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| LG Uplus staff inspect data racks at the company's datacenter in Pyeongchon, Gyeonggi Province, last week. / Courtesy of LG Uplus |
By Bahk Eun-ji
PYEONGCHON, Gyeonggi Province ― Advances in IT technology and a mobile lifestyle have changed how people behave. Creating a huge data mine proved an asset for businesses to accelerate growth, with LG Uplus Pyeongchon Mega Center providing the systems.
The LG Group's telecommunications affiliate has opened a Mega Center to take advantage of the looming era of cloud computing.
"Cloud service is becoming more international and expanding national borders," Choi Young-bum, general manager of the company's International Datacenter (IDC), said last week.
"The Mega Center is at the center of the creative economy." The LG Uplus Mega Center is Asia's biggest. Three buildings ― an office building and two datacenters ― are on track to cover 17,281 square meters.
Each building has seven floors above ground and three basement levels. The physical separation of the data centers and office offers strong security with five steps of access control.
An area of 1,157 square meters can accommodate more than 450 server racks. It provides power of six to 20 kilowatts (kW) per rack ― more than three times the amount required for operational management efficiency.
The center will officially open in a month, but companies are already using 1,500 racks in three rooms.
Large IDCs are usually built in remote areas. However, LG Uplus chose the city, 22 kilometer from Seoul and a five-minute walk from Pyeongchon Subway station.
"It will eventually be more eco-friendly and highly efficient, as it is adjacent to a 154 kilovolt substation of the Korea Electric Power Corporation," Choi said.
"If we set up this size of IDC in a remote area, it would require a transmission tower, just like the one embroiled in controversy in Miryang."
The manager said the LG IDC had adopted eco-friendly technology, using patented free-cooling systems. It uses outside air to cool the rooms, so no air-conditioning is required for more than seven months of the year.
The center also features improved energy control.
"It can achieve a power usage effective level of 1.4, which enhances efficiency by 50 percent and reduces the utility rate by more than 20 percent, compared to existing centers," Choi said.
He said the center would lead the nation's cloud business, because it could be a bridge to China, the world's largest market.
"This center will be the stronghold of the Asian market," Choi said.
The center will be fully operational in August.
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