Posts Tagged ‘international’

Dealing with jet lag, unfamiliar surroundings, foreign currencies and different languages just begins to describe my hectic life over the past two months. We’ve been in overdrive, building out SoftLayer’s Singapore and Amsterdam data centers in weeks (rather than months).

Our “Go Live Crew” of 16 dedicated SLayers has been working ’round the clock to make sure everything is up and running on time. The biggest challenge has been building out both data centers simultaneously … With the “Go big or go home” mindset, when we decided to go international, we went all in. Our growing customer base of 23,000 won’t stand still, so we need to deliver, whether it be through innovation or expansion. In less than 60 days we’ve been able to add 31,000+ servers to our network platform, bringing our unique cloud, dedicated and managed hosting solutions closer to our customers around the world.

This accomplishment has been something of a “miracle,” and I really need to shout out to my team members on the GLC. Putting in 16-hour days and working weekends while still finding time to go out on the weekends (Jägermeister and Red Bull have been sampled at many a fine pub) has made us a pretty close-knit family. The old “work hard, play hard” saying is an understatement when it comes to the SoftLayer team.

If we’re ever dragging a bit in the morning, we can always rely on Duck Sauce to get our pulses racing again by the time we get to the data center. With such a full work schedule, we become creatures of habit, and “Barbara Streisand” is only one example of a staple for the crew. Our daily consistency has even carried over into meal time: My favorite luncheon spot in Amsterdam even named a sandwich after me – Da Bobby G Meat Sandwich. Apparently the combination of meatballs, salami, ham and (a smothering of) ketchup on a bun is not a common order at this establishment, so my innovation needed to be recognized. Nutritional considerations aside, this is one fine sandwich:

I’ve been on the road for a while now, and these are just a few memories I’m taking with me. Jumping around between three continents has definitely had its challenges, but with a great team of focused SLayers, we’ve been getting the job done. I’m proud to have had a hand in making our international aspirations a reality, and I know that even though this has already been an unbelievable adventure, we’re just getting started.

-Robert

Over the course of about a month, you were able to follow the build-out progress of SoftLayer’s Singapore data center facility. Todd book-ended his coverage of the process with an early look on September 2 and the official “LIVE” announcement on October 3, and given the fantastic response from customers to those updates, we’re going to keep them going from Amsterdam.

If you follow SoftLayer on Twitter or keep an eye on our Flickr account, the last time you saw the Amsterdam facility, it looked pretty empty. You might assume that with all the attention on Singapore, Amsterdam wasn’t getting much attention, but you’d be wrong … Folks have been working non-stop in Europe as well, and the facility looks beautiful:

It’s pretty obvious with the racks you see pictured that our go-live team has been on the ground and working hard in the new facility. We shipped loads of gear across a different ocean to get it to Amsterdam, but things will probably look pretty familiar.

When Singapore went live on Monday, customers were ecstatic. We’ve already provisioned a few hundred servers in the new facility, and the chorus of users anxious about our European expansion has gotten louder as a result. As you can see, Amsterdam is coming along nicely, so you’ll have a SoftLayer server in Amsterdam before you know it.

SoftLayer’s growth internationally has been fueled by customer demand, so while we’re working on Amsterdam, we’d love to hear where you’d like to see us next. Leave a comment with the country/region you think could best benefit from a local SoftLayer facility … And if you agree with any of the ideas, be sure to post your agreement as well so we get an even clearer picture of customer demand.

More to come!

-@quigleymar

We’ve always set our sights globally at SoftLayer and this week we’ve certainly achieved some key milestones. With our data center in Singapore going LIVE, we now have a “digital gateway” for providing our unique cloud, dedicated, and managed hosting solutions to the Asia-Pacific region.

What is even more remarkable is the speed at which we are deploying our new international data centers. In only a few months, all the meticulous planning, logistics and execution were done and customers could place orders. And we’re not slowing down. The trajectory path we’re on has us expanding faster and farther than we ever thought possible.

