CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL) has confirmed the growth of its global data center footprint to meet continued market demand. In the first half of 2015, CenturyLink says it completed data center expansion projects in six markets: Boston, London, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Phoenix, Seattle and Washington, D.C. The company also grew its market presence into Australia and central Washington.
The company says the expansions add approximately 10.8 megawatts of critical capacity, bringing CenturyLink's global data center capacity to more than 185 megawatts. The expanded facilities are built to support up to an additional 35 megawatts to meet future market demand.
"As enterprises increasingly consolidate their on-premise and sprawling data center infrastructures, and move workloads to the cloud, they want outsourcing options that are flexible, reliable and in specific geographic regions," said Drew Leonard, vice president of colocation product management at CenturyLink. "Many of our customers are turning to CenturyLink as their strategic partner as they move toward hybrid IT environments to help manage their legacy and cloud workloads. This allows them to focus on objectives tied to business goals instead of worrying about IT infrastructure operations."
Additionally, CenturyLink says it has expanded its reach in the Asia-Pacific region to address growing customer demand by expanding the company's public cloud platform to the Asia-Pacific market and partnering with a data center service provider within five Australian markets.
"CenturyLink continues to invest in meeting the increasing demands of our customers, including exploring new green technologies and expansion options in new and existing data center markets," Leonard added. "Our customers know we are resolute in our commitment to keeping their businesses operating 24/7."
The company also continued to execute on its green energy initiatives by offering alternative energy options to customers through a new hydro-powered facility in central Washington, incorporating Bloom fuel cell technology into the Irvine, Calif., facility, and achieving Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification for the Minneapolis-St. Paul data center expansion. CenturyLink also participates in carbon-reducing initiatives, including Climate Change Agreements (CCA) in the United Kingdom and Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) in the United States.
CenturyLink says it is committed to providing operational excellence in all of its data centers worldwide. The company received the Network World Asia Data Center Infrastructure Management award in 2015, and has completed and passed 12 Uptime Institute Management and Operations (M&O) audits in the past six months. All of the company's data centers are expected to be M&O certified by the end of 2016.
CenturyLink currently offers more than 2.6 million square feet of gross raised floor space throughout North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.