“Location, location, location…”, an old real estate adage suggests that the value of a property is, on a large scale, determined by the geographic place it is situated, whether it’s because of the view, safety, convenience, amenities, or other factors.

This expression is also valid for IT data centers. The location where you put your company’s most valuable asset, its data, is a decision that needs to be carefully analyzed.

So, what factors should you consider when looking for where your data will live?

Determinants of Data Center Location

Below is a minimal list of common and vital considerations to make this decision. Keep in mind that the final list will likely be considerably more extensive.

1. Buy vs. Rent

Like housing trends, every time more companies decide to rent space with global colo data centers, given the flexibility, these provide to expand and shrink the required power and space without huge investments. 

Keep in mind that there might still be valid reasons to build and maintain your own data center or parts of it, such as contractual agreements or very steady and predictable environments over a long period of time. 

2. Risk of Natural Disasters

Some locations are more likely to be prone to natural disasters like tornados, wildfires, floods, riots, or even strikes than others.

3. Data Proximity to its Primary Users 

Depending on the applications and services they need, network latency can play an essential role in their productivity. 

4. Public cloud co-hosting 

“Living” close to major CSPs (Cloud Service Providers) will make it easier to stretch networks simplifying data and service transfers as needed and providing additional service flexibility. 

Are you in the Real Estate business? Can your company profit from managing your own data center, or can this responsibility be transferred?

This article was contributed by our expert Manuel Ayala

Frequently Asked Questions Answered by Manuel Ayala

Q1. What is cloud vs. data center?

A data center (DC) is a physical location that transfers, hosts, and processes large amounts of data. Cloud is a term used to refer to one or multiple DCs as a single virtual location to transfer, host, and process data.

Q2. Why are data centers geographically distributed? 

To increase productivity, you want to make your data available as fast as possible to your users or local systems. This requires that data being hosted as close as possible to those users or systems. 

Q3. What are the challenges of a data center?

Managing the physical space, providing enough reliable power, maintaining the proper temperature, and securing a large complex of buildings are typical challenges in supporting a DC. 

Q4. What are the factors that contribute to data center security? 

Robust physical access controls and strong cyber security can pass continued external audits.

Q5. What steps to take to secure your servers and data center?

Constant access reviews, modern systems to help secure the complex and monitor environmental controls such as temperature and humidity, robust cyber security policies, standards, and periodic audits.