Next month we’re opening a new data center in Amsterdam, along with network Points of Presence (PoPs) in Amsterdam, London and Frankfurt. Each of these facilities is built and maintained by SoftLayer, and that organic growth is a huge differentiator. We didn’t go out and acquire a company to expand our capabilities, and because we’re doing the work on the ground, we’re able to guarantee the most consistent, best possible service. Every data center – whether it’s Singapore or San Jose – is exactly the same. Because of that consistency, our customers don’t have to worry about whether the services in the new facilities meet their expectations, and based on the phenomenal provisioning statistics we saw on day one in Singapore, they aren’t hesitating to order more.

International Expansion: Currency

Because our global expansion enables us to perform even better for the SoftLayer customers located outside of North America, we wanted to make it easier for those customers to do business with us. As of 8:01 a.m. Central Time today, we support and accept payment in 60+ currencies! This currency support allows our customers to price SoftLayer services in their native currency, and it lets them avoid those pesky exchange fees from their credit card.

Our BYOC (Cloud) and Dedicated Server order forms have been updated with a currency selection on their first page, so once you select a currency, your order form will reload with all pricing displayed in that currency. Existing customers are also able to pay for their existing servers with one-time or recurring payments in our customer portal.

Currencies Supported

It’s amazing to say that we are truly a global company operating on three continents. Our success and future growth are tied to these new international capabilities. We will move aggressively and open more data centers, so stay tuned. With our global aspirations taking flight, I’m reminded of the saying that, “the sun never sets on the British Empire.”

Speaking of flights, I’ve got to get to the airport … My flight to Amsterdam is leaving in a few hours.

-@gkdog

I write this message while overlooking the International Business Park in Singapore. The desk I sit at faces east; the sun is now on the opposite side of the building and our new Singapore office is starting to cool off, but it’s eerily quiet here on the 6th floor.

Our new Singapore General Manager Michael Ong is in Dallas meeting the rest of the SoftLayer team, our new Server Build Technicians (SBTs) are on the data center floor assisting the Go Live Crew (GLC) and the inventory team is indexing and organizing of the mountains of gear we have in the Large Parts Room (LPR).

Thinking back just 30 days, we were getting early access to our two data center suites. Our four ocean containers were unloaded and waiting for us in the LPR, and the members of the GLC from Dallas, Houston, Seattle and Washington, D.C. had their steel toe boots on, hard hats in place and dragging a little from the 14 hour time change. The GLC has worked tirelessly to get this data center online.

Our success on the ground was far from a standalone feat, though. The steadfast support, backing and encouragement from everyone back home enabled our successful launch. Many departments and individuals spent tireless nights on the phone and on email helping us through issues. I can’t overstate the importance of their support and willingness to step up to get things done. Without their help, the data center certainly wouldn’t look like this:

Our first international data center and office are worth celebrating, but it’s important to realize that our work doesn’t stop today. It’s critical that we continue to support the Singapore office like we do our other offices and data centers around the U.S. We are depending on the local team to run the daily operations, and they’re depending on us to provide them with the necessary guidance to keep the gears in motion. This is not a fire and forget mission — we are now truly a global company.

While we sweep up the imaginary confetti from the floor in SNG01 (since we’d never let real confetti in the DC), we know that the GLC in Amsterdam is on the ground getting our first European facility ready. The ocean containers have been delivered and racks are being built. It’s time to get some rest and sleep fast … We’ve got another data center coming online soon.

To all our new Singaporean team members: Welcome to SoftLayer. We’re excited and proud to have you join our team. To everyone that supported us: Thank you again from the very bottom of our hearts. To our customers: Enjoy your new SoftLayer servers in Singapore. And to our competition: This is just the start.

3BFL.

-@toddmitchell

Are you familiar with the “slow clap” phenomenon?

It’s basically a crescendo of applause in a crowd that starts with a single hand clap. A few seconds after that first clap, you hear the second. A slow rhythm takes shape. A few people join in. The rhythm is contagious, and it starts to spread through the crowd. As more people join in, the natural tendency is for the pace to speed up as the volume increases, and within about a minute, a single hand clap becomes a huge roar of applause. In the movie Rudy, one character starts a “slow clap” on the sideline of a football game, and the cheer ends up filling the entire stadium … And that’s the visual that comes to mind when I think about the upcoming “go live” date for our Singapore data center.

