Lee Bragg, CEO of Eastlink, at his corporate office in Halifax.PAUL DARROW/The Globe and Mail
As telecom players go, Lee Bragg isn't afraid to be the little guy going big on Big Data.
The chief executive officer of Eastlink is taking a deeper dive into the data centre business – one of the hottest growth sectors in telecom – at time when his Halifax-based cable company is craving more growth.
On Monday, he announced the opening of a data centre in Sambro, N.S., just outside of Halifax. Known as the Pennant Point Data Centre, it is Eastlink's second such facility.
For the past several years, Eastlink has been testing the waters with another data centre in Bermuda. But growing demand from commercial clients in the Maritimes prompted the company to expand back home.
"We're consuming more and more data, and it's becoming a more important part of a lot of commercial operations," Mr. Bragg said in a telephone interview.
"People truly have just their whole business running on a little server in a closet somewhere. They're realizing that when those things crap out and the power goes off, they can't run their business any more."
That need for constant connectivity is expected to fuel more growth in Canada's data centre market, which was worth roughly $4.1-billion last year, according to consultancy IDC Canada.
A wave of consolidation has swept the data centre industry in recent years allowing larger companies such as BCE Inc., Rogers Communications Inc. and Cogeco Cable Inc. to bulk up on assets. And while Eastlink is not as big as those other guys, it stands ready to compete.
Eastlink, a subsidiary of privately-held Bragg Communications Inc., has spent about $3-million over the last year to purchase and refurbish the Sambro facility. Since it was previously used as a cable landing station, it came with some of the requisite gear.
In addition to business clients, Eastlink is also experiencing growing demand from residential customers for services that allow them to back up their home computers and preserve key files such as family photos and videos.
As a result, Mr. Bragg sees data centres as a growth opportunity – not unlike the wireless business. Last year, Eastlink became the latest company to launch a cellphone network in a bid to compete with heavyweights such as Rogers, Bell and Telus Corp.
"There seems to be a need for more competition … So we decided to get into the cellular business."
He later added: "This is another business investment that made sense to us, and we're just charging ahead."
Although Eastlink has historically grown through tuck-in acquisitions of small telcos and cable companies, he said management began to seek out new revenue streams after available targets grew scarce in recent years.
"Our neighbours are all bigger than I am – it's, you know, Cogeco, Vidéotron, Shaw and Rogers. And [the] telcos are Bell, Telus and SaskTel and MTS. And those guys; they're harder for us to buy," he quipped.
Rita Trichur