Quarter million dollar expansion of 5NINES Cloud data center complete

Jun 01, 2009

5NINES recently completed a major infrastructure upgrade and data center expansion at its downtown data center, located at 222 West Washington Avenue. 5NINES worked exclusively with local businesses to complete this expansion. Private financing assistance was provided by Associated Bank, at its State Street Branch.

The data center facility was expanded by 25 percent to support an additional 35 racks of data servers. The expansion of the data center now includes “unescorted” co-location space in addition to private “Data Suites” for customers requiring 24X7 access to their secure computer racks. As the facility is filled, 5NINES will be able to hire up to 10 additional Madison high tech employees.

H&H Industries of Madison provided upgrades to the Environmental Control System. These upgrades improve efficiency while doubling capacity, and build additional redundancy in the air cooling and conditioning systems which are critical in a commercial data center.

A third UPS (Uninterrupted Power System) subsystem was purchased to provide electrical service in case of a power shortage or outage. It was engineered and installed by QPS (Quality Power Solutions) of Janesville. This state-of-the art UPS has a 96% energy conversion rating, resulting in less waste heat from the system.

The new diesel-powered, 375KVA high-efficiency generator, manufactured by Generac in Whitewater, Wisconsin, runs on diesel or bio-fuel and will deliver continuous and uninterrupted power in case of electrical power loss. The generator and automated power switching systems were installed by Specialized Electric of Verona.

“This expansion gives us full N+1 capability on HVAC, UPS and power to allow for the true 99.999% availability with our data center’s infrastructure”, explains Todd Streicher, 5NINES President. “In addition, our data center location is extremely important as we sit not only on the downtown’s dual electrical power grid, but we also are located in the only carrier neutral location in the city of Madison, allowing us unequalled connections to internet providers. We’re very excited that we meet the goal of our company’s namesake and pleased for our customers to get these benefits.”

The data center expansion also allows greater flexibility to meet customer needs. Great Wolf Resorts is the first customer to move into the unescorted data center area. Another customer, Rural Wisconsin Health Cooperative, will expand its data center presence to deliver more information and network services to the rural hospitals and clinics that it serves throughout Wisconsin. In addition, several tenants in the same building as 5NINES, including Sonic Foundry, will take advantage of the generator in the event of an electrical outage.