2014 Data Center 100: 20 Designers And Builders

Designers and Builders: The Data Center Experts

Whether it's a server closet or a dedicated facility, a data center requires the right mix of IT, power and cooling equipment laid out so as to maximize efficiency while providing flexibility and room to grow.

That, in turn, requires design and construction expertise, as well as the know-how to quickly turn the new facility over to customers. Just as important, in many cases, is expertise in finding, purchasing and prepping the right site for a new data center.

The companies and individuals with such expertise, often the unsung heroes of the data center, are essential to getting data center projects started and making sure they are ready for move-in as expected.

42U
Broomfield, Colo.
CEO: Alan Mamane

42U is an efficiency consulting company that helps develop vendor-neutral energy-efficient best-practice and technology solutions for data centers, computer rooms and server rooms for clients with a focus on cooling, power, monitoring, KVM and rack PDUs (power distribution units).

AHA Consulting Engineers
Lexington, Mass.
CEO: Martin Holloran

AHA Consulting Engineers provides data center and mission-critical facilities design services with consulting expertise in mechanical, electrical, plumbing, fire protection, building commissioning, sustainability consulting and energy modeling.

Alcatex
Royse City, Texas
President: Allison Griffis

Alcatex is a woman-owned small business specializing in the design and building of data centers. The company also provides related data center services including migration, relocation, building and demolition, as well as help with power, fire suppression and cooling infrastructures.

BladeRoom
Mount Prospect, Ill.
Managing director, US: Barnaby Smith

A newcomer to the U.S. market, U.K.-based BladeRoom develops efficient modular data centers that can be brought together at a customer site to make single-story or multistory facilities with a 60-year design life structure, with capabilities to match extreme environments.

Business Information Services
Colts Neck, N.J.
CEO: Bob Cassiliano

Business Information Services, a.k.a. Biz, provides data center customers with engineering, networking, telecom, security and cabling infrastructure services; energy assessments; corporate relocation and technical recruiting services; and business continuity and disaster recovery services.

Cannon T4
Ashburn, Va.
Chairman: Carl Cullop

The U.S. office of U.K.-based Cannon Technologies, Cannon T4 is a developer of prefabricated flexible modular data center architectures and builds complete data centers as turnkey projects up to TIA 942 Tier 4.

Comfort Systems USA
Houston
CEO: Brian Lane

Heating, ventilation, and cooling (HVAC) services provider Comfort Systems USA constructs, services and maintains mission-critical cooling solutions across a wide range of building types including data centers.

Compass Datacenters
Dallas
CEO: Chris Crosby

Compass Datacenters builds dedicated, natural-disaster-resistant data centers with 1-3MWs of initial IT load capacity and with plenty of room for future growth. Its data centers offer Level 5 commissioning and Uptime Tier III and LEED Gold certification.

COPT Data Center Solutions
Columbia, Md.
CEO: Roger Waesche

Corporate Office Properties Trust (COPT), a REIT (real estate investment trust) has more than 60 data center properties including six purpose-built data centers from which it develops, finances and operates mission-critical space and data centers to meet customer requirements.

Cosentini Mission Critical
New York
President: Douglas Mass

Cosentini Mission Critical provides consulting, engineering design and commissioning services for data centers and mission-critical facilities for either building new data centers or retrofitting or expanding existing facilities, leveraging expertise from designing UPS, central chiller and standby power systems.

Data Centers Delivered
New York
Partner: Stephen Madaffari

Data Centers Delivered is a manufacturer of custom modular data centers and utilizes off-site construction to custom-build IT modules, electrical infrastructure and mechanical infrastructure either as a stand-alone building or for installation in a traditional building.

Data City Exchange (DCE)
London
CEO: John Eland

London-based DCE designs and operates data centers around with world and offers customized data center solutions to corporate, government and carrier markets based on its Evo-POD cooling solutions that use either high-density liquid or evaporative free air cooling efficient operations.

Ehvert Mission Critical
Toronto
President: Vello Ehvert

Ehvert offers a full suite of data center engineering and technology solutions from facility design and build-out to technology relocation and ongoing systems support based in part on the company's own proprietary DCIM software.

Future Facilities
London
CEO: Hassan Moezzi

Future Facilities provides companies looking to build data centers with consulting, support and training services based on its 6sigmaDC data center simulation software, which allows an entire data center to be built virtually in 3-D.

IDC Architects
Portland, Ore.
President: Tim Meier

Architectural firm IDC Architects provides integrated services for designing and building data centers, stretching from the site and facilities phase through the engineering and construction of the final facility.

Imprint Data Center Solutions
Aurora, Ill.
President: Peter McGurran

Imprint Data Center Solutions provides services for planning and building data centers from network closets to multiple-megawatt facilities. Services include assessments, project management, design, construction, power and cooling, and implementation, as well as sourcing of IT products.

PTS Data Center Solutions
Oakland, N.J.
President: Peter Sacco

PTS Data Center Solutions specializes in the planning, design, engineering, construction management, commissioning, monitoring and maintenance management services needed to help plan, execute and operate data center projects of nearly any size.

Total Site Solutions
Columbia, Md.
CEO: Anthony Angelini

Total Site Solutions provides modular and traditional data center mission-critical infrastructure design and support services including data center assessment and audit, design, construction, operations, maintenance and planning.

Utilipath
Mooresville, N.C.
CEO: Joaquin Luna

Utilipath, which last year was acquired by Voille, provides construction and engineering services, including solutions customized for data centers, intelligent building systems, equipment and networking, outside plant and private fiber builds, and intelligent highway systems.

Wood Harbinger
Bellevue, Wash.
CEO: Robert Axley

Wood Harbinger provides mechanical and electrical engineering, IT and commissioning services for buildings and the infrastructure and industrial systems that support them, with expertise in campus infrastructures, commissioning, electrical, fire protection, industrial system, planning and IT.