2016 Data Center 100: 20 Designers And Builders
20 Designers and Builders
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.
Here’s a look at the designers and builders on this year’s Data Center 100 list.
1547 Critical Systems Realty
J. Todd Raymond, CEO, Managing Director
Headquarters: Matawan, N.J.
1547 Critical Systems Realty develops and operates custom-designed data centers with more than 500,000 square feet of data center space under development in New York, Illinois, Wyoming and Hawaii. Its data centers scale from a few hundred kilowatts to multiple megawatts of power.
AHA Consulting Engineers
Martin Holloran, Co-Founder, CEO
Headquarters: Lexington, Mass.
AHA Consulting Engineers provides data center and mission-critical facilities design services with consulting expertise in mechanical, electrical, plumbing, fire protection, building commissioning, building information modeling, sustainability and energy modeling, and provides LEED project administration.
Alcatex
Carlton Griffis, Co-Founder, VP
Headquarters: Royse City, Texas
Alcatex, a woman-owned small business specializing in data center design and construction, also provides related data center services including migration, relocation, building and demolition, as well as help with power, fire suppression and cooling infrastructures. In addition, the company provides energy assessments and equipment updates.
Balfour Beatty Construction
Mark Layman, Chairman, CEO
Headquarters: Dallas
Balfour Beatty Construction is a nationwide building contractor with mission-critical facilities experience from small-scale improvements within existing IDF (intermediate distribution frame) closets to new construction of Tier 1 up to Tier 4 data centers within urban environments.
Bruns-Pak
Mark Evanko, Principal, Engineer
Headquarters: Edison, N.J.
Bruns-Pak designs and builds scalable mission-critical data center solutions. The company provides facility infrastructure services including consulting, design and construction; IT and cloud services including SaaS and professional services; construction management; and commissioning.
Burns & McDonnell
Greg Graves, Chairman, CEO
Headquarters: Kansas City, Mo.
Burns & McDonnell designs, engineers and constructs high‐performance, energy‐efficient and scalable data centers and other facilities. The company in 2015 introduced global reuse services, which aims to recycle building materials as part of its sustainable design-build services.
Compass Datacenters
Chris Crosby, Founder, CEO
Headquarters: Dallas
Compass Datacenters builds data centers with column-free raised floor options with 10,000- to 20,000-square-feet increments and power options with 1.2-megawatt increments. Its data centers feature Uptime Tier III and United States Green Building Council (USGBC) LEED certification.
Corgan Associates
Bob Morris, President, CEO
Headquarters: Dallas
Corgan is an award-winning architecture and design firm and counts mission-critical facilities among its core businesses. The company has a focus on green design and has worked on more than 60 LEED-certified projects, including the nation’s largest LEED Gold Certified freestanding data center.
Corporate Office Properties Trust
Roger Waesche, President, CEO
Headquarters: Columbia, Md.
Corporate Office Properties Trust acquires, develops, manages and leases office and data center properties primarily near government and other business in the Washington, D.C., and Baltimore region. Its core portfolio includes 164 office properties totaling 17.5 million rentable square feet.
Cosentini Associates
Douglas Mass, President
Headquarters: New York
The Mission Critical group of building systems consulting engineering firm Cosentini focuses on data centers and other mission-critical facilities. Its expertise includes UPS systems and central chiller plants, standby power plants, raised-floor distribution systems, and modular data center design and commissioning services.
Data Centers Delivered
Stephen Madaffari, Principal
Headquarters: New York
Data Centers Delivered manufactures custom modular data centers and utilizes off-site construction to custom-build IT modules, electrical infrastructure, mechanical infrastructure, self-contained portable data centers, in-building modules and complete data centers.
Ehvert Mission Critical
Vello Ehvert, President
Headquarters: Toronto
Ehvert offers a full suite of turnkey data center services including assessment, building and IT infrastructure planning, mechanical and electrical systems design, physical security design, project management, construction management, site supervision, coordination, and relocation and cutover.
Electronic Environments Corp.
Kenneth Rapoport, Founder, CEO
Headquarters: Marlborough, Mass.
Electronic Environments Corp. (EEC) provides mission-critical life-cycle services from the planning and building phases to assessments. The company can deliver engineering, construction and maintenance services as custom turnkey solutions, including solutions for data center energy and cooling.
MDI Access
Robert Heiderscheidt, President, CEO
Headquarters: Alsip, Ill.
MDI Access designs and builds data center and telecommunications infrastructures as well as co-location cages in data centers, and manages existing facilities. The company offers data center design and build services, co-location programming and deployment, infrastructure management, and data center migration services.
PTS Data Center Solutions
Pete Sacco, Founder, President
Headquarters: Oakland, N.J.
Data center consulting firm and turnkey solution provider PTS specializes in data center planning and feasibility consulting, facility and support infrastructure design and engineering, construction and project management, commissioning, monitoring, and operation and maintenance management services.
Server Farm Realty
Avner Papouchado, CEO
Headquarters: El Segundo, Calif.
Server Farm builds, integrates and manages data center environments and IT deployments. The company owns and operates eight data centers, four of which are leased, consisting of more than 1.3 million square feet, and provides complete data center oversight from facility to IT infrastructure management.
Skanska USA
Richard Cavallaro, President, CEO
Headquarters: New York
Skanska provides comprehensive construction services, including in the data center and resilient infrastructure markets, with comprehensive end-to-end services from initial design through commissioning and close-out. The company’s expertise includes enterprise data centers, co-location facilities, and live data center upgrades and expansions.
Total Site Solutions
Anthony Angelini, President, CEO
Headquarters: Round Rock, Texas
Total Site Solutions provides mission-critical infrastructure design and support services including data center assessment and audit, design, construction, operations, maintenance, and planning for both traditional and modular data centers, with a full series of life-cycle services for modular solutions from pre-deployment to post-deployment.
Wood Harbinger
Thomas A. Leonidas, P resident, CEO
Headquarters: Bellevue, Wash.
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 electrical and mechanical engineering, industrial systems design, commissioning, fire protection, industrial systems, planning and IT.
WSP Global
Pierre Shoiry, President, CEO
Headquarters: Montreal
WSP Global provides professional services including fire engineering, lighting design, intelligent building systems, and green building design across many industries including energy-efficient data centers. The company expanded rapidly in 2015 with acquisitions of engineering consultant MMM Group and structural engineering firm Halvorson and Partners.