Yandex started construction of its most powerful data center in Russia

Yandex will build its fourth data center in Kaluga to cover the growing demand for cloud services - it should become the most powerful in the holding structure in RUSSIA.Previously, the company had problems with the data center in Finland

The fact that "Yandex" has begun construction of a new data center in Kaluga on the territory of the industrial park "Grabtsevo", the company said.

The data center will have more than 3.8 thousand server racks, and the total design capacity of the site will be 63 MW, which is 1.5 times more than in the most powerful of the existing Yandex data centers. The opening of the first zone is scheduled for the first half of 2023.

So far, for the development of cloud technologies in Russia, Yandex has used three data centers: in the Moscow, Vladimir and Ryazan regions. The data center in Kaluga will have to be used to host customer equipment. Yandex explained that distributing the load across several data centers would ensure fault tolerance for customer applications and reduce the likelihood of data loss.

The Finnish data center of "Yandex" was disconnected from power supply Technology and media

At the same time, when creating a data center, according to a company representative, own equipment will be used, including for power supply. Against the backdrop of sanctions against high-tech exports to Russia on Wednesday, September 21, the HEAD of Yandex.Cloud (provides cloud services under the Yandex Cloud brand) Alexei Bashkeev said that the company had planned infrastructure development for 2022 even before these events, taking into account the projected growth business, so "the company does not experience problems with the equipment." Against this background, the commercial DIRECTOR of the company, Alexander Chernikov, announced a 20-30% reduction in prices for services for some clients, as the company recorded "certain stabilization in the market." In mid-April, Yandex announced a 30-60% increase in prices for cloud services due to an increase in prices for network and server equipment,

Yandex does not disclose investments in the construction of a new data center. According to the head of data centers CORE.XP. Thomas Hodgkinson, the construction of such a data center can cost $170–190 million (9.9–11.1 billion rubles at the current exchange rate). “Since we are talking about building a data center with a capacity of 15 kW per rack, and in Kaluga the cost of land is lower and, probably, cheaper electricity connection with higher equipment and engineering costs due to higher load, the cost will be about $45-50 thousand per counter (2.6-2.9 million rubles at the current exchange rate),” he argues.

ER-Telecom Holding decided to buy a stake in the data center business Technology and media

Read on RBC Pro Pro Leave to return:why foreigners sell business to top management Pro Instructions How to save money when the market crashes:advice from economists Forecasts Pro How to get into the IT talent pool of the state Instructions ProThe Fed's hawkish mood could bring down the S&P index.What are the Prerequisites of Article Pro How to Use an Overseas Account and Avoid Penalties from Tax InstructionsPro How to build processes in the IT department: choosing the appropriate methodology Articles Pro “Salary does not grow for years”:what it's like to work at Cisco - in 5 points Articles Pro Who will not open an account abroad and why InstructionsPro Who will not open an account abroad and why InstructionsPro Who will not open an account abroad and why InstructionsInstructionsInstructions

According to iKS-Consulting, at the end of 2021, 52.6 thousand rack spaces were introduced in Russia in commercial data centers, and by the end of this year the figure could grow to 55.7 thousand. sixth place in terms of revenue with a share of 2.5%. The largest players in this market were Rostelecom-DPC (19%), SberCloud (14.7%) and MTS (9.9%).

According to iKS-Consulting, the size of the IaaS (infrastructure as a service) market in 2021 amounted to 53.8 billion rubles. iKS-Consulting consultant Stanislav Mirin expects this market to grow by 40.7% in 2022, to RUB 75.7 billion. “In order to expand the volume of services, it is necessary to build up the computing infrastructure in a timely manner, which Yandex is doing. The company is growing faster than the cloud market, so the company's share in it will continue to increase," he predicts.

Problems with the Finnish data center

In addition to Russian data centers, Yandex has a data center in the Mäntsälä community in Finland, which was intended mainly to work with foreign companies. Part of the heat generated by the data center is used to heat water in about a thousand houses in Mäntsälä. However, after the start of a special military operation in Ukraine at the end of April, the local energy company Imatar Energy Oy disconnected it from the power supply, and Yandex had to transfer the data center to a backup source of energy - a diesel generator.

Experts interviewed by RBC then said that in a similar power format, the data center would be able to work for an unlimited amount of time if it was constantly refueled with diesel, but this would lead to significant costs - about 15 million rubles. per day, based on the cost of diesel at that time. A week later, the company changed the name of its legal entity in Finland from Yandex Oy to Global Dc Oy. A company representative explained this by the fact that international services do not use the Yandex brand.

"Daughter" of "Rosatom" is interested in buying data centers Technology and media

According to a RBC source in the IT market and confirmed by an interlocutor close to Yandex, the company "successfully" solved the problem with the data center in Finland. According to the second, they registered a new legal entity and restored access to electricity, but did not specify with which of the energy companies they managed to conclude an agreement. Prior to switching to diesel generators, the data center collaborated with Imatar Energy Oy.

At the same time, on Thursday, September 22, the Finnish edition of Helsingin Sanomat reported that the shares of the local "daughter" of Yandex in Finland were frozen due to sanctions against the founder of the company, Arkady Volozh (in early June, the European Union included him in the sanctions list, calling a major businessman working in sectors of the economy that provide a significant source of income for the Russian government, as well as a person who materially or financially supports the government and is responsible for actions or policies that undermine or destabilize Ukraine). In addition to the data center, the company is developing a taxi service under the Yango brand in the country. But, according to the publication itself, the freezing of shares will not affect the operation of the company's assets.

The press service of "Yandex" refused to comment on the information about the freezing of shares of its Finnish "daughter". RBC sent a request to the municipality of Mäntsälä.