The cost of colo goes up year by year, but hosting on-premise contains hidden costs says Coreix

In-house flexibility comes at a premium, says colo provider

Data centre colocation firm Coreix made a case to support its business model today, suggesting that while colocation costs will certainly rise every year, they could still outweigh the hidden costs of choosing to host on-site.

"Storing in-house is good to begin with, but in the end software updates or failed power supplies lead you to start googling solutions or parts, or hiring someone to help," said Mansoor Bin Saeed, development director at Coreix.

But responding to CIO of St Andrews University Steve Watt's comments about a potentially increasing cost of 15 to 20 per cent when going colo earlier today, Bin Saeed told Computing:

"The cost of power goes up, so the cost of colo will go up year by year - there's a certain figure of percentage it goes up by.

"But if you're hosting in-house you don't how much your cooling or power will cost, and maybe you've never thought about having separate power feeds or UPS [uninterruptible power supplies] in case there's a power outage for four hours."

With colo, argued Bin Saeed, "there's no added power or bandwidth costs, and you can even outsource your tech support completely. And they'll allow you to scale as well."

Bin Saeed added that he believes maintaining a level of flexibility is not as cost effective in-house as it is with colo.

"It's not cost effective to have the same level of flexibility built in-house - the most cost-effective solution is to colocate," he said.

"You don't have to pay for generators or substation fees. It'll also give you flexibility and scalability."

Computing spoke to Coreix managing director Alan Dean about the company's perceived challenges in the colocation market a few weeks ago.