I forget what company it was awhile ago, but I was reading their history. They grew from a single server colocated to owning a whole datacenter. I think it took them about 10 years....

Of course it is possible, but how far have all of you come from your start? How big of an initial investment did you make? A single server, partial rack, whole rack?

I am just curious. I have been operating for a little over 2 years with a single server, and have been profitable for about 6 months.... curious on what other outfits have done.

I think you might be talking about DreamHost

e at DreamHost have been happily hosting our clients' dreams (and websites) since April 1997 - close to a century ago in Internet years! That was when we (four Computer Science undergraduates at hmc.edu in Claremont, CA) launched this company with no capital apart from a single Pentium 100 web server (Destro was her name), using shared bandwidth on a T1 line that a friend gave us at no cost.

By necessity we had to be frugal, but even with our less than ample resources we always did our best to provide a quality service at a reasonable price. Those early days quickly taught us the technical expertise and market savvy necessary to survive in our industry, as well as teaching us to respect each and every customer's wishes, dealing with them as though they were our friends. Hey, most of them were!

It's hard to believe that we've already grown to over 700 servers (each with over 50 times the processing power of Destro), a state of the art data center, and a full time staff of 40. Even though we now grow more in a day than we did in our first three months of business, we've always made it our number one priority to deal with every client as a human being and as a friend. We like to think that that, more than anything else, is the real reason for our current success.

Now hosting over 200,000 web sites, we've definitely come a long way since 1997. But we can see there's still a long road in front of us. We don't know exactly where it will lead; all we know is that the trip will be fun, and we wish you'd come with us!

http://dreamhost.com/aboutus.html

I've been operating for 6 years..

Started with 1 1U, then went to 2 and have been between 2-4 on and off for the last couple of years.. I'm not profitable; I'm just breaking even and so I'm on to the next step of starting a DC which finally is at the starting phase..

6 years out? Not bad.... what kind of plan do you have to open a datacenter?

I assume there is a few hundred thousands of dollars involved (at least) in opening a building, getting fiber, etc, etc..... seems like a daunting task to me.

ServInt has a similiar, and just as impressive story. It started with a server hosted out of Reed Caldwell's dorm room from what I understand, but quickly moved to co-location, and they now own their own office space and datacenter. They started 1994/1995-ish. They've had their ups and downs, from filing a pretty large bankruptcy for a company their size, and now to the success they're having today with their VPS and Managed Server Product line.

One of the most impressive stories I have herd is "The Planets", dear lord its amazing.

I'm in a telco hotel.. connectivity isn't a problem..

I'm in a telco hotel.. connectivity isn't a problem..

excuse my ignorance, but what is a telco hotel?

excuse my ignorance, but what is a telco hotel?
A telco hotel simply refers to a building that houses sophisticated telecommunications technology equipment that enables communication of voice, data, wireless and streaming digital content.

A telco hotel simply refers to a building that houses sophisticated telecommunications technology equipment that enables communication of voice, data, wireless and streaming digital content.
What he said... ;)

Places like where we use at the Infomart in Dallas would be what he is talking about. They are fiber wired on all floors and have major carriers in the building.

Sometimes having your own datacenter isn't anything that great, once you see you're getting large it may be in your benefit to establish a partnership with an existing datacenter. They already have staff there, procedures are laid down, you can get things going quicker since you aren't bringing everything in, etc.

This also allows you to get in on lower rates for everything, the existing datacenter probably already buys things in bulk, you can join in with them on that rather than starting from scratch and no buyer credit with certain companies.

Has anyone got The Planet's story?

One of the most impressive stories I have herd is "The Planets", dear lord its amazing.
How is it really amazing? They've been successful, but it's nothing like SerVint, Site5, HTTPMe, or even Dreamhosts.

The Planet was founded by a bunch of previous dot com guru's, with lots of funding. No harm, or shame in it, but it's nothing like the little engine that could story.

We started with a reseller account back in 1997-1998 at Communitech, a $100 investment, upgraded to a dedicated box a couple months later and then had a couple colo boxes by the end of 2001. We just added a couple more boxes until we got our own cage in Equinix in 2004. Since then we have gotten our own 2000 sq. ft. data center in Chicago and will likely be expanding to San Jose this summer.

We started with a reseller account back in 1997-1998 at Communitech, a $100 investment, upgraded to a dedicated box a couple months later and then had a couple colo boxes by the end of 2001. We just added a couple more boxes until we got our own cage in Equinix in 2004. Since then we have gotten our own 2000 sq. ft. data center in Chicago and will likely be expanding to San Jose this summer.

We're basically the same. Started with 1 little celeron ensim server, expanded to ~30 leased servers, made the shift to colo. Adding an additional 200sqft of cage space in the next few months and we're in the market for our own facility in the next 12-18 months :)

June will mark our 2 year anniversary of incorporation, I wouldn't count anything prior to that as anything more than my hobby :)

Wow. That's awesome, both of you guys. I need to spend a lot more time on this, get focused. Been running it (really well mind you) kind of as a hobby....

I started out about a year ago last may with a partner, My partner and I had our differences and split up, a little over a month ago I started my own, and am working hard to bring it about. I hope to bring the company out more mainstream in the next couple of months. right now I am on a shared reseller plan and will build from there.