Google planning Oklahoma data center

[luke911]

Google Planning Oklahoma Data Center - Data Center Knowledge

I'm glad to see Oklahoma bringing these types of projects. It'll only help us become a bigger target for these types of projects in the future and improve the job market for us geeks.

[okcpulse]

Sweetness!

[MadMonk]

Too bad it's in Pryor (NE of Tulsa).

[Oh GAWD the Smell!]

I'd move to Pryor in a heartbeat for some of that good 'ol Google money.

[okiemom]

Someone is doing something right in Pryor. The industrial park, the music festivals. Whatever it is, I wish Chickasha would give it a try.

Pryor - Population 8,900
Nothing against Pryor. It's a nice little town but how did a town that size get a Chili's?

[kmf563]

I agree - who is bringing all the attention to Pryor?? They have some great things going for them. Their music festivals are fantastic.

[Karried]

It's confirmed...
Google to build data center in Pryor





PRYOR — Search engine giant Google announced plans Wednesday to build a $600 million data center at the MidAmerica Industrial Park.

In a news conference attended by Gov. Brad Henry and about 200 others, Google's Lloyd Taylor said Mountain View, Calif.-based Google will develop the data center in multiple facilities that will be built on 800 acres it has purchased at the park.
The first data center will be located in an 84,000-square-foot existing building and should be open by mid-year 2008, Taylor said. Taylor is Google's director of Global Operations.
Google will employ about 100 people initially, then expand to as many as 200 people when other buildings are developed.
"Our strategy is to bring up one data center and simultaneously prepare the building pad for the next one,” Taylor told the Oklahoma audience in a brief presentation. "When we need more computer resources, we'll start construction on the second site and prepare the pad for the third site.”
Taylor showed the audience a slide that showed the undeveloped acreage Google will develop on the park.
Sanders Mitchell, administrator of the 9,000-acre industrial park, called Google a "dream” tenant.
"Maybe it will break the ice on more high-tech companies to take a look at us,” Mitchell said.
Henry welcomed Google "on behalf of all Oklahomans” and said that he is a Google user, citing a recent opportunity he had to use it to solve a debate among his staff members. "It's incredible to me how Google has changed the way the world obtains information,” Henry said. "Now they are in our own back yard.”

[metro]

Google picks Pryor

By Jim Stafford
Business Writer

PRYOR — Search engine giant Google Inc. is setting deep roots in Oklahoma, Wednesday announcing a $600 million data center complex it plans to build at the MidAmerica Industrial Park here.
In a news conference attended by Gov. Brad Henry and about 200 others at the MidAmerica Expo Center, Google's Lloyd Taylor said the company bought 800 acres in the industrial park and will open its first data center here by mid-2008 in an 84,000-square-foot building already on site.

Taylor is Google's director of Global Operations.

"Our strategy is to bring up one data center and simultaneously prepare the building pad for the next one,” Taylor told the Oklahoma audience in a brief presentation. "When we need more computer resources, we will start construction on the second site and prepare the pad for the third site.”

The Oklahoma data center — sometimes called a "server farm” — will join a chain of computer servers across the continent and in Europe. It will initially employ about 100 people in Oklahoma and up to 100 more as the data center expands, Taylor said. Full-time salaries will average $48,000.

Taylor showed an aerial view of the Google property at the industrial park, which is a large tract of undeveloped land.

"It doesn't look like much now,” he said. "See me in 12 months.”

Gov. Brad Henry looked over the audience and estimated there was not one person present who has not used Google, "no matter what the level of your computer expertise.”

Henry told a story of a debate among his staff about the date a particular rock song was released. The governor solved the argument with a Google search that took seconds.

"It is incredible to me how Google has changed the way the world obtains information,” Henry said. "Now they are in our own back yard.

"Google looked at really everywhere in the central United States, from the Appalachians to the Rockies. It's a testament to the low cost of doing business in Oklahoma.”


The Google dream
Sanders Mitchell, administrator of the 9,000-acre MidAmerica Industrial Park, said Google is moving into a "spec” building the park built and that was used as a warehouse for a company that eventually moved to larger space within the park.

"Google is just a dream for us,” Mitchell said. "Maybe it will break the ice on more high-tech companies to take a look at us.”

Google will buy about 15 megawatts of electricity as a minimum daily load from the Grand River Dam Authority to power the computer servers in the data center, Taylor said. It recently signed contracts with the power generator. Water and other utilities, such as fiber optics for communications, will be supplied by the industrial park.

Google needs large amounts of computing power because its servers "contain and index every document on the Internet,” Taylor said. He would not disclose the number of computers a Google data center houses.

Eventual location of a data center for what many consider to be the world's premier search engine began a little more than a year ago and was initiated by Google, said Rob Gilbert, chairman of the industrial park's board of directors.

"How did they find us?” Mitchell said. "They Googled us. We're glad they did and we're glad they're here.”


Yearlong process
Google researchers made first contact with MidAmerica Industrial Park on March 11, 2006, Mitchell said.

Eventually, the Oklahoma Department of Commerce was brought into negotiations, which were kept confidential for competitive reasons, said Amy Polonchek, executive director of the department.

Google was offered statutory sales and ad valorem property tax exemptions, as well as participation in either the state's Quality Jobs or Investment Tax Credit programs, she said.

"We put all the data together, and they liked it,” Polonchek said. "This has been a long process, and they had a good idea of what they wanted. They have been negotiating with MidAmerica for over a year. I think it's good for them and it's good for us.”

Taylor said Google charges nothing for its search engine services, relying instead on revenue from ads placed in search results pages. The company was founded in 1998 by a pair of graduate students at Stanford University.

"Google is only 8 years old,” Taylor said. "We haven't even made it to being a teenager yet.”

[ibda12u]

Warning: Geek Talk Ahead.......








Well we're another step closer to getting some very good Tier 1 Internet Drops in Oklahoma I guess you'd have to live close to tulsa though to get into that Tier 1 Google Drop
If someone could get into that good bandwidth, they could offer WLAN service to a lot of those remote area's, and probably make a killing. All those hills out there, just keep setting up towers, and bouncing the signal.