Whether measured by attendance, exhibitors or location, the American Internet Services Second Annual Technology Expo held Oct. 15 will go down as one of the year's most innovative local trade shows.
The massive 80,000-square-foot Light-wave Data Center, owned and operated by AIS, was briefly opened to the public to accommodate a sold-out crowd that topped 1,000 people.
The preparation work that went into securing the facility for such an event, which included armed guards and employees stationed at every turn, started three months in advance.
Planners had ambitiously allotted space for 50 exhibitors -- twice the number that turned out last year -- only to find the roster climbed to 62.
"We even ran out of parking," said an incredulous but delighted Chris Orlando, director of strategic channels at AIS. "We had four parking lot attendants concerned about where to direct the overflow "
The strategic thinking behind hosting  the expo on-site sprang from the desire to get vendors and visitors talking with the many diverse businesses that AIS interacts with.
"We had folks who showed up that afternoon just to take in the facility and the networking, but one of the goals was also to get them to stop and ask, 'Wait a minute. Why aren't we in a facility like this?' We were planting seeds in people's mind to rethink how they were managing their IT operations."
Many took guided tours of the custom-built facility constructed by a company that ranks in the top five electrical power consumers among privately held companies in San Diego.
Tour groups glimpsed aisle after aisle of server racks, surveillance equipment, a room of batteries stacked dozens high, and two diesel generators the size of studio apartments that can be powered up indefinitely in the event of an electrical outage.
The equipment and amenities all go under the heading of colocation services, which allows parties to place Web servers or storage devices in AIS' racks and utilize its bandwidth .
Brisk Business
AIS also offers related engineering services, cabling and Internet Security Manager, which is grounded in a firewall that detects and prevents intrusion.
"Our business is doing well because we provide a service that helps companies save (capital expenditure) dollars," Orlando said. "In this economic environment, businesses are re-evaluating expenses across the board. When it comes to colocation services, a lot of people are finding that it doesn't make sense to invest in huge infrastructure and the cost it takes to build redundancy at their own facilities." (continued...)
© 2009 San Diego Business Journal under contract with MarketWatch. All rights reserved.
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