Carrier neutral Central London colocation Tier 3 data centre for server hosting

This article was published in the DataCenterDynamics news magazine. the author is journalist Penny Smith, a DCD staffer. The British government has designated the area of London around the Old Street Roundabout as a high-tech growth area, called "Silicon Roundabout" by the popular press. The government is encouraging companies to migrate to the area and establish a self-sustaining "cluster" of high technology companies in the area. Both City Lifeline and DataCenterDynamics have offices close to Silicon Roundabout.

Pro-Net re-locates to City Lifeline to enhance connectivity and support business expansion

City Lifeline, the London-based independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre, has announced today that UK internet service provider, Pro-Net, is moving its team and equipment to its facility, located at the heart of the emerging Silicon Roundabout district.

The move allows Pro-Net to widen its networking, carrier and colocation options and offers the company the flexibility to expand and utilise vital technical office space, unavailable at its former base. The team will now operate from City Lifeline, with part of its core network remaining at the Telehouse Docklands facility.

Danial Subhani, managing director at Pro-Net says, “City Lifeline understands our need for a data centre facility from where our team can operate and grow. In our industry it is vital for us to have a reliable data centre delivering strong connectivity from a diverse range of carriers, all of which are now on-hand for us.

“Our new location at City Lifeline is conveniently located near to some of our customers, is perfect for networking opportunities with likeminded businesses in the media, web and software sectors and means we can access our critical equipment fast.”

Roger Keenan, managing director at City Lifeline adds, “We have experience working with businesses like Pro-Net that really recognise the benefits of operating from the rising Silicon Roundabout district and need flexible colocation solutions. We are looking forward to providing them with a data centre operation that suits both their business and customers.”

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About City Lifeline

City Lifeline is the leading independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre in central London. Lifeline House is situated in an ideal location, just outside the central London Exclusion zone, in the emerging Silicon Roundabout district.

With some of the best connectivity in London, City Lifeline provides a secure, reliable and resilient home for telecoms, networking and server hosting. Its customers have access to the fastest, carrier diverse networks in the UK connecting across the world.

The data centre offers a first-class, flexible and personal service coupled with the security, reliability and engineering team to match.

For further information about City Lifeline visit: www.city-lifeline.co.uk

About Pro-Net

Founded in 1995, Pro-Net is one of the most established ISP businesses in Europe, offering a wide range of bespoke ISP services to UK SME and corporate clients around the UK.

The main focus for Pro-Net is to provide resilient bonded connectivity over ADSL and 3g which ensures an excellent middle ground between expensive Leased Lines and poor quality connectivity. A key area for this technology is replacing expensive MPLS services or supplying stable bonded connections where connectivity is poor.

For further information about Pro-Net visit: www.pro-net.co.uk

New survey reveals worrying reliance on one data centre despite high number of outages

Over three-quarters of IT and operations managers (79%) have suffered significant outages that disrupted their online business and affected delivery of services to their customers, according to a recent survey conducted by City Lifeline at this year’s Internet World.

City Lifeline questioned over 150 IT and operations managers from a number of internet-based businesses and uncovered that 18 per cent of these outages were caused by data centre failure, 45 per cent were caused by failure of their internet communications and 16 per cent from another cause. A fortunate 21 per cent said they had never suffered any such outage.

In addition to this, nearly half of managers questioned (42%) admitted that their business relies on one external data centre to deliver services to their customers, with 17 per cent depending on two, 10 per cent relying on three or more and 31 per cent keeping all their operations in-house.

Roger Keenan, managing director at City Lifeline comments: “It worries me to see that internet-dependent businesses are entrusting their most critical processes to a single supplier operating just one data centre, especially when you consider the recent major data centre failure at large internet business Amazon. Our survey shows that outages do happen to any company, regardless of size, so those who rely on just one data centre are placing their business at considerable risk.

“Companies reliant on Internet communications, in particular, need to be resilient and ensure that wherever possible everything runs on at least two well-spaced sites, operated by at least two companies independent of each other, with automatic fall-over and diverse communications between them.”
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Notes to editors

City Lifeline interviewed 152 IT and operations managers at Internet World at Earl’s Court between10 – 13 May 2011.Full details of the questions asked and any further information regarding the survey can be requested from Ascent PR.

About City Lifeline

City Lifeline is the leading independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre in central London. Lifeline House is situated in an ideal location, just outside the central London Exclusion zone, in the emerging Silicon Roundabout district.

