Google Inc.
(
GOOG
) recently announced the expansion of its data center in Finland to
meet the fast-growing demand for Internet usage and data storage
capacity.
The expansion will involve an additional investment of €150 million
($177 million). The company said that the project will take about
18 months to complete, creating 25 additional positions.
The data center is located in a former paper mill in the
south-eastern town of Hamina on the Baltic Sea coast. Google had
paid €40 million for its purchase and invested another €160 million
on converting and equipping it. The center began its operations in
September 2011. The data center uses sea water from the Bay of
Finland to reduce its cooling costs.
The need for data center expansion is rising due to growing
preferences for cloud computing. Cloud computing allows users to
store and process big data at remote data centers instead of their
own computers. Hence, expansion of data centers is more likely
these days. Google, being no exception, has also expanded its data
center to meet the requirement for more data-intensive services
such as YouTube and Gmail.
A survey conducted on 100,000 facilities by a data center dedicated
website, datacenterdynamics.com, shows that data center usage is
expected to grow around 7% in 2012. Moreover, the website has also
increased its investment projection for new data centers from about
$30.0 billion in 2010-11 to $35.0 billion in 2011-2012.
Recently, Google announced that it will spend more than $300
million to construct its largest Asian data center in Taiwan. The
company is scheduled to complete the construction of the Taiwanese
center early next year and start operations by the end of 2013.
Google has done very well in the second quarter, with its gross
revenue touching a record $12.21 billion. Revenues from both
Google-owned and partner sites continued to grow in double digits
on a year-over-year basis. Historically, Google has always fared
better than
Yahoo Inc
(
YHOO
), which has been struggling to uphold itself, and
Microsoft
(
MSFT
), which is yet to gain critical mass.
However, legal entanglements related to competitive matters or
patent infringements remain an overhang. Google retains a Zacks #3
Rank, which translates into a short-term Hold recommendation.
GOOGLE INC-CL A (GOOG): Free Stock Analysis
Report
MICROSOFT CORP (MSFT): Free Stock Analysis
Report
YAHOO! INC (YHOO): Free Stock Analysis Report
To read this article on Zacks.com click here.
Zacks Investment
Research