Last month, Japanese telecom giant NTT expanded its European e-shelter data center brand into the Netherlands by opening a large green-field data center campus in the Amsterdam area in one of the world’s most fiber-dense locations, Schiphol-Rijk. What customers at this new data center spot in Europe may expect? More than just colocation services, as e-shelter will bring their Innovation Lab to the Amsterdam facility as well.
Initiated in 2017 in Frankfurt, Germany, the e-shelter innovation lab is an enterprise-level R&D environment where an expanding number of tech companies such as Cisco, Fujitsu, Dell EMC and Mirantis OpenStack come together to share their visions and ideas while jointly designing, testing and deploying Proof of Concepts (PoCs) within a highly secured data center environment. Through the e-shelter innovation lab, these companies are able to find and develop optimal configurations with combined and integrated technologies in the field of cloud and disruptive technologies including hybrid IT, storage, big data and cyber security.
Google, Intel, Rittal, Vertiv
More than 115 technology partners and start-ups, including many well-known brands, have implemented test environments in the e-shelter innovation lab to date. By offering an innovation ecosystem to their customers, e-shelter intends to give meaning to their ‘Home to the cloud’ marketing slogan. The infrastructural ingredients made available for e-shelter’s innovation lab come from partners such as Google, Intel, Pivotal, Vertiv and Nutanix. While Intel and Google provide tools for hybrid cloud container orchestration, companies like Pivotal and Nutanix are providing a data-driven software deployment platform.
“The Innovation Lab’s secure infrastructure is an added bonus for our colocation customers and enables users to find and develop the optimal configurations to meet their business goals,” said Pieter Duijves, Managing Director e-shelter Netherlands. “It allows our customers to test and validate distributed cloud architectures, for example. It also enables them to differentiate their offerings with customized trials in a secure, stable and highly connected environment.”
IoT, Blockchain, AI
“For Internet of Things, Blockchain, as well as Artificial Intelligence use cases, our Innovation Lab offers a unique place to test and validate architectures in a real-world production environment faster – with greater flexibility, and with lower up-front investment,” added Mr. Duijves. “Our data center ecosystem can be used to plan, develop, and test cutting-edge IT deployments under real-world conditions as part of PoCs before they are migrated to production.”
It is e-shelter’s goal to go beyond providing its customers with large, scalable data center environments with enterprise-grade amenities. “We want to help our colocation customers to be creative with hybrid IT solutions and their cloud environments while developing new business models and generating greater revenues,” said Toan Nguyen, Director of Business Development and Cloud Platform at e-shelter. “Our Innovation Lab distinguishes itself through a vibrant community fostering creativity and innovative collaboration. In 2017, we started with 30 participants and the results achieved by connecting these companies and technologies are impressive. That’s why in two years time we’ve now managed to quadruple the participant base to 115 companies, but we’re still inviting new partners and customers to leverage e-shelter’s rich ecosystem and highly secure infrastructure to validate and develop new tech ideas to solve their business challenges.”
About e-shelter
e-shelter is one of the leading data center operators in Europe providing highly secure environments for housing and connectivity of IT and network systems. With a presence in the key city-markets in Europe, e-shelter leverages more than 400 MVA of power capacity to deliver scalable data center solutions. As a subsidiary of NTT Communications, e-shelter is part of a global network of data centers covering 20+ countries and over 400,000 sqm of data center space. Among e-shelter’s clients are financial services companies, telecom operators, public sector, IT service and outsourcing providers as well as cloud service providers.
In addition to e-shelter, the companies Arkadin, Dimension Data, itelligence, NTT Communications, NTT DATA and NTT Security are part of the NTT Group. You can find further information on the global NTT Group at www.ntt-global.com.
To learn more about the e-shelter innovation lab, visit: https://www.e-shelter.de/en/e-shelter-innovation-lab
