Redbus
From Weycrest Support Wiki
Redbus Interhouse is a London based colocation provider. It was founded in 1998 by Demon Internet founder, Cliff Stanford, with the establishment of their first data centre in London Docklands.
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London Sites
Redbus Harbour Exchange: This is their original data cente located on floors 8 and 9 of 6&7 Harbour exchange. Like many data centres this was a retro fit into commercial office space. It had a number of problems (mainly power related) which Redbus invested a lot of money trying to correct during 2005.
Harbour Exchange offers parking for a small number of vehicles outside in Harbour Exchange Square and is adjacent to the London Docklands Arena (shortly to be demolished for residential housing).
Waiting time may be restriced during office hours so you may have to park at the London Arena. Usually there are no parking problems, evenings, late at night or at weekends. There is excellent public transport with the Crossharbour Docklands Light Railway (DLR) Station only a short walk away.
Redbus Meridian Gate: Again another retro fitting commercial office space, but to a higher standard. Backs onto East India Dock. It offers parking for a small number of vehicles.
Redbus Sovereign House: Purpose built for datacentre use and their biggest facility, next to a multi-storey car park. This building has the best of all locations in london specification wise. It is also now their head office.
Once again there is parking in the service road behind Sovereign House and in parking bays outside adjacent offices (namely the Isle of Dogs Job Centre).
A wireless network is operated from the roof of Sovereign House by Awellconnected and supplies a number of organisations in the City, including Weycrest
Facilities
All Redbus facilities in theory have clean build rooms, though getting one at short notice can be difficult. All facilities have a break or snack room, with refreshments provided from a vending machine. Coffee was originally free at Sovereign House, on account of it being the Head Office, but this is now charged. Office accomodation for tech staff is also available at some Redbus locations.
Europe
Redbus also operates 7 data centres in 5 european cities - Amsterdam, Frankfurt, London, Milan and Paris.
Company Take over
Following a number of scandals which would seem far fetched even in a soap opera, Redbus was bought out by its major competitor Telecity in late 2005.
The combined company is now called TeleCityRedbus.
Redbus operates seven facilities in London, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Paris and Milan and boasts more that 800 clients including AOL, AT&T, BT, Vodafone, City Index, BBC and Google. In 2004 Redbus lost £1.1m on a turnover of £16m.
TeleCity operates nine datacentres across six European markets and has some 600 clients.
The offer was made by an outfit called Torch Partners on behalf of TeleCity. In the summer TeleCity agreed to a £58m buyout led by the 3i investment group.
This take over has seen massive increases in the costs of floorspace and power within the Redbus facilities pushing the average rack price to £1500 per month from a previous price of £350.
Internet exchanges
LINX connections are available at two of the London Redbus locations. Also present are LoNAP, LIPEX, SovEx and Redbus Internet Exchange switches.
