October 16, 2003 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- eXchange@200 Paul (e200paul.com), a carrier hotel and provider of colocation facilities, has expanded its second San Francisco Bay area carrier hotel in Santa Clara, California, and increased the selection of high-speed network and services at both of its facilities within the last quarter.
At its 1100 Space Park facility, eXchange@200 Paul added several carriers and network service providers to its carrier hotel, including Verizon Global Networks, SBC Communications Inc., WilTel Communications, Qwest Communications International Inc., Neopolitan Networks, Looking Glass Networks, Silicon Valley Power and Tyco Telecom. Between its two facilities, eXchange@200 Paul now has 42 carriers and IP service providers.
Within its 200 Paul Ave. facility in San Francisco, eXchange@200 Paul provides 65-gigabit Ethernet connections through 11 services providers, including NTT/Verio, Above.net, Wiltel, Cogent Communications, OnFiber Communications and Optigate.
The company now also has the capacity to build up to an additional 300,000 square feet of space on its campuses. Further, eXchange@200 Paul can now escalate service provision for its customers from a single cabinet cage to 10,000 sq. ft.
"eXchange@200 Paul continues to grow stronger demonstrating our stability and growth in the carrier hotel and colocation industries," said John Wilson, CEO and President of eXchange@200 Paul. "In the past 12 months, we have maintained strong positive cash flow, reduced our debt and remain fully funded to support future capital investments. We are bullish on our prospects for the remainder of 2003 and beyond as we maintain our commitment to providing network providers and enterprises with the optimal carrier-neutral marketplace for bandwidth connectivity."
The company contends that it has emerged as the West Coast's major telecom and IP interconnection center, or network access point (NAP). As a result, the carrier hotelier is on the same competitive tier as the 60 Hudson Street facility in New York City; NAP of the Americas in Miami; or 151 Front Street in Toronto, Canada. According to Wilson, both the eXchange@200 Paul and 1100 Space Park facilities house between 100 to 120 carriers that are only one hop away from the facility.
The major difference between eXchange@200 Paul and the other facilities listed however is that both 200 Paul and 1100 Space Park are under the full control of the company. The firm designed, built, owns, and manages all aspects of both campuses. According to Wilson, this means less headaches for the company's customers, as they only need to deal with one vendor for the installation of equipment, installation of cables through risers, and access to meet-me rooms.
"We strive to offer fully end-to-end solutions," states Wilson. "In most other buildings, if you need special arrangements, you will need to deal with three companies. With eXchange@200 Paul, you only need to deal with one company - us."
He attributes this business model for making his company tremendously popular and by extension EBIDA positive. The current 115 colocation customers in both facilities presently covers all the company's debt servicing. Wilson notes the company's debt load is tremendously low because the majority it is held as low-interest mortgages.
Under his conservative management style, the company has reduced its debt load by almost 20 per cent. Because of the low cost for borrowing, which is currently under 5 per cent, the company is strongly cash positive, allowing it pursue its expansion strategy into the upcoming fiscal quarters.
"By the end of the first quarter of 2004, we expect to partner with certain service providers in order to offer more products and services to our telecom and enterprise customers," said John Wilson. "In certain markets, major carrier hotels have emerged. We want to partner with those hotels in other major geographic locations that have a critical mass of carriers."
Basically, eXchange@200 Paul intends to directly peer traffic with other network access points throughout North America by early next year. The intent of a number of NAPs is to connect to each other directly around the county. By so doing, a corporate office in California can obtain more rapid network access to the 60 Hudson facility or other mid-town office buildings in Manhattan when sending data (whether telecom, voice over IP, or strictly IP traffic) to its offices in New York City.
Through striking such deals in the first quarter of next year, all facilities involved will be able to offer its large corporate customers more advanced direct connections to other geographic markets, while retaining their carrier neutrality. Currently several facility operators, including eXchange@200 Paul, have begun to negotiate the terms of their direct interconnection.
