A busy summer for announcements in containerised data centers saw HP enter the market. Reports showed the take up of European data center space held up in the first quarter while August saw IBM announce a $360 million facility in North Carolina.

July: Technology: HP entered the containerised data center market with its POD (Performance Optimised Data center). HP also got involved with Intel and Yahoo! to create a global cloud computing research test bed. Liebert Challenger ITR launched to provide energy efficient cooling directly to data center rows. Migration Solutions, the data center and computer room specialist, has launched a new Environmental Report and Audit (ERA) - the first industry-standard tool to provide a 360 view of the environmental impact and performance of data centers. NTT Facilities, a fully owned subsidiary of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT Corp), and Hitachi Ltd announced power-saving and operational technologies combined with NTT Facilities' know-how on building management such as air conditioning. The base system is intended to be operational by March 2009. HP launched Factory Express RFID Service to track data center assets.

Europe: Dynamic Network Services Inc. has announced the opening of their latest data center in Amsterdam. Interxion opens its fifth Frankfurt data center. TelecityGroup signed a contract with Eindhoven based Van Schaik Innovation Handling. It announced EnoTemp, a mobile unit will be used to visualize air streams and heat release at all of TelecityGroup's Amsterdam data centers. It also announces a new data center in Milan. CB Richard Ellis said London data center take up was hit by a dip in financial services sector activity while Frankfurt market had an excellent first quarter with take-up of 11,180 square meter which represents 60 per cent of total take-up across the Tier 1 markets. Total market take-up for the European Tier 1 market in Quarter 1 was 18,620 square meter, down four per cent compared with Quarter 1 2007. Dresdner Kleinwort deployed Tideway Foundation across the investment bank to gain a 360 degree view of their applications and infrastructure.
Corporate: DataPipe secured $75 million dollars in combined credit and equity financing led by Goldman Sachs. Capgemini acquires Getronics PinkRoccade Business Application Services BV. Schneider Electric and Bull partnered to offer comprehensive data center energy audit services.

US: Terremark opens the NAP of the Capital Region - a facility 60 miles from Washington DC. CRG West announces new 50MW data center campus in Santa Clara. VMware plans major data center in Wenatchee. Juniper Networks selected IBM as a data center hosting provider at the supplier's Boulder, Colorado facility.

UK: Car parts supplier Find-a-Part colocates with The Bunker as part of a move out of London.

Asia: SAVVIS opens new data center space in Singapore

August: US: IBM unveils plans for $360 million data center in North Carolina. Equinix to join US EPA Energy Star Program and Support Certification Initiative for data centers. Stream Realty Partners breaks ground on second ready-to-fit data center in San Antonio, Texas. Frost Bank, the investments and insurance subsidiary of Cullen/Frost Bankers Inc., in San Antonio, made plans to construct a $50 million data center in the city.

Asia PAC: IBM launches cloud computing center in Tokyo. Cisco Malayasia's MD said the country's government should focus on establishing energy-efficient data centers. A survey found availability and energy efficiency to be the top data center issues in Asia.

Technology: APC announces TradeOff Tools - web-based applications that simplify the data center decision making process and also introduced its next generation of hydrogen fuel cell UPSs. Chloride N+1 uninterruptible power protection for UK Grid data center. Active Power selected by Sun Microsystems for its containerised data center.

UK: Network-i brings much needed additional data center space to the Thames Valley. Anite builds new UK data center space. Evolution completes 550 sq metre £6 million data center for Netstore.

Europe MEA: Kenyan Bank K-Rep has set up a data center. Central Europe's largest data center' opens in Hungary with the completion of an investment by Magyar Telekom.