The third largest cloud computing company in the world, OVH, will be investing $47 million to establish its first U.S. data center, and North American headquarters, in Fauquier County, Va.
Based in France, OVH operates 250,000 physical servers in 17 data centers, has just about 1 million customers in 17 countries, and is hosting 18 million Web applications. Providing customers with dedicated servers, Web hosting, cloud computing, and more, OVH will initially create 54 jobs in the upcoming Virginia location.
“The U.S. is a strategic market for OVH as we grow our business, and Virginia was a natural choice for our first presence in this new market,” said OVH CEO Laurent Allard in a recent press release. “Fauquier County offers a unique mix of a high-end, innovative digital infrastructure combined with a business and employee-friendly environment, along with a dedicated team that greatly facilitated our move.”
Virginia competed with North Carolina for the location of this project. The Virginia Economic Development Partnership worked with Fauquier County to secure this project for Virginia, and, Gov. Terry McAuliffe approved a $1.25 million grant from the Commonwealth’s Opportunity Fund to assist the county.
“OVH’s decision to establish its North American headquarters in Virginia after meetings and discussions in Europe and Virginia further solidifies the commonwealth’s global standing as the top player in the flourishing data center sector,” said McAuliffe. “Thanks to our competitive IT infrastructure and skilled workforce, Fauquier County will be home to one of the most elite cloud providers in the world.”
As one of their operations, the company will install dark fiber infrastructure in an existing facility in the Vint Hill Business Park location.
Todd Haymore, Virginia Secretary of Commerce and Trade, believes the project is a “win-win,” stating, “OVH will invest in infrastructure enhancements to the Vint Hill Business Park; opening access to the development of nearly 150 acres with increased fiber, sewer, water, and electrical capacity.”
“OVH is a tremendous addition to the nearly 600 data processing and hosting centers in the commonwealth, and we are proud that the company is part of our ongoing success in building a new Virginia economy,” said McAuliffe.
