SoftLayer Expands Data Center Footprint

As SoftLayer completes its acquisition of The Planet, the new company will go forward with a dramatically larger data center footprint, including two new facilities it is leasing from Digital Realty Trust. That includes a push into international markets with a data center in Amsterdam, as well as a West Coast expansion with a new data center in Santa Clara, Calif.

SoftLayer will now have 253,000 square feet of raised floor data center space spread across 14 facilities, including seven in Dallas, three in Houston, one apiece in Seattle and northern Virginia, plus the new sites in Santa Clara and Amsterdam.

SoftLayer has leased two pods in newly-finished Turn-Key Datacenter space in a new Digital Realty Trust building in Santa Clara, with an option to expand into a third pod if needed. Each pod is supported by 1.125 megawatts of critical power load, and the total lease represents about 25,000 square feet of space.

SoftLayer has also leased two pods in a Digital Realty facility in Amsterdam. SoftLayer Chief Strategy Officer George Karidis says the company has been considering European expansion for some time, and originally scouted sites in the greater London market. But Karidis said feedback from customers led the company to opt for Amsterdam instead.

SoftLayer has already deployed a pod of its automated hosting environment in one of the Houston data centers previously operated by The Planet, which will go live next week. The companies don't plan any immediate changes in the combined data center footprint. All of The Planet's data centers have leases that extend through at least mid-2013.