 Welcome to JSA TV and JSA podcast the leading newsroom for data centers and telecoms professionals I'm Joe Marksley. I'm joining me today state control city of Iceland's leading data center provider Vern global Thanks. Thank you so much for joining us Thanks, yeah For people that don't know you or the northern very well, let us know. What's your journey? What's your history? How did you become involved with the data center worlds and what was very what does one do? Sure. Well for me Started many years ago. Actually, I actually started in a super computing lab in Tulane University in New Orleans I was programming My own science. I was doing super computing simulations of electromyocardial activity in the heart and You know, I was my whole life was surrounded around these two millimeter by two millimeter patches of tissue and as an electrical engineer in undergrad I got kind of a I don't know a fly that was buzzing me around me and Said I should I should go see the world a little bit and and and also learn a little bit about what? More I could do an electrical engineering. So I actually drove up to Alaska Got a job in the power engineering industry up there and Then by the time I came back To the lower 48 as we called it up in Alaska By the by the time I came back I actually settled near Washington DC and that was right about the time that the internet Industry was kicking off. I started working for the group that was designing and building all of the data centers for America online at the time You've got mail So I started working there and and helped a company called above net You know go with their global deployment of data centers around the world really interesting time and Coming out of the the comm we'll call it the comm bust It was a time when frankly a lot of people questioned The value of the data center assets and and I was actually lucky enough to get involved with the the start of Dupont Fabros at the time it was Dupont Fabros development They they brought me in as a partner to develop the operations team And to operate and design and and help to build the the data centers that they rolled out across the the US They went public that company floated in 2007 It was at the time. I think it was the seventh largest reed in history So it was pretty exciting But I kind of wanted to do more and so I knew that that one of the next challenges for the data center industry was going to be Energy and specifically power also about that time I was I was getting my I had three boys by then and was starting to think about the legacy I was leaving for them and and just building data centers everywhere and so I Got very interested in vernglobal which at the time in 2008 was just getting started with their concept of sustainable data centers built in Iceland which has a 100% renewable energy grid actually the only one in Europe. That's a hundred percent renewable renewable generation so so and and that's really where where Verne started and Oh, you know, it didn't take us long to find out that we had an important niche to serve in the industry in the data center industry Which was to bring that sustainable? Capability to high-intensity computing and by high intensity computing. I'm not limiting it just to high performance computing Which we think of as HBC, but also artificial intelligence AI The training of these models super important and and so what vernglobal has been able to do It's been able to take the concept of Iceland Which was this I remember hearing about it kind of in the early knots as this place where you could do these amazing things with free cooling sustainable power, but No one had gone and done it and and so we we actually Really set up the industry. I mean it took from 08 until 2011 to get the campus set up and Get started and from there. We've just had fantastic uptake. We've got some really marquee customers in Iceland BMW Volkswagen representing the manufacturing industry We've got some great financial services customers who prefer to be unnamed But that that's a large large growth area that we see and and then companies like that are really leading the edge in artificial intelligence like deep L Which is a natural language translation company that does uses artificial intelligence and you know very parallel models to do this and one of our most recent customers, which is Really exciting company called peptone and so peptone is Developing what they call the protein engineering operating system and that they developed this P. O. S. To handle massively parallel Molecular simulations that are orchestrated and supervised by reinforcement learning algorithms So you're getting that kind of you're getting HPC this convergence of high performance computing And artificial intelligence, which I just I love being at the center of that. Yeah, I mean, it's a whole new world I remember the first time I heard from you guys very and I think was 2015 and at the time You had signed something around smart cars or driverless cars So you're quite involved in a lot of different things and then came blockchain and everything else But how would you describe the data center market in Iceland today? And how would you kind of connect into the other continents? So North America and Europe because you kind of this bridge in the middle of the Atlantic connecting both continents Sure. Yeah states of the place. So I'd say the status right now is you know, obviously very well-served For the local population. There's there's a number of small data center companies and and burn That's serving primarily the enterprise in international enterprise market. We were set up specifically for that And since we were that international connection international company All of the the high-speed undersea cable systems terminate at Vern as as you would expect And so in a way, we are we are really the center of enterprise computing in Iceland And and so, you know, just for those who don't understand how Iceland's connected with the rest of the world I mean, first of all, we're in a in a strategic location Right in the mid-Atlantic. So we're we're connected back to the US by a cable system called telegreenland and then we're connected back towards your Europe with two systems one terminating in Scotland and another terminating in Denmark and and these are really modern, you know 100 gig wave, you know, or you know, in some cases a dark