Article

NetShift managed services locked down tight

NetShift hosts managed services for 20 clients from a nuclear bunker built by American forces.

September 3, 2003

Bunker door

It's a location of intrigue straight out of the Cold War: a nuclear bunker built in Greenham County, England, by American armed forces. It has six-foot thick concrete walls slammed shut with a blast-proof door; a dual, uninterruptible power supply; backup phone lines; constant temperature...an infrastructure built strictly for security.

And today it is the off-site hosting facility for kiosk vendor NetShift. For the past 18 months, NetShift has hosted its managed service from the bunker. The software vendor hosts from that location about 20 different clients with networks ranging in size from six kiosks to nearly a thousand. See related stories, "Software's remote control," NetShift issues release on Fla. office closing."

One of NetShift's biggest customers, Vodaphone, has devices managed from the bunker. "They have very strict standards. That's as tough as it gets," said Tim Daw, chief operations officer at NetShift.

Quite a find

Daw has had his eye on the bunker for some time. And the company was considering moving hosting to an off-site location as an added security measure for customers. "It's only about a 10-minute drive from the office. I've always been intrigued by it. The site was famous during Cold War protests."

The protesters stayed about 10 years after the end of the Cold War, but the site is all quiet now. "They've ripped up the runways and turned the area back to wildlife," said Daw.

When the bunker became available for rent, NetShift jumped at the chance. Daw did not disclose the cost of renting the facility, or the owner.

"We aren't the only people using bunkers in this fashion. A security company is using another local bunker. The physical security of the building is attractive."

And, of course, the location adds a bit of color to NetShift's offerings, said Daw.

The facility hadn't been used since the American forces left it. "We have it built up now, and it's time to announce it to the world," said Daw. He explained that NetShift had to upgrade mostly just the air conditioning. The company put in place replicated servers with real-time back up.

"The infrastructure is fantastic. There are these big cables run into the building. It was built for service at a time when money didn't matter. To build something like this now would be prohibitively expensive," he said.

Daw added, "We joke that the American taxpayers built our hosting facility."

At your service

NetShift offers a comprehensive suite of services to kiosk deployers, including design, development, deployment, monitoring, analysis and remote management of devices. Customers can select from dedicated or shared servers.

"We have a very complete managed service with a suite of programs. We don't just ping kiosks." Enterprise Managed Service sells for about $75,000, according to Daw.

Often NetShift completely monitors kiosks in the pilot stage. Then customers migrate into managing the network themselves through the hosting center.

"To run a NOC (network operations center) isn't just setting up some servers," he said. "By letting us host the network, customers get the benefit of our expertise."

Four people man the hosting center, and a development team is available from NetShift's headquarters.