With some of the best connectivity in London, City Lifeline provides a secure, reliable and resilient home for telecoms, networking and server hosting. Its customers have access to the fastest, carrier diverse networks in the UK connecting across the world.

The data centre offers a first-class, flexible and personal service coupled with the security, reliability and engineering team to match.

For further information about City Lifeline visit: www.city-lifeline.co.uk

Do you have the right attitude to secure your colocation data centre?

Bill Walsh, Operations Manager, City Lifeline, London

Colocation data centre users really value physical security, as was revealed not only in Telehouse’s research at the start of the year, but also in a recent survey we conducted at this year’s IP Expo of nearly one hundred IT and systems managers who visited our stand. Colocation hosting users place physical security as their top requirement and expectation of an independent colocation data centre, above power availability, redundant cooling, world-class connectivity and a central location. Customers valued physical security and trust above all of those, and they have good reason to.

Physical intrusion – it can happen

Those with longer memories may recall the spate of thefts of Sun computer systems across London at the start of the last decade. Those with even longer memories may remember the world-wide shortages of computer DRAM memory in the late 1990’s, which led to PCs all over the world being randomly stolen so their memory chips could be stripped out and resold. At an even higher level, there was the Al Quaida plot to blow up a major Docklands colocation facility and disable the UK internet (foiled by MI5). More recently it’s not uncommon to hear of disgruntled technicians walking out of a colocation data centre with their employer’s most critical piece of equipment before anyone had realised or could react. Data centre users really need to trust their colocation data centre and a right to expect that trust will always be fulfilled.

Can you be trusted to secure a data centre?

So what does a professional colocation data centre need to do to achieve that trust? Infrastructure certainly, but the most important thing by far is a real human being – a properly trained professional security guard, on-site 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, who can personally assess situations on the ground and make decision immediately. In these kinds of situations, nothing substitutes for a real, trained person.

The second most important consideration is a safe security office for security staff to work in, inside the colocation facility. They need to have a clear view of all the non-alarmed entrance points to the building by CCTV if necessary, but preferably by direct sight. Their office needs to be at reception, so they can talk to, evaluate and screen all people going in and out of the colocation facility. It needs to be strong with tough, glass shields that can be shut fast for maximum protection from potential intruders. Security guards need to be able to retreat into it for long enough to be able to think, evaluate and ring for assistance, or, in extreme cases, call the police.

Furthermore, security teams need infrastructure to support them, particularly in large colocation data centres where they cannot be everywhere at once. All possible entrances to the colocation facility should be either directly visually monitored or secured (fire escapes for example, which would never usually be opened). Main entrances should be blocked by magnetic electronically-controlled doors, so that no entrance is permitted, except when security makes a positive decision to allow someone to enter or exit the colocation facility. Where non-manually controlled exit and entry is allowed, anti-tailgate pods should be installed, so that two people can never enter on one pass.

Good access control systems are needed to control entrance to all the technical and colocation plant areas. Swipe cards are the norm, and are very effective. Doubling-up on access controls has a disproportionate effect on security; even swipe cards supplemented by a simple digilock will greatly increase security effectiveness (but don’t forget to change the digilock codes regularly). Swipe cards plus biometrics (e.g. fingerprint recognition) inside a security-controlled colocation facility is very difficult to circumvent and just the existence of such a combination will deter most security violation attempts.

Give yourself more eyes and ears

CCTV is vitally important in a colocation data centre. All external entrances should be monitored continuously, as should all stairwells and corridors. The monitors should be in the protected security office, and the CCTV control systems need movement detectors and electronic trip-wires to alert security when something untoward happens. Furthermore, don’t forget that something may happen at night when the security guard is doing his rounds, so he needs a way of being alerted when he’s not in the security office. All CCTV should be continuously recovered as experience shows that retrospective security analysis of what went on in the colocation facility is at least as valuable as real-time alerts.

Plus, as with all security systems, presentation and appearance matters. Delivering someone who sizes you up and concludes it’s too hard, is better than having fought off an attack. Security is not all about equipment (although that does matter too). It’s much more about training, attitude and awareness. It’s about having security people in the colocation facility who are continuously aware of their surroundings, are alert to unexpected changes and curious and dynamic enough to respond to change. They have to be supported by technical colocation infrastructure, but, more importantly, they need to be backed up by training, processes and procedures.

