August 18, 2008 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- Data center operator Digital Realty Trust (digitalrealtytrust.com) announced on Monday it has promoted Jim Smith to chief technology officer.
Smith has served as the company's vice president of engineering. He is the first person to hold the title of CTO at Digital Realty Trust, a role where he will direct the company's implementation of data center technologies.
"Jim's work has had a profound impact on the way we design and operate all of our facilities, and this promotion to CTO will allow him to play an even greater role in how we utilize technology to drive increasing value for our customers by reducing costs, increasing operating efficiencies, and developing green operating environments," says Michael F. Foust, CEO of Digital Realty Trust. "He was recently recognized as one of the top technologists in the industry by InfoWorld, and we are proud to call him our own. Digital Realty Trust is changing the face of the data center industry, and he is a big part of our success story."
Last month, Smith was included in 'InfoWorld's Top 25 Chief Technology Officers for 2008,' a list of the top technologists in the IT industry.
InfoWorld's profile of Smith highlighted his role leading Digital Realty Trust's green data center initiatives and his extensive industry education efforts to spread adoption of green best practices.
Digital Realty Trust has achieved a number of industry firsts for green data centers, including building the first LEED Gold data center, being the first company to report PUE energy efficiency data about its data center facilities, being the first real estate company to become a contributor member of The Green Grid (thegreengrid.org), and being the first company to adopt a number of other green best practices across its global portfolio of data center facilities.
In April, the company shared the results from a new study it conducted on green data center trends that "show significant changes since 2007."
As vice president of engineering, Smith directed all data center development projects, leading the company's efficiency and green datacenter strategy, and managed power procurement and energy management.
The past three years has seen Smith and the Digital Realty Trust team deliver more than 100,000 kW of UPS capacity on over 40 data center projects in North America and Europe.
