Located within its sprawling Redmond campus, the Microsoft Technology Center (MTC) was designed to showcase and demonstrate the tangible business values of implementing solutions for its enterprise customers. “We are here to assist our customers assembling the detailed information they need to make smart decisions regarding their technology solutions.” says Jeff Ramos, Director of Enterprise Technology for Microsoft.

The Redmond MTC, one of several worldwide, provides development suites, hands-on training facilities, product labs and the technology experts to help its customers envision, architect and prove out solutions using .NET connected technologies. The Redmond MTC is located on Microsoft’s corporate campus, and hosts CXO’s and IT Professionals from all vertical industries around the world.  MTCs are also located in Austin, Boston, Chicago, Silicon Valley, Munich, London, Tokyo and Beijing.

The APC Business Value
APC was tapped to design the MTC’s core data center with stringent technical requirements— like accommodating for disaster recovery twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. Ramos adds, “The future is all about business efficiency based around operations. Microsoft needs to drive efficiency in systems management and reliability as the demand continues to grow.”

The success of this approach was instantaneous—word spread from one MTC to the next that deploying APC InfraStruXure® was the right strategy from both a management and operational perspective. The solid reliability and flexibility of the InfraStruXure® solution is an asset to MTC’s customers.

Flexibility + Modularity = Savings
Lewis Herrington, who manages the MTC’s daily operations, describes the unique challenges in further detail: “These centers require 100% uptime. The self-contained nature of InfraStruXure® makes it possible for us to implement a server and power solution rapidly with a high degree of reliability.” As a result, the Redmond MTC requires very little support from the company’s Operations and Technology Group. Herrington’s team also has the flexibility to move their InfraStruXure® gear from one location to another within the building. One benefit that stands out due to the unique design of InfraStruXure® is the cost and time savings of not having to hardwire the power distribution into the walls.

“The option for overhead cabling makes our lives easy”, adds Herrington. “Plus, the modularity of the InfraStruXure® system allows for power and battery module upgrades that take only minutes.  Servers of all makes and models slide in and out of the APC NetShelter® VX racks quite easily.”

InfraStruXure® in Action
In the first year of its deployment, InfraStruXure® came to Microsoft’s rescue when a truck hit a transformer on the campus grounds. Circuit breakers were heard popping throughout the building. InfraStruXure® automatically compensated for the imbalance and protected several sensitive applications, Internet sites and communication configurations. Downtime was avoided; it would have taken six hours for the center to recover from the power outage.

Mr. Ramos underscores an important value of the Microsoft-APC partnership: “The fact that APC is a truly global company reassures us that we can access the same consistently high level of data center design and power management expertise regardless of where we choose to do business.”