Colocation security is all about judgement

For instance, the security guard’s most important tool is not his CCTV or his swipe cards – it’s his access list – the up-to-date list of who has customer colocation authority to come and go, who may or may not allow deliveries or authorise equipment removals. It needs to be kept continuously up-to-date, both by the colocation supplier or the data centre manager, but also most importantly by the customer or colocation data centre user’s management. This requires good co-operation, procedures, collaboration and excellent contractor management.

All the security in the world is no use if a man in a boiler suit carrying a spanner can turn up at the back door, saying he’s come to fix the leak on the fourth floor and be let in without question. Delivery processes, car park controls, support authorisation and escalation procedures, all need thought and care so that when they are needed, they work first time.

Time and again surveys show that customers rate physical security as the most important service a colocation facility or a colocation data centre can offer. Security is an attitude - it is not purely about equipment. Any colocation provider or a colocation data centre operator needs to think it through carefully, implement it thoroughly, and more importantly earn his customer’s trust.

City Lifeline will be exhibiting at the 2011 Internet World Exhibition at Earls Court, London between 10 and 12 May. Come and see us on Stand E4018. We offer exceptional London colocation hosting for ISP's, for voice and VoIP switching, and first-class facilities for anyone interested in data or voice communications. At the heart of London's new Silicon Roundabout area, we are convenient, well-situated, well-connected and easy to work with. Come and see us!

The data centre conundrum – colocation in London versus the rest of the country?

Roger Keenan, Managing Director at City Lifeline

Data centre colocation plays a significant role when it comes to housing today’s IT operations; and yes, for many businesses it’s an attractive alternative to investing in building and maintaining a sizable space to house and operate power hungry hosted servers, hosted telecoms and hosted network equipment. The notion of operating this colocated equipment offsite brings with it many benefits, but the decision is not as clear-cut as that. There are a number of considerations to take into account when looking at colocation and one of the most deliberated is the issue of location. In reality, this comes down to one fundamental question: do I operate my IT and telecoms in London colocation or colocate elsewhere in the UK?

Of course, there are many valid arguments for both, and often it will come down to evaluating what the real priority or reason for wanting to colocate is in the first place. We’ve all seen the articles that alarm even the most level-headed IT managers, emphasising the high concentration of colocation data centres within Docklands and the London ‘ring of steel’ perimeter - this itself being a serious threat (from a terrorist perspective) to a business’s operating integrity. But on the other hand, London is renowned for having the best connectivity and physical accessibility for city-based businesses - Central London is is perfect for colocation and colocation facilities.
Any large metropolitan area, and particularly London as the capital city, will always be more vulnerable to terrorist attacks than remote countryside destinations. Despite this, almost half of the entire UK population of colocation data centres are in London. The reality is, we have to base all of our decisions on rational probability and weigh up the pros and cons - there are always advantages and disadvantages to any site for colocation, the key is to ensure you’re clued-up on the facts and examine what it is your business needs.
Taking a step back to put these considerations into perspective can really help if you are under pressure to make an informed colocation choice and the right decision for your business. There are several key reasons why a business will choose to colocate in London, and several reasons why it will not:

The attractions of the ‘big smoke’:

