I've been discussing with some people about getting into the colocation business.

Currently things are in the design phase, as we're still talking with providers.

What I'd like to know if there would be interest in colo at the following price?

1u or 2u with 75GB transfer for $150 a month, atleast that's what I'd like to be able to do.

We're also looking into being able to provide bandwidth as cheap as $400-450 per megabit.

Note: This wouldn't be done with some crappy connection, we're looking into a facility, quite possibly in Seattle's Westin Building.. which is a major telco hotel with a huge number of providers in it.

Those are very, very attractive prices. If you can handle some support as well (you might have to do some things at the box since I'm all the way in Florida), we may be interested. :) Keep us posted on how it turns out.

I think you can blow past 400 per mbps depending on your carriers.

Its really a depend state, your looking at about 2$ per gb for colocation, which is not something that isnt out there.

I think have colocation that can drop to 1.50 or less will win you some market share

Joe,

It's possible, but it all depends on how much bandwidth we purchase up front. All the providers I've checked with will provide connectivity via ethernet drop.

Well in our business plan for our investors.

In combination with equinix the datacenter we will eventually use.

Yipes, C&W, UUnet, and Cogent, and the other 18 carriers here in the chicago facility...

We will be able to offer bandwidth at under 1$ per gb depending on which carrier our customers choose.

For the real bandwidth players, it will cost more.

Its really dependent on the customer you are appealing too. Some people want cheap bandwidth, and some want high end bandwidth, its just depends.

If you like to discuss more, id be more then happy to chat sometime.

Joe

Jbiz while it is possible to get pricing that low, its not something thats for everyone, when you calculate in the amount of support, personel, and hardware expense, anything below 2.00/gig your not going to be making any money on no matter what carrier your talking about. In addition, if your talking about a very high end carrier such as UUNET you cant even come close to that figure their expensive. On top of that if your wanting to run BGP and Load Balancing, then you have to have have 2 carriers for the some customer which raises your cost even more.

What im trying to get across is dont price yourself to be the lowest, price yourself to be competive and make your distinquishing characteristic the level of service you provide, thats the only business model that will work in the long run, period!

Originally posted by cbaker17
Jbiz while it is possible to get pricing that low, its not something thats for everyone, when you calculate in the amount of support, personel, and hardware expense, anything below 2.00/gig your not going to be making any money on no matter what carrier your talking about. In addition, if your talking about a very high end carrier such as UUNET you cant even come close to that figure their expensive. On top of that if your wanting to run BGP and Load Balancing, then you have to have have 2 carriers for the some customer which raises your cost even more.

What im trying to get across is dont price yourself to be the lowest, price yourself to be competive and make your distinquishing characteristic the level of service you provide, thats the only business model that will work in the long run, period!

I tottally agree!
You Get what you pay for!

Double post, Sorry!

Well if you read my post correctly,

I said specificly there is cheap bandwidth and high end bandwidth

High end bandwidth being UUnet, sprint, c&W, Genuity.

Those are going to cost some cash, and our prices will not be as low.

But Cogent who is also in the equnix facility, will cost us around 10 cents per gb.

Now this isnt great bandwidth, and i would NOT recommend it for alot of things dealing with the internet, but people email us all the time about test stuff, colocating a server and just getting some cheap bandwidth to run trials on.

Where they dont want to allocated alot of money to a bandwidth expense.

Its just a market and its out there...

Joe

Yea im keeping an eye on cogent to but they only peer with one provider so their def. not good for any type of serious apps in addition they have little to no redundancy, i look forward to reevaluating their network when its complete, but their moving very slow.

I wish I could get bandwidth for 10 cents a gig.

I am thinking about checking with ColoCenters, in Seattle. Since, they have InterNAP among others in their facility.

BTW: What do you guys think about InterNAP?

Originally posted by JTY
BTW: What do you guys think about InterNAP?

I've heard good things. We're getting a DS3 to them in about a month. Ask me then and I can give you a better answer. :stickout

Josh,

What's the cost per megabit via InterNAP?

It depends on what kind of deal you can get. The list price is around $1,300 per mbps if you're getting a Burstable DS3. You should be able to get it down a fair bit from there. (At least 50%, if not more). It's supposed to be good bandwidth because of the excellent peering.

You can get it alot cheaper then that

Cable and wireless you can get a full t3 for 14k

Yipes 12k or less depending on location

Joe

What most people dont understand is that the lines while a very high expense are very low on what it actually costs to provide the service. Equipment, personel, support, facility, etc all come into play

I've been quoted as low as $499/mo just for a cabinet, from one provider in my area. Of, course I've been given much higher prices than that.

I can get bandwidth for $349 per megabit from a very well connected local provider.

But, I have to do my own support, as they only maintain, power, enviromental, physical security, and the ethernet connection to my router.

Anybody know what kind of interest there would be in firewall services?

Please keep in mind regardless of bandwidth costs, there is alot more to this business

Support, Hardware and what not.

Dont get the wrong idea, there is cheaper bandwidth, and there is more expensive bandwidth, but what you get cheap you make up in other costs.

Its not a cheap industry...

Joe

I'm pretty picky about the network connectivity and facility.

My main requirements for connectivity from a company, is peering at a large NAP, and multiple high-quality transit providers. Unless, I'm going straight to a backbone provider.

As far as datacenter, I wanted one with multiple AC units, multilevel power backup, 24/7 video surveillance, 24/7 card key access. Of course, I can't forget fire protection, and growth space. And those are my minimums.

I was looking at hardware today...... it's amazing how expensive, a VLAN capable switch can get. I think my cheapest piece of network hardware will be my OpenBSD firewall.