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The Value of Co-location for Business Continuity

Colocation

As COVID-19 changes how we do business now and in the future; co-location of IT equipment to a data center is proving to be more valuable than ever.

Co-location is a service where organizations take their existing onsite servers and move them into a data center that offers an environment optimized for technology. In fact data centers are the same facilities that house equipment that make “cloud” computing possible. A data center offers physical security, cooling and backup power generation along with a host of other resources that can be too expensive for one organization to afford on their own.

In a time when many organizations need to keep employees safe by having them work from home, support and care of on-site IT servers can pose technical and personnel challenges. IT infrastructure is the backbone of almost every organization working hard to keep people safe while also keeping them employed and the business running.

Co-location provides the safest possible environment for the servers that run a business. Data centers have redundant connectivity to ensure not only high capacity bandwidth to the internet but higher degrees of reliability. Co-location is also a great intermediate step for organizations on their way to becoming fully cloud-based where they get maximum redundancy while eliminating capital expenditures.

Making the Shift to Co-location

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the need for connectivity to high speed internet at a time when computing loads where shifting substantially under circumstances where downtime was not an option.

The need for reliable systems to power business continuity has never been more vital with stay at home orders and a work happening in such a distributed environment. Man-made and natural disasters, from cyber security threats to tornadoes and hurricanes, won’t stop in the face of a global pandemic. Ensuring that critical data and application access continues is vital for your business.

A move to co-location provides the best environment and resources to power that the systems that drive your operations.

Moving Forward

Businesses are going to be assessing the lessons of COVID-19 and adapting. Several assumptions have been shattered as a result: not only that many functions can be done with a remote workforce, but also the vulnerability of IT systems kept in-house. on must ensure that disruptions are minimized or eliminated and there are proven plans in place to minimize IT personnel exposure. By making a transition from your on-premise IT infrastructure to Brush Mountain Data Center, you have access to remote hands.

This also gives you on-site operational support to handle any server maintenance, virtualization or expansion needs, and troubleshooting of critical data center equipment. By removing the need to have your personnel physically working on-premise, or coming to BMDC facilities by leveraging these services, you can keep people safe and maintain control of mission-critical infrastructure.

Colocation is proving to be more valuable than ever, and by leveraging BMDC, your business can plan for safety while planning for the future.

Contact us to learn more.

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Power Your Growth with Data Center & Cloud Services

It’s unusual to find a cloud computing center in an office park. Yet, we’ve been innovating and growing our Brush Mountain Data Center.  Brush Mountain Data Center (BMDC) has its primary location on the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center campus where it   provides cloud computing, cloud data backup services and server rack rental (co-location).

While some organizations have quickly adopted cloud computing and data center services, many others can and should,  once they understand what is possible.  In the past, data centers and cloud computing was the domain of very large organizations with lots of resources.  Now, data centers like Brush Mountain are bringing the benefits to organizations of all sizes.  Small and resource constrained organizations, hyper-growth mode organizations, these are all great candidates for data center services.  After all, the name of the game is cost effective agility.

Embracing data center services enables scalable access to computing and data storage resources, without the cost of hardware, software, staffing or up to date expertise.  

How?  Here are some of the common business drivers our clients are seeing:

Local Connection to Many Clouds 

BMDC is itself connected to several of the market leading cloud service companies. This enables us to move and scale computing resources as needed. It also enables us to accommodate certification requirements.

A Better Environment for Computing

BMDC provides a secure facility optimized for IT equipment. It has redundant power, internet and cloud service connections. If one service goes offline, services are not interrupted as they would be in an office suite. You get all the benefits of a data center, but at a fractional cost.

Flexible Resources to Help You Grow 

Most organizations are looking to grow.  For some it is top-line growth, others bottom line growth. Both benefit from innovation and flexibility made possible by cloud services. Computing and storage are needed to power that growth. BMDC can provide the compute and storage you need via a scalable model. Another bonus: these services bill monthly as an expense, freeing up working capital.

Focus on Growth – Not Complexity

BMDC services ensure that IT uptime and reliability are the last thing you have to worry about.

We Make It Easy

We can extend existing IT, connecting cloud-based functions into your on-premise systems. Or, for those not wanting any overhead, we can provide full-service compute, data protection and services. Perfect for remotes and startups who need IT but less overhead.

  • FlxCloud Infrastructure as a Service provides fast, reliable computing power that can scale to meet your growth.
  • FlxStore Backup as a Service protects your valuable data.
  • FlxPro Managed IT Services are available to fill gaps in your IT support needs.
  • FlxTalk services will provide reliable cloud-based managed phone services.

Want to learn more? The next step is easy. Let’s have a conversation about your particular needs. The information is free, and we have conversations that can range from non-technical business objectives to technical conversations.

CONTACT ME

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5 (Great) Reasons to Leverage Regional Cloud Services

eGuide_cover2When people first hear about a “regional data center” – they have some very predictable questions, like:

  • What’s a regional cloud provider like Brush Mountain?
  • What are the benefits for my business?
  • How is it different from services from national providers?

