The CP List: 20 Top Colocation Providers You Should Know
Beckers said his company works with – and is a Gold partner of – Microsoft Azure. Microsoft Azure ExpressRoute provides a private connection between an organization’s on-premises infrastructure and Microsoft Azure data centers.
“Uptime is one of if not the most important selling points of a colo provider,” Cronin said. “Any cutting-edge provider should have a Tier IV facility rating, which provides for no less than 99.995 percent uptime on all facility systems including power, cooling and network.”
Beckers also works with Amazon Web Services (AWS). AWS and QTS formed a strategic partnership to bring hybrid cloud offerings to AWS customers needing dedicated colocation that communicates with their AWS cloud.
“QTS is an example of a provider that has facilities that were built to meet government and health-care compliance standards, (and) they also set up hybrid environments including virtualization incorporated into their managed-service capabilities,” Bradley said.
Following the Cyxtera spinoff, CenturyLink is still in the data center business. With the Level 3 acquisition, CenturyLink now has 350 data centers around the world.