• Connectivity: London is the only place where a large multiplicity of international fibre-optic cables terminate; putting the city at a major advantage when it comes to colocation carrier choice and latency.
• Accessibility: many of London’s colocation data centres will be within easy walking distance from underground stations or public transport, which for many city businesses means they can get to their hosted IT or hosted telecoms equipment quickly and easily to install, upgrade and repair. And if things go wrong they can get there fast at any time of the day or night.
• Community: Being close to others operating in London is a big advantage. Dark Fibre connections to other businesses or carriers are possible, and you can share experiences with many other like-minded people (over a beer?)– more so than in a rural location.
The pull of the countryside:
• Cost: with the coalition government proposing a 43 per cent hike in business energy bills, businesses will continue to look for opportunities to shave costs where they can. Choosing a colocation data centre outside of London or even collocating outside the UK will have an impact on the price you pay, particularly if you need a lot of electrical power and cooling.
• Lower risk: housing your hosted equipment in colocation outside London is also thought by many to be a lower risk option for unpredictable terrorist attacks.
• Newer purpose-built buildings: many colocation data centres in remote locations are purpose-built rather than conversions and people are tempted by the idea of the look and feel of new colocation premises.
It really is horses for courses but choosing the right colocation site for your particular business is hugely important and making the wrong choice can lead to problems later down the line. As such, there are a number of questions that you should ask yourself before that decision is made:
• Check if the colocation data centre in question is carrier-neutral. Any colocation data centre, whether in London or not,, can give you an internet connection, but finding a colocation facility where you can use two different carriers with two separate routes (to different destinations) is more challenging, and adding telephony makes it even more so. Having a wider choice of colocation carriers means you can deliver any national or world-wide routings you want.
• It also allows you to negotiate better prices as more than one colocation carrier will be competing for your business.
• When latency is important, micro-seconds matter. Really low-latency connections with a choice of colocation carriers are currently only feasible in a central London location where you have many specialist carriers PoP’ing a colocation data centre set up to do just this.
• Physical accessibility – think about whether you need to be close to your hosted equipment. It may even be an emotional thing that defies logic at the time, but if something goes wrong in the middle of the night can you get in your car and get to the colocation facility relatively quickly.
• Outside London the choice of carriers is more limited (it’s much more expensive to dig up roads and lay fibre to a remote location). Price is always an important factor in the decision-making process but colocation access and colocation connectivity are also vital – make sure you balance quality against cost for your business.
• If there is a major terrorist incident, all of London is at risk but urban centres are also vulnerable. Mirroring (or duplicating) equipment in other colocation facilities is key to protecting against the impact of terrorist threats.
• Think about the type of colocation data centre you need: robot-like high security with little ‘human’ interaction, or the flexibility of ‘community’ to share knowledge and talk to others also using and managing the colocation data centre.
• Does your selected colocation data centre give you the option to hire and use meeting rooms, so you can talk to suppliers or colleagues or customers on site?
• What level of security do you require? Will you have the option of a private colocation suite? Some colocation data centres will provide a private colocation suite that no one else can enter without your permission, nothing can be removed or touched and in some cases you can arrange that an outsider can’t physically see into the suite.
The list is endless, but when it comes to colocation the answers to these considerations will often very much help to determine what location (or indeed, type of colocation data centre) is best for your business. Get this part right and you are less likely to experience unforeseen problems later down the line and more likely to ensure your hosted IT and hosted telecoms operations continue to run smoothly and seamlessly for the future.

For further information contact:

Donna Bennett / Lucy Knighton

Berkeley PR

T: +44 (0) 118 909 0909

E:[email protected]

60 per cent of UK SMEs hit by IT failures

2 November 2011 – A worrying 60 per cent of respondents surveyed[i] by City Lifeline at this year’s IP Expo have lost access to the company’s IT system following an unexpected incident. The resulting unplanned downtime lasted for more than six hours for 40 per cent of the firms surveyed, leaving employees struggling to access essential business data, run operations or communicate effectively with customers.

Unplanned downtime can have serious financial repercussions. Whether caused by equipment failure, a cyber-attack or something as mundane as road works cutting through a power line, studies show that the loss of access to data and electronic communication systems costs SMEs on average around £7,500 a day in lost business and productivity: ranging from £1,800 for micro-businesses to £14,000 a day for mid-sized enterprises[ii].

In a worst case scenario the lost data can never be recovered. According to the Federation of Small Businesses, 90 per cent of SMEs that lose data following a major incident are forced to shut within two years. Yet research shows that less than half of SMEs bother to back up data every week, and a mere 23 per cent back up daily[iii].

“SMEs are by their nature more vulnerable to the impact of data loss,” said Roger Keenan, managing director at City Lifeline. “Our survey reveals just how many small and medium-sized companies have experienced an IT failure – and for around two thirds of respondents, the resulting downtime lasted for at least half a day. Six hours of downtime effectively amounts to a lost working day. This inevitably means reduced productivity, missed business and unhappy customers and suppliers, something many smaller firms simply cannot afford. It is vital that SMEs make sure important files are saved not only on an external hard drive but in a safe and secure offsite location. Colocation data centres are created to avoid disasters or at least able to cope with them protecting the equipment and servers hosted inside. Most importantly, they are designed to protect a business’ critical IT systems.”

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About City Lifeline

City Lifeline is the leading independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre in central London. Lifeline House is situated in an ideal location, just outside the central London Exclusion zone, in the emerging Silicon Roundabout / Tech City district.

With some of the best connectivity in London, City Lifeline provides a secure, reliable and resilient home for telecoms, networking and server hosting. Its customers have access to the fastest, carrier diverse networks in the UK connecting across the world.

The data centre offers a first-class, flexible and personal service coupled with the security, reliability and engineering teams to match.

For further information about City Lifeline visit: www.city-lifeline.co.uk

City Lifeline boosts disaster recovery and support for remote workers at ihotdesk

City Lifeline, the London-based independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre, has today announced it will provide colocation services for award winning IT support company, ihotdesk.