Start a slow clap in your mind and think of each successive milestone getting faster and exponentially louder applause:

• In July, George Karidis posted a high-level overview of SoftLayer’s international growth.
• About a month later, I blogged with details about our network expansion into Japan.
• Three days after that post, you got your first glimpse at the Singapore data center build-out process.
• A week later, you saw updated pictures of the data center and office space.
• Last week, racks were installed and wired up by the time a press release hit the wire announcing the launch of our Asia-Pacific operations.
• From that press release, you learned that SoftLayer’s Singapore data center will go live on October 3, 2011.

If you imagined correctly, the applause in your mind should be borderline deafening … And I didn’t even mention the fact that we enabled pre-orders on select servers in Singapore last week with a Triple Double special exclusively for servers in the new SNG01 facility.

AND I haven’t said anything about the progress of our first European data center in Amsterdam. We already have a team of people there working to get that facility ready, and it’s coming together just as quickly. Don’t be surprised to see a few sneak peeks at the build-out process there in the next few weeks.

It’s almost unfathomable that we’re so close to the launch of our first facility outside the United States, and when you consider how quickly Amsterdam will come online after Singapore, you probably think you’re taking crazy pills … Or that we are. I don’t want to take any of the wind out of the sales of our launch day, so I’m just going to share a few more glimpses into the data center.

On Monday, you can light your first server at the end of this Singaporean hallway:

All of the racks are powered:

The server rails are installed:

And we thought it might be a good idea to go ahead and install a few servers:

Now all we need to do is flip the switch … Are you ready?

-@toddmitchell

Last week, I shared an early glimpse of our Singapore data center pods and office space. What a difference a week makes. A week after the first batch of pictures were taken, I made my way back through the facility to document some of the progress, and you’ll be amazed by how quickly everything is coming together.

You’d probably be even more amazed if you knew how many people (literally) around the world were working hard every day to keep the build-out moving forward so quickly … Some of the most visible folks in the process are the guys we have on the ground in Singapore:

We weren’t able to use SoftLayer’s fancy new truck to get our gear to the Singapore facility. I think it had something about having to travel over the Pacific Ocean … I guess there weren’t enough gas stations? We had all of our DC gear shipped down (literally) in ocean containers, and when the skids were all moved into the storage area, it was almost like Christmas.

I say “almost like Christmas” because we happened to know everything we’d be unwrapping, and if we were surprised by anything we opened, it probably wouldn’t be a good surprise. Luckily, we got exactly what we needed. Meanwhile, the Singapore data center pods have been coming along nicely. Here’s a look inside Pod 1.

And while we do our best to mirror the build-out of our data center pods regardless of their location, you can see that a few exceptions are made. In the pods we’re building in the United States, we have at least two fewer languages on signs like the ones you see here:

If we walk next door to Pod 1, you’ll see the progress we’re making in Pod 2. I know the pictures look similar … But that’s the point. Given the demand we’ve heard from customers, we’re building both pods at the same time, hoping to keep up with demand while we start building our next facilities.

While the pod progress is impressive, the progress on the office space is almost unbelievable. Where you previously saw ladders and cement, you now see desks, chairs and carpet. We’ve been hiring in Singapore for a few weeks now, and when we officially get the keys to move in, this place will be abuzz with new SLayers.

We’ve posted a few more pictures in our Singapore DC Construction Flickr photo album, enjoy them! Soon after these pictures were taken, the team started assembling the racks in the DC, so the next update you’ll see from me will probably include a lot more server goodness.

If you happen to live in Singapore and want to join our team, be sure to visit SoftLayer Careers for our current opportunities. As of right now, we have positions available in inventory, channel development, inside sales, enterprise account management, network engineering, sales engineering, systems administration and server building … And if you don’t fit in any of those positions, we can probably find another role for you to fill!

-@toddmitchell

This week, Lance and I hopped over the pond to attend WorldHostingDays 2011 at Europa-Park in Rust, Germany. If you haven’t heard of WorldHostingDays, you may be a little more familiar with WebhostingDays, its more narrowly focused predecessor. Because many of the sessions and discussions at the event have evolved and grown significantly from the pure-play “web hosting” market, the name change was a good one … And it didn’t even require tweaking the WHD abbreviation.

