Reveal?s Longmont data center offers 24/7 secure access

LONGMONT ? A longtime Internet service provider launched a data center in Longmont targeting the small- to mid-size business market.

Reveal Systems Inc.?s 700-square-foot data center opened in March to house equipment for the company?s 23 data center clients. The data center offers a climate-controlled environment, two fiber-optic Internet connections using Qwest and ICG, redundant AC/DC power through an onsite generator, offsite backup and 24/7 secure access for clients.

Reveal has ?always? offered collocation services at its offices at 2101 Ken Pratt Blvd., said Joe Yandrofski, vice president of Internet Services. ?People have been bringing in their servers, and we do their server management.?

But when it ran out of space, Reveal built a separate room for its clients? equipment. Reveal also made secure key card access available to their clients who want it so their information security staff could get into the data center 24 hours a day.

Pure collocation ? with no services provided by Reveal other than space ? runs from $85 for a single server with 256 kilobytes per second connectivity to $900 per month for a locking cabinet filled with ?whatever you can cram in there,? and 512 KB per second connectivity, Yandrofski said.

But most customers want managed services, Yandrofski said, which runs an additional $50 per month per server. These folks bring in their servers for Reveal to put in a cabinet and provide all information technology services including network security and offsite backup.

For some customers a lease arrangement makes more sense, Yandrofski said. For about $300 a month Reveal builds a server to specifications and manages it.

Reveal can help clients who need a network to be especially reliable by providing load balancing and failover. Load balancing is dividing a computer?s workload between two or more computers, and failover is a backup operation that automatically switches between those computers.

Yandrofski said the Pratt Boulevard location is terrific from a technology point of view because when it was built by Pratt Management Co., then-president Ken Pratt had the foresight to install fiber-optic cable. ?It lay dark for many years, and we?ve lit much of it up.?

Pratt Management, which still owns the building, is one of Reveal?s largest managed services clients, Yandrofski said.

Pratt Spokeswoman Frannie Follick-Hood said the company outsourced its IT functions to Reveal about four years ago. ?They are very prompt. It?s easier because they know so much about the technology.?

Reveal competes with local big players including Qwest, Level 3, Inflow and Viawest.
It also competes with Earthnet Inc., a Boulder-based data center that serves the small- to mid-size market from its 1,400-square-foot facility on Walnut Street.

In 2004 Reveal ranked No. 12 on The Boulder County Business Report Internet service provider list, and Earthnet ranked No. 8.

?I think it?s good for business,? said Bahman Saless, Earthnet chief executive.
?Competition is good for everybody.?

Reveal Systems Inc.
2101 Ken Pratt Blvd., Suite 105
Longmont, CO 80503
(303) 774-7150
www.revealsystems.com

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