All great questions!  To help explain the benefits of a regional provider like Brush Mountain Data Center, we’ve assembled this quick e-Guide: Top 5 Reasons to Leverage Regional Cloud Services

 

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CTO David Carter’s interview with Syncsort: “Regional Data Centers: Also on Big Data’s Front Lines”

David Carter, CTO

David Carter, CTO

Recently our Chief Technology Officer David Carter was interviewed by the team at Syncsort about the challenges and opportunities faced by Regional Data Centers like Brush Mountain.

In this interview, David candidly covers a variety of subjects including:

  • What are the top pricing questions from prospective clients?
  • What are the advantages of a Regional Data Center for SMB clients?
  • The impact of Software Defined Networking?

>Read the full article

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Join us at our Open House December 10th!

The Benefits of Cloud + Local IT Support

December 10, 2013
11:30 AM – 1:00 PM
Lunch Provided, RSVP please

 

Ready to leverage the benefits of the Cloud without sacrificing local IT support?

The ALI team has been busily upgrading our Brush Mountain Data Center: from infrastructure to services. Brush Mountain now offers the best of both worlds – unparallelled virtual infrastructure for Cloud computing; and options for local IT support from Advanced Logic. It’s the first hybrid data center of its kind in the region!

Now Brush Mountain offers:

  • Robust enterprise-class data center services
  • Scalable Local IT Support Services from ALI
  • NEW! FLxCloud virtual infrastructure
  • Disaster preparedness & recovery services
  • Co-location & Backup Services

To celebrate the upgrades we’ve made and our new FLXCloud service, we’re hosting an Open House Luncheon on December 10th from 11:30 – 1:00. Our leadership team will be on hand to talk about our new services, answer questions and you can come see the Data Center for yourself.

>RSVP today to join us!

>Learn more about how BMDC can benefit organizations of ALL sizes

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Brush Mountain Data Center Open House & Showcase Coming December 10th

diversity

Brush Mountain Data Center will be hosting an Open House & Ribbon Cutting on December 10th from 11:30 to 1 PM at the Lakeview Conference Room at 2200 Kraft Dr in the VT Corporate Research Center.  This event will showcase the completely upgraded Brush Mountain Data Center and the launch of their new FLXCloud service.

FLXCloud provides a flexible data center in the cloud (including CPU, RAM, & storage).  What makes it unique is the ability to allocate and re-allocate the cloud computing horsepower; supported by trusted local IT support services – all for a predictable price.

Lunch will be provided along with an overview of Brush Mountain’s offerings and tours of the Data Center. All are welcome but please RSVP by Dec. 5 online.

>RSVP

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When is Hosting your data the right decision? (Part 3 of 3)

When is Hosting your data the right decision? (Part 3 of 3)

In Part 1 of this series, I discussed the increasing complexity of information systems that in turn drives up costs.  In Part 2 I addressed the issue of staffing and planning for the skill sets needed to support this increased complexity so your organization can meet its needs.

In this final installment on our “Key 3” assessment areas, I’ll discuss Sustainability.

Sustainability (the Cost of Loss)

With data that is critical to an organization’s lasting success, placing that information in a secure, professionally managed and constantly refreshed facility becomes a topic that is not only important, but vital to the fiscal health and sustainability of an organization.

Like the staffing assessment, assessing Sustainability can be uncomfortable.  Frankly, it’s another reason why clients ask us to help them.  No one likes to plan for a crisis.  Whether we help you, or you take a stab at it, it’s important to understand and assess the risk and projected financial consequences of losing critical information.  What information is critical to keep your organization running?  What systems and processes are in place to ensure backup, redundancy and continuity in case of a crisis or system failure?  These are all critical data points.

So once these questions can be quantified on paper, for better or worse you have the beginnings of your plan for sustainability.  Once you know the issues, then you know what you need.  In an increasing number of cases,  Brush Mountain’s Regional Data Center model starts to make a great deal of sense.  Having key data and systems in a secure, managed facility with fully redundant systems and IT staff monitoring the site 24/7365 ensures that you are informed and prepared with facilities and resources that would otherwise be cost prohibitive.

Be watching for my next topic where I’ll give some insight into the anatomy of a move into a data center.

In the meantime, join the conversation with us on Facebook! Are there any particular areas in my Key 3 that you struggle with the most?  Or suggest a topic for one of my upcoming posts!

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When is Hosting your data the right decision? (Part 2 of 3)

When is Hosting your data the right decision? (Part 2 of 3)

In Part 1 of this series we discussed Cost and its frequent companion: Complexity.  Now in Part 2, I’ll discuss another key component of our assessment guidelines; namely staffing and acquiring just-in-time skillsets.

Talent Availability (The Cost to Have Enough)

In the previous post, I talked about the increasing specialization of IT skill sets.  It’s often no longer financially reasonable or even possible to find candidates who can address both the macro and micro aspects of your IT systems.  Finding someone with the very specific in-depth technical skills to support a specific system is often hard enough; but expecting that person to also have the experience and very different skills to zoom their focus out to a holistic view of your systems is just setting yourself up for expense, disappointment and turnover.

