densely connected, strategically located data centers in Columbus, Dallas, Jacksonville, Lakeland, Minneapolis, Montreal, Northern New Jersey, Toronto and Vancouver. The company’s experienced team of communications infrastructure professionals supports a Customer ecosystem consisting of carriers, managed services, cloud, media, content, financial services and enterprises ensuring the highest standard of local customer support.
Strategic Locations & Unparalleled, Neutral Choice of Service Providers
Since inception, Cologix has focused on operating data centers at the interconnection hubs in strategic edge markets where Internet and Cloud traffic intersect and connect. These data centers are not only ideally located but they also provide access to more choice of networks and cloud providers than any other provider across its markets. Why does that matter? Robust choice and low switching costs are the core elements for Enterprises to find the right vendors, reduce costs and find the flexibility to adapt to their ever-changing requirements.
Customers have far more leverage to negotiate rates when in a competitive, neutral environment. Many businesses moving to neutral data centers have gained over 30% savings on their overall network costs by forcing providers to compete for their business. Neutral data centers result in fair pricing and innovation for customers of all sizes. In fact, smaller businesses often leverage the same buying power traditionally reserved for the biggest customers.
Choice also enables businesses to use the best providers for their specific applications within the same facility negating the need for a multiple data center solution. Leveraging multiple networks within the same data center also increases redundancy and ensures 100% uptime as it prevents having a single point of failure.
With all of this talk about cost savings for businesses connecting to network and cloud providers you might wonder why they want to have a presence in densely connected (competitive) data centers. By extending networks to Cologix data centers, service providers can reach a large and growing embedded base of potential customers in target segments. Cologix enables access to hundreds of relevant customers who buy network and cloud services by accessing their Meet Me Rooms and Cloud Connect platform.
Excerpt from Stratecast Colo Brief: Whereas some co-lo providers are focused on the largest US markets, Cologix is building a dominant presence within the next tier of strategic US and Canadian cities, such as Vancouver, Jacksonville, Minneapolis, and Dallas. As a leading data center and interconnect provider in those cities, Cologix has attracted nearly every major carrier and cloud service provider to its data centers – including 450 carriers and more than 200 cloud service providers.
For customers, the result is choice – choice of network provider, choice of the cloud provider, and choice of other service and technology providers in the cloud ecosystem. The message of choice and flexibility is one way Cologix attracts customers and differentiates itself from other data center providers and deployment options. Because it is so difficult to migrate applications and re-architect infrastructure – whether in a hosted cloud or a customer-managed facility – businesses can mitigate risk by utilizing a center that provides the greatest number of options for deploying IT environments. Cologix expanded its support for hybrid IT environments when it launched the Cologix Cloud Connect platform offering direct access to private, public & hybrid providers.
Cologix stands firm in its strategic focus on “next tier” cities. The company believes that such markets are underserved, as larger data center companies – including Equinix and Telx – exclusively focus on the top markets. Yet many mid-tier cities have high growth rates, and enterprise customers, carriers, and services are looking for a gateway into those markets. In developing its data center buildout plans, Cologix anticipates which cities will experience the next burst of traffic growth.
Supporting the Cloud
The massive growth and acceleration in cloud adoption and advancement has required businesses to redefine their cloud strategies. Data centers play a critical role in supporting cloud environments as the physical servers that host the cloud sit within the data center. Businesses must assess critical infrastructure (power and cooling), redundancy, security, uptime service level agreements (SLAs), flexibility, scalability, and choice of network & cloud providers.
Cologix has a reputation for best in class colocation and interconnection solutions exceeding the infrastructure demands of companies seeking a cloud solution. They also address cloud requirements through their Cloud Connect Solution which facilitates a direct gateway for private, secure, physical connections to the top public cloud providers (AWS, Softlayer, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud) as well as more than 200 additional “best-in-breed” cloud service providers across the platform. By enabling access to public, private and hybrid cloud providers businesses can customize a solution for their specific needs all within a data center environment that will scale with their growing needs.
What’s Ahead?
Cologix has always been committed to heavily investing in their markets in order to successfully grow and scale with customer demand. Management expects to continue their aggressive construction schedule to bring new capacity online. Meanwhile the organization will focus on bringing in more networks and more cloud providers into their Meet-Me-Rooms. Operationally, they will continue to invest in infrastructure, preventative maintenance programs, systems, monitoring and live Customer Support. Their unique Customer Support model provides 24/7 local support in each of their data centers by trained experts who have intimate knowledge of the facilities. Cologix also has several enterprise grade data centers under construction that will introduce new capacity to meet growing demand in multiple markets. Cologix is also committed to staying ahead of industry trends that impact customer’s network and IT decisions and to enhance its platform accordingly.
Grant van Rooyen, Founder of Cologix
Grant van Rooyen, President, CEO & Director of Cologix, has over 15 years of experience in the communications industry. Prior to forming Cologix, Grant was CEO of IX Investments which was acquired by Cologix in late 2010. He was with Level 3 Communications for 10 years from 1999 until 2009 where he held a number of leadership positions, including President of the Content Markets Group, with responsibility for over $1.5 billion of customer and product revenue.
In addition to his Cologix responsibilities, Grant is a Partner in vR Equity – a private investment firm. Grant has lived and worked around the world and holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics and Finance.