Fiber which is very uncommon to be able to obtain in an undersea system so fantastic connectivity back to Europe and and really we knew this was a prerequisite to be able to set up really a data center industry and So what I really like about what what we've been able to do in Iceland is we've been able to establish a Ecosystem so that regardless of the type of computing that someone is choosing to do How they want to operate it how they want to support it whether it be through cloud through bare metal Through individual servers. There's an entire ecosystem that's been set up to be able to support that and and while we're talking about connectivity I'll just go ahead and mention that there's a new cable system called iris which has been fully funded and should be coming online some time next year and that is going to be a New cable system connecting us directly to Dublin and and that that's really going to be interesting because you know We are the furthest west Nordic country and with a direct connection down to Dublin. You can just imagine how we're going to be able to short circuit You know the to the east coast of the US and and and also the connectivity down to you know What has become you know, just a real center a hub for a hyperscale Cloud type computing so so we're really excited about that We believe that the you know the growth that we're seeing, you know, whether financial service companies and other High-performance high-intensity computing users We think that that will pair very nicely with direct access to the cloud over that iris cable I was going to ask you on the back of where you just said about the iris cable if we can expect to see a lot of Fresh releases and news coming out of Fern around working with the hyperscale is so with the Google's and Facebook's of the world because if you're into Ireland I guess that's probably the main business drive behind it. Well, I mean, so, you know, they the Expansion of undersea cable systems really, you know, we've seen that that has been driven by hyperscale demand. So, you know, I wouldn't Comment specifically on any direct relationships that we might have with with the hyperscale community But for us, you know, we're just super excited to give our Customers the option to be able to choose how they do computing because you know specifically on the HPC side of things Our customers at least have seen that, you know, while you can You know cloud is fantastic at starting up with a new idea and being able to flexibly work decide which tool sets You're going to choose to work with and to be able to experiment with with new ideas It can become cumbersome once you're looking to scale and and look the cloud folks know this, right? I mean, that's that's the stickiness they they get people in with the new ideas and sure if you want to stay in that ecosystem You can you can be nimble But if you decide how your workflow is going to work and you know, we deal with some of the largest companies in the world They established workflows and then they look to optimize those and really ring all the fat out of them And when we're you know, I know specifically one of our financial services companies said that we're they You know, they put kind of an RFP of sorts to model what we're doing with them And it was over 5x the cost to put it in the cloud So which I don't think really should surprise anyone and it's why I think Co-location specifically as it relates to high intensity computing will be very important in the years to come I mean, we see the HPC markets growing Forecast to grow Intersex 360 said it should grow to 55 billion USD by 2024 and I mean the AI markets, you know, well well over double that Yeah, we are just the beginning at the beginning of it all But now that we've gone through the footprints the customers and the connectivity scheme around Verne and Iceland I mean Iceland is the island of fire and ice Every time I go to conference and you talk about Iceland Well, I talk about Iceland to some people some people still come back with well, they've got volcanoes there It's not the best place to host your data. What do you have to say to people like that? Because I mean, obviously there's a business there. You've been there for 15 plus years now And the business is going well and there's other clients going in there's other companies going in so What you have to tell people about when they say there's volcanoes in Iceland and you can't build a data center in Iceland beautiful canals Sure. Well, I mean, we purposely went there for a reason, right? You said fire and ice Kind of sums it up nicely, right? It's it's a great opportunity to be in a location where you know, there's a hundred percent Renewable generation. So that's that's first off. Um, and with the geothermal opportunity there, you know, there is You know, I I don't like the term limitless because there's always a limit to things but um, there's a very large expansion capacity For us to grow in terms of, you know, with the local providers of power in terms of generation So we like the scale and so what I would say to people is Um, if you like the ability to scale and you like low cost power Then the nice land is is something that should be on your radar. Yes, there are volcanoes But I would also counter that um, there are There are risks anywhere you put a data center I I mean, I've I've put data centers all over the world and I'm yet to find the place where You have zero risks. It just just doesn't happen It also just so happens that we decided, you know, this goes back to 2006 Which predates me a little bit, but um, you know, just after NATO pulled their flag down and handed the um, handed their campus You know, their allied command base they handed that back to Iceland It wasn't very long after that that vernglobal decided that that was an optimal location And I can tell you that that nato did not choose that location out of a whim. Um, we were actually Geologically isolated from uh other look in the areas in iceland where there is volcanic activity And the the the nice thing is is actually Volcanoes are not that hard to engineer against We use cooling systems that um can can operate a completely closed loop Which prevents this and and I you know, I I fully expect the next few generations of compute We're going to at least in the high intensity computing side We should be moving over to direct