Given the ambitious scope of WorldHostingDays, we weren’t sure what to expect from the sessions, but we were excited to hear fresh perspectives on the European-centric hosting market. We walked away from the sessions with a few new ideas to implement into SoftLayer’s business, and it was interesting to hear the (regionally accented) conversations focus on the same problems and questions the US hosting industry is tackling: Public and private clouds, IPv6, scalability, stability and security.

Many European companies that are relatively new to the hosting scene are experiencing some phenomenal growth (similar to what we’ve seen at SoftLayer), and the opportunity is growing exponentially beyond their growth as new markets turn up with fresh needs for quality infrastructure. In these developing markets, local events in Europe like WHD will be invaluable to educate and relate how this relatively new industry might change the face of the local business environment … And when those efforts carry into Asia, the sky is the limit on the opportunity.

We have some pretty huge global plans on the horizon, and we’re excited to position ourselves for worldwide recognition. When WorldHostingDays 2012 rolls around, you’re going to see an even bigger, badder and better SoftLayer.

-@gkdog

Will Charnock put me in the hot seat at the end of his 3 Bars | 3 Questions interview last week, so I welcomed Kevin into my office virtually to have a quick chat. He came equipped with three good questions about my experience with SoftLayer SLales, and I did my best to give three good answers. Here were the questions:

1. What makes SoftLayer different from any of the other companies you’ve worked for?
2. When you’re hiring a new sales representative, what do you look for in that person?
3. What are you most excited about when it comes to the next few months at SoftLayer from a sales perspective?

This week, we used a High Definition video chat, and the quality is pretty impressive. We’re still working to improve and tweak the format and quality of these videos, so you might notice a few blips in the audio recording, but we’ll get those ironed out soon.

All in all, the video chat was a lot of fun, and I’m looking forward to watching Drew Jenkins enjoy it in the next episode!

-Tom

Globalization is now, and forever will be, an ubiquitous topic in most political, economic, and social forums. The term “globalization” is defined by Merriam-Webster as “the development of an increasingly integrated global economy marked especially by free trade, free flow of capital, and the tapping of cheaper foreign labor markets.” The latter of the traits has emerged as the strongest point of contention due to outsourcing. Markedly, Fortune Magazine recently published a story on a new “insourcing” trend. It’s a trend so new that my spellchecker doesn’t even recognize the word.

Though “free trade” and “free flow of capital” are explicitly declared in the definition of globalization, free flow of information is somehow absent. The role that the Internet has played in globalization and the development of the global economy cannot be overstated. Continued advancements in the Internet and Telecommunications have literally connected suppliers, vendors, sellers, and buyers that historically had been segmented by barriers such as geography and time zones. What this phenomenon has come to shape is the global marketplace, where products from across the world compete for the preference of an endless consumer base. With an increase in competition comes an increase in the consumer expectations for quality and performance. As a growing company with a significant international client base, SoftLayer continues to strive towards providing quality solutions and support that exceeds our customers’ expectations.

Though the Internet has helped to fuel the soaring growth of the global marketplace in the recent decade, there are still many obstacles that impede its progression. Most of the hazards have a legal connotation surrounding hot-button issues such as Intellectual Property, Copyright Infringement, and most notably in the hosting world, Abuse (bandwidth theft, computer viruses, fraud, etc.). It’s certainly enough to keep our abuse department busy as international standards and governing policies are fortified to help combat these areas of concern.

This observation merely skims the surface of globalization and the development of the global economy as there are many arguments both for and against its advancement. At the forefront or behind the scenes (depending on your vantage), you will find the Internet. It has been stated that “the Internet is the backbone of the global economy” with evidence cited in the form of web transactions going from “virtually nothing in 1994 to nearly $657 billion in 2000.”¹ Care to guess what that number is now? As SoftLayer furthers its commitment to quality, our objective is to continue to strengthen the platform from which our domestic, international, and multinational customers launch into and compete in the global marketplace.

-DJ

¹Charles W. L. Hill, International Business: Competing in the Global Marketplace (Irwin/McGraw-Hill; Fifth Edition, 2004), p.13.