July 29, 2003 -- Moving a complex web site from one data center to another is a headache. Most companies aren't eager to do it. So Mike Bullock and Craig Macfarlane started a business to do it for them.
Bullock and Mcfarlane founded Transitional Data Corp. last year, just as the current wave of data center consolidations began to pick up steam. Facility closures by Cable & Wireless, Qwest, Above.Net and others have created a steady supply of customers.
"The second half of last year is when we began to take advantage of the chaos and forced churn," said Bullock, who along with Macfarlane had moved sites several times while working with iCast and Student Advantage Inc.
Transitional Data is among a number of companies now specializing in the migration business, including Data Move and Web Site Movers. While these business are thriving on the current turmoil, Bullock says that making migrations simpler and easier is critical to the future of the hosting industry.
"When there's little new business and the only way you can get customers is to steal them from your competitors, a low churn rate is a problem," says Bullock, noting companies' historic reluctance to relocate. "Hosting is a really sticky business. We'd like to change that."
While many of the current migrations are driven by stability issues, in the future they will be driven by cost management.
"A lot of companies are looking to cut costs," and would like the option of moving, he said. "They're coming to the end of three-year agreements they signed right at the top of the market."
For the moment, data center closures are keeping Boston-based Transitional Data busy. The company has several ways to locate customers.
"Our business is split between direct sales and a channel approach," said Bullock. "Initially we partnered with tier two providers like NEESCOM and Northeast Data Vault, figuring they'd be the beneficiaries of consolidation, and they were. But we also get a significant number of leads from AT&T and MCI. We're going in as their partner.
"We're also seeing a fair amount of activity around the disaster recovery and business continuity area," Bullock added. "We've done a couple of moves from the East Coast to the West Coast."
Moving between two data centers can cost a company between two and three months' of its average hosting costs, according to Bullock. The cost also depends on whether your site is being mirrored and hosted by Transitional Data during the switchover, or they're just moving the equipment.
"Typically you can't just pick up and move," said Bullock, whose work often involves imaging and mirroring systems for 30 to 60 days, and then "resinking" the data at the new facility. Transitional Data would be paid hosting costs while the data is mirrored, he noted.
How prepared are companies for the migration process? Often the answer is "not very," although Bullock says the numerous facility closures are causing more companies to consider whether they're ready to pick up and move.
"One of the primary values we bring is that we've done this so many times," said Bullock. "Typically for smaller outfits it's several days of preparation work, and we can pull off transitions in a matter of weeks. With larger operations, just the remediation can take several weeks. When you get into the larger moves, you start getting into a level of complexity where if you don't do a lot of preparation, you'll be left with weeks of work after the move."
While migrations have provided business for specialists, many hosting providers have in-house procedures for relocating incoming clients. Among them is managed hosting provider Inflow Inc., which has moved more than 190 companies into its data centers.
"We feel that (managing migrations) is a a core competency for us," said Inflow chief executive officer Art Zeile. "We have a very defined process of planning out every minute of the move. Every transition is always unique, but we've put a process wrapper around it.
"Usually they don't have any planning in place," said Zeile. "We'll document everything and put together a move plan that incorporates their time factors."
With Sprint and Cable & Wireless still sorting out the future of their data center networks, there's likely more work ahead on the migration front.
"I believe there is a bit more shakeout coming," said Bullock. "There's definitely overcapacity, and there are some very shaky players out there."