For this reason, we begin addressing this issue by mapping the existing technical skills on staff to those needed to support the ongoing goals of a client.  It might be tempting to skip this step, but in doing so you fail to assess effective utilization of your most expensive asset – your people and their knowledge. What have you really got and are you getting what you need from them?

It is vital to have a candid assessment of the current skills of your staff, and match them against the systems and expectations that in turn support your organization’s strategic objectives.  It sounds easy to do, but it takes technical assessment skill (what skills do they really have) operational understanding (what’s the systems impact) and how do they both support the big picture (where are the critical path problems and skill gaps)?

We close skill gaps by giving clients access to a staff of skilled resources (from break/fix specialists up to CIO level consulting) to help organizations staff the right team for their needs, and do so more cost effectively.  This way an organization can focus their IT staff on strategic needs, and leverage a utilization model to ensure support in the gap areas.  Our data center technical talent that takes responsibility for certain functions without the need for staffing or management expense. The shared utilization benefit we outlined in Part 1 for the data center infrastructure also applies to sharing the benefit and reduced cost to technical expertise.

Next, In Part 3 we’ll discuss Sustainability: why ensuring it for your critical data and systems is important and how we approach it.

In the meantime, join the conversation with us on Facebook.  What’s been your toughest IT staffing challenge lately?

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When is Hosting your data the right decision? (Part 1 of 3)

When is Hosting your data the right decision? (Part 1 of 3)

So – let’s ask the question:  when is hosting your data or IT systems the right decision?  The answer? It almost always comes to down to reducing cost, risk or both.

Cost comes in several forms.  Some expenses are easily quantifiable on a P&L sheet, and some are qualitative – where the impact can add to or subtract from an organization’s performance, depending on how a resource is utilized.

Frankly, data center services aren’t for everyone, but with the advent of the Regional Data Center model (like Brush Mountain); the benefits of these services are now scaled for the rest of us.  There’s now a compelling reason for organizations of all shapes and sizes to benefit from a private cloud, business continuity systems or managed services.  No longer are the very real benefits of economies of scale, infrastructure flexibility and the ability to drive down cost and risk just the domain of the very large enterprise working with a “mega-datacenter” somewhere across the country.

So, where to start?

In every potential engagement, as we assess the viability of a hosted solution, we use a set of guidelines to help us determine the business case and quantify the potential impact. In this 3 part series, I’ll break down in plain English the three key drivers behind those guidelines to help you understand the issues, and perhaps see possible solutions to help your organization.

Complexity (The Cost to Manage it All)

No doubt, IT has gotten more complex.

Now that systems interconnect more, deliver a dazzling array of expanding productivity features and employees joyfully embrace the ability to work anywhere, anytime from the device of their choice, things have gotten incredibly challenging for your IT systems and staff.

The ability for a small staff to support today’s highly complex IT systems has become nearly impossible, if not impractical. Much like doctors and lawyers, technology workers are being forced to become specialized – limiting their ability to be adequately skilled in all the applications and systems you have.  This is not to denigrate their abilities: just ask,  and they’ll tell you about these rocketing demands on their technical skills.

This complexity also includes your IT hardware. Keeping equipment secured, cooled and running efficiently has become a specialty unto itself. The layers of expanding complexity continue to increase the cost of your IT infrastructure.  In many cases it is becoming cost prohibitive for some organizations to continue staffing and running their IT systems the same way they have been accustomed for the past 20 years.

For this reason, as we assist our clients in devising technology plans, our analysis routinely considers the potential benefit for hosted IT services for some, or all, of their infrastructure.  A data hosting center has already made investments in resource redundancy and staffing that can then be spread across many clients.  That way no one bears as much cost as they would on their own.

In Part 2, we’ll discuss IT staffing: why it is increasingly difficult to find and retain the skills you need, and how we help our clients alleviate that problem.

In the meantime, join the conversation with us on Facebook!  What systems or applications are driving your IT costs up the most these days?

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Updates and Upgrades All Around

Updates and Upgrades All Around

It’s been a busy time since Brush Mountain Data Center changed hands earlier this spring.  We’ve been doing a LOT behind the scenes to upgrade and enhance our systems, processes and services; and now the results of all that hard work is about to become more visible!

In parallel to helping a number of new clients move into our Data Center, the facilities have undergone significant audit, inventory and upgrades, and expect that process to continue in the coming months.  Admittedly, one of our most visible changes is here at our website.  We wanted to make this a place where you can get a concise overview of our current capabilities and make it very easy to connect with us.

We hope you’ll find this a useful resource to learn more about what Brush Mountain  Data Center can do to help your organization.

Also, if you are on social media, be sure to follow us on Facebook or Twitter.  We’ll be giving updates on feedback the RBTC Regional Data Center Roundtable meeting, plus we’ll be announcing upcoming Open House tours and other helpful articles, events and resources.

In the meantime, take a look around our new website and let us know: what do you think?  Have we missed anything you’d really like to see?

Parker Pearson
Vice President, Marketing

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