In Building Data Centers, Chicago Outpaced by Other Markets

The greater Chicago area ranks third in the country for data center capacity, but it’s not growing as fast as other major markets. Those are the findings of a new report sponsored by the Illinois Chamber of Commerce Foundation and data industry professionals. What are data centers? Simply put, they’re buildings that house tech infrastructure like servers and computers that store, process and distribute digital data – from serving up websites to number-crunching for e-commerce transactions to backing up multimedia and documents. In other words, crucial equipment for businesses, governments and organizations to operate. According to the real estate firm CBRE, the number of data centers in the Chicago area grew at a rate of 7 percent from June 2017 to June 2018 while Phoenix, Northern Virginia and Atlanta saw growth rates of 26, 16 and 12 percent, respectively, over the same time period.