SLS’ Circular Center expansion is key to delivering sustainable data center services
As data center use explodes across the globe, so has the demand for sustainable decommissioning, resale and recycling services for data center equipment. Sims Lifecyle Services (SLS) is meeting that challenge by ramping up our capacity to provide local decommissioning and repurposing of servers in key data center areas of growth. In 2020 SLS introduced our “Recycle the Cloud” initiative, with the goal of increasing the number of data center assets we process from that year’s 1.6 million to 8.5 million by 2025. By 2021 we were well on our way, with a 31% increase, processing 2.1 million assets despite the restrictions brought on by COVID-19. We’re achieving this by both opening new Circular Centers and expanding existing sites in high-demand areas.
Ireland’s data center market is one of the fastest growing in Europe, and we’