liquid which even further allows us to isolate that infrastructure. So And I you know, I should also mention as you said, you know, we've we've operated there for you know Well in excess of a decade and you know, there've been, you know, four events That that have been ongoing at the time During that time and and we've we've operated normally we've never had any impact To operations or infrastructure, you know upstream on campus. So It's a great opportunity and and uh, and we've been able to you know, engineer successfully around Concerns that some people might have But I I should also mention You know, our customers are continuing to grow right and and that's that's what we see We you know, we we bring value from an operational standpoint when somebody has an application that they would like to scale out They get comfortable with us and and they grow accordingly. So um once you become a customer, I think um, it's that's that's an easier easier question to solve And I'm sure it's a pretty day isn't it to visit with surrounding it is Yeah, we we we encourage people to come and have a look. I mean, you know that you know, I we um We've used to our advantage The location of iceland in fact, uh, you know, interesting story. I mean pep tone Came along with I think 25 other companies We had a we had an artificial intelligence round roundtable summit in iceland that we hosted This is pre-pandemic but um, we hosted that at the blue lagoon and and um Just had a you know, hosted a fantastic set of conversations And and they you know, pep tone was actually in that group. So So we we don't mind using iceland as a draw to get people interested in coming up and and now, you know They're they're actually in the position now. We're thankfully I just got my second shot and and I'm looking forward to being able to get back Over there again, um, you know, they're they're done amazingly well at uh, you know, throughout the covid pandemic. It's a it's a very Impressive society that iceland has out there. Yeah, they're very good at containing it And now in this second phase of vaccinations as well. So maybe I'll join you a few months time once I get my please But you touched on this As we were talking through as well Why are you going to be working on during this year and even into next year? And um, are we ever going to see verne global going global going elsewhere opening sites elsewhere? Sure. Well, I I will say for us. It's it's just about continued expansion. Um, we you know, we've in the last few years I mean we we more than doubled the amount of infrastructure that we we had in place and And we're we're planning on And on a huge increase in this coming year We should be in excess of 30 megawatts of infrastructure put in place, which is still That's still a small amount compared to our total campus capacity um, we um I think what you you should expect to see is a lot of announcements involving Partnerships, right? I mean we we have a very strong relationship that we've developed with nvidia We're now a titanium partner with del And and we do this because you know our our customers are you know for for some of their industries It really is you know somewhat of an arms race. I mean you know that the new technology And the new advancements that are are capable with you know chips like the the dg xa 100 nvidia dg xa 100 There's just some fantastic things that people can do and once they get those workflows in place It's just a matter of of how much equipment that we can move up So we're seeing huge growth from our customers And I would say be on the lookout for some interesting Funding announcements that will really allow us to leverage some relationships Moving forward, which you know could see some significant growth story for verne in the years to come Well, you know, I always like a bit of a money story. I like a bit of cash I know and and you know, I would definitely encourage you to have a conversation with our CEO dominic ward Dominic's really got an interesting story. I mean he he actually led The round for the welcome trust. He was heading up their private equity division at the time and so they were our first Let's say large long-term vision shareholder and you know, they've we we have fantastic investors, you know, they Every time there's been you know call for for capital To help us continue to develop They've been there and and we're now at a point where you know, we're we're able to we've been able to leverage some Very interesting debt story and I know dominic will be really excited to talk to you about that Yeah, but at this point, I would love to see him face to face Yeah But if people want to find out more about verne and if they want to subscribe to maybe Announcements or alerts your announcements, where can they go to find out more? well, you know, depending on when someone sees this we we're just in the final days of Launching a new website from global calm that will be focused on Making sure that our story is matching up with our social media message You can of course always find us on on twitter Facebook linkedin is probably you know for for professionals probably the best place to do it And then you know also, you know, I I like to I like to blog and talk about it So, you know, feel free to hit me directly on social media. I'm you know tate eight tech the number eight But uh, yeah, I'm I'm always happy to interact with people. I think there's just so There's so many great things that are happening and technology right now I think the data center has an important There we're of course important important part of driving infrastructure forward But but I believe that We should be and will be an example for other industries in terms of how You take sustainability and and make it an important part of the success of your overall industry And I think in the years that come, you know, I think we'll all look back and be very happy about these You know next 10 20 years that the data center industry is able to really convert to Um, identifying just how important sustainable infrastructure is And that's happening right now. I mean we can't wait. I'm 10 years to get the ball going. No Okay, thank you. Thank you so much for talking to us And thank you to our viewers for tuning into jsa tv and jsep podcast And don't forget to check our social media channels as well for more content Until next time happy networking