Granlund sets up new Data Center department

Company aims to develop the world's most energy-efficient data centers.

In September, Granlund started up a new department focusing on data center design and consultancy. The data center organisation, to be known as Mission Critical, is led by Jari Innanen, who has previously worked for Granlund as a design director focusing on data center projects.

The new department will be a hub for all of the company’s specialist expertise in energy-efficient datacenter design and consulting, areas in which Granlund has accrued significant expertise in recent years.

”This decision is part of our increasingly substantial investment in design and consulting work, which will become even more important to us in the future. As the amount of data in the world is constantly increasing and the speed of data traffic is increasing, data centers will play an increasingly important role. And, of course, the energy efficiency of data centers will be particularly important,” says Innanen of the background to the new department.

In recent years, Granlund has been involved in major data center projects where the design has focused on energy efficiency. For example, Sonera’s data center in Helsinki, due to come online in 2018, has the largest data center heat recovery system in the world. CSC’s data center, located in Kajaani, is one of the most energy-efficient in the world, and the Equinix data center, designed by Granlund and located in central Helsinki, received the 2010 Green Enterprise IT Award from Uptime Institute.

The new department aims to promote data center operations and other services related to key expertise in Finland and, in the future, on international markets. The department will initially be staffed by 18 experts with a strong background.

”Granlund’s data center operations have expanded significantly in recent years. The top experts in the new department will also enable data center operations to undergo strong international development. This complements our Granlund 2020 strategy perfectly. Energy-efficient data centers are an important part of our future,” says Granlund’s CEO,Pekka Metsi.