HETZNER CONSTRUCTS DATA CENTER PARK IN FINLAND

Gunzenhausen/Helsinki – 1. December 2015

Gunzenhausen/Helsinki, December 2015. The German webhoster Hetzner Online is investing in a new data center park in Finland. Its construction is scheduled to begin in spring 2016. 

Hetzner Online operates several of its own data centers in Germany, where they have many IT products and services on offer, and their approximately 200 employees serve private and business customers from across the globe. The cornerstone of Hetzner Online's Finnish investment is its participation in the construction of a submarine cable from Helsinki to Rostock. With the completion of this initial step, Hetzner Online hopes to then build a solid foundation for its data center in Finland and for the company's continued growth abroad. 

During the search for a location for its new data center park, Hetzner Online discovered that other European countries are able to provide more favorable conditions for growth than Germany. After analyzing the advantages and disadvantages of each potential location, a clear picture gradually emerged of which states offered the best conditions for Hetzner Online's new international data center. 

At the end of the selection process, Finland stood out amongst the other countries for several compelling reasons: the country's ideal climate, its proximity to the Eastern European webhosting market, and its location as a geographic intersection of Eastern and Western Europe. 

However, one of the most significant factors in favor of Finland is its comparably cut rate electricity prices. These are considerably cheaper than they are in Germany; because data centers are known for consuming a lot of energy, this low price is a very decisive factor in ensuring that Hetzner Online will remain a competitive international data center operator. 

After carefully considering 20 potential locations in Finland, Hetzner Online chose a plot in the business part of Tuusula, a town approximately 20 kilometers north of Helsinki. The site, which is located near the region Vantaa, is 150,000 square meters. It is also connected to an important fiber optic network, and it centrally located, making it ideal for potential workers. A distance far enough away from the coast was chosen in order to prevent the sensitive technical equipment from being damaged by a high level of salt in the air. Martin Hetzner, the founder and CEO of Hetzner Online explained, “In the end, what actually made this particular location so attractive was people associated with it – the professional cooperation that we experienced from the Tusuula municipal administrators and from the national economic development office 'Invest in Finland' played big role.” 

The first data centers of the locally-founded Hetzner Finland Oy will be built in stages and to meet demand for more server space. The technical plans as well as the aesthetic design will be based on the company's previous data center parks in Germany. 

This investment decision will result in a range of innovative new jobs, especially for IT specialists, electricians, and software developers. For more information regarding these positions, please see jobs.hetzner.com. 

The new Helsinki data center park is the perfect complement to the two German data center locations in Falkenstein and Nuremberg, and is, from a European standpoint, the optimal site. In addition to this location, Hetzner operates a data center park in Johannesburg, South Africa. 

With this investment, Hetzner Online is taking another important step in its continued and successful growth. “Having servers available on offer in the near future, not only in Germany, but also in Finland, will lay the foundation for Hetzner Online being able to offer all of its customers better price-to-performance ratios and exceptional customer support,” underlined Martin Hetzner.