Major Qwest Contract with i/o Data Centers

Qwest Communications (Q) has announced a multimillion-dollar agreement with i/o Data Centers to create a custom telecommunications solution for i/o Data Centers' Scottsdale ONE facility. i/o said it chose Qwest because it provides an "exceptionally robust solution" for large bandwidth needs and could work within the company's design specifications. Scottsdale ONE is the first facility for i/o Data Centers, which plans to build a national data center network.

"This agreement shows how Qwest is willing to go above and beyond for customers such as i/o Data Centers who have mega bandwidth needs," said Chris Ancell, vice president of sales, Qwest Business Markets group. "Qwest now provides high-capacity network services for many of the top Fortune 500 companies in the nation. And now, other businesses in Arizona can take advantage of the mega bandwidth available in the i/o Data Center."

"Our Scottsdale ONE data center facility is perfect for enterprises of all sizes but is particularly ideal for companies looking to outsource high-performance application hosting and primary or redundant data center operations, and who need N+1 and 2(N+1) data center service level specifications," said Anthony Wanger, senior managing director of i/o Data Centers.

Scottsdale ONE can provide customers with Internet speeds from 1 Gigabit per second (Gbps) to 10 Gbps. i/o Data Centers is using a GigE port from the Qwest 40 Gbps backbone. Qwest and i/o Data Centers have designed the 100,000 square foot Scottsdale facility for future scalability of 40 Gbps and 100 Gbps interfaces.

i/o Data Centers is the data center operations affiliate of private equity firm IO Capital, LLC with $100 million in assets. i/o's management team developed and operated the Downtown Phoenix Technology Exchange before selling it to Digital Realty Trust in a 2006 transaction valued at $175 million.