In a move to expand its existing data centre capacity, ihotdesk selected City Lifeline's facilities to enhance its disaster recovery capability and support for its growing number of clients. Located in central London, City Lifeline’s data centre is close to ihotdesk’s office and customers, who will regularly access and use the facility to maintain equipment.

Preet Chahal, CEO at ihotdesk says: "We did look at data centres in the Docklands but they are too far away from our office and this would be inconvenient for our staff and customers. Our team of engineers will need to visit the site daily, as do our clients who will soon be operating their own equipment from there, so quick and easy access is vital."

“City Lifeline’s facilities and operations are excellent, security is tight and the facility is exactly what we required. Image is vital to us, so we needed a professional colocation data centre that complemented our high quality IT support and services that we in turn offer our clients. In short, we wouldn’t offer our clients a data centre that we didn’t use ourselves.”

Roger Keenan, managing director at City Lifeline says: “We are pleased to be working with ihotdesk and providing them with a data centre operation that suits them and their customers. We are continuing to work with many businesses like ihotdesk that are expanding and recognising the need for a proficient colocation data centre to help support their future growth plans."

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About City Lifeline

City Lifeline is the leading independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre in central London. With some of the best connectivity in London, City Lifeline provides a secure, reliable and resilient home for telecoms, computer and server hosting. Lifeline House is situated in an ideal central London location with a wide choice of carriers connecting across the world. The data centre offers a first-class, flexible and personal service with the security, equipment, plant, services and engineers to match.

For further information about City Lifeline visit: www.city-lifeline.co.uk

About ihotdesk

ihotdesk is an award winning IT support company based in central London which provides IT support, outsourcing and communication services to businesses situated in London and throughout the United Kingdom.
ihotdesk has been establised for over 11 years and offers a comprehensive range of services that cater for the needs of small, medium and large sized companies.

For further information about ihotdesk visit: www.ihotdesk.com

City Lifeline enables its customer base with direct connection to euNetworks

City Lifeline, the London-based independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre, has today announced it can offer its customers a high-density network connection from bandwidth infrastructure provider, euNetworks.

This arrangement now brings the number of voice telecoms carriers and internet carriers to a total of 23 that have chosen to establish a Point of Presence (POP) at City Lifeline’s data centre. Ideal for any organisation requiring high-speed access and monitoring fast transactions, euNetworks’ infrastructure will significantly boost City Lifeline’s connectivity and carrier offering.

Roger Keenan, managing director at City Lifeline says: “We are delighted to be able to give our customers the option of using euNetworks’ fast network. As a carrier neutral colocation data centre it’s vital we can provide a wide range of networks to meet our varied customers’ needs, whether it be a fast network or a direct secure link to the Far East.”

”We are delighted to provide City Lifeline customers with direct connection to our metro network in London and onward to further cities in Europe,” said David Selby, Vice President of Product at euNetworks. “We continue to add more data centres and bandwidth intensive buildings to our metro networks across Europe, enabling enterprises to benefit from our high-bandwidth fibre-based services.”

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About City Lifeline

City Lifeline is the leading independent carrier-neutral colocation data centre in central London. With some of the best connectivity in London, City Lifeline provides a secure, reliable and resilient home for telecoms, computer and server hosting. Lifeline House is situated in an ideal central London location with a wide choice of carriers connecting across the world. The data centre offers a first-class, flexible and personal service with the security, equipment, plant, services and engineers to match.
For further information about City Lifeline visit: www.city-lifeline.co.uk

About euNetworks

euNetworks Group Limited (SGX: H23:SI) is a bandwidth infrastructure provider, owning and operating 13 fibre-based metropolitan networks across Europe connected with a high capacity intercity backbone. The company offers a portfolio of metro and longhaul Ethernet and Internet Protocol services including dark fibre, dedicated fibre, wavelength, Ethernet, and Internet. Enterprise and carrier customers benefit from euNetworks’ unique inventory of fibre and duct-based assets that are tailored to fulfil their high bandwidth needs.
euNetworks Group Limited is headquartered in London and publicly listed on the Singapore Stock Exchange. For further information please visit www.eunetworks.com

City Lifeline will be exhibiting at the 2011 Travel Technology Exhibition at Earl's Court on 9th and 10th February. Come and see us on Stand B13. We can explain why a well-connected Central London colocation data centre can bring real benefits in terms of reliability, resilience and security to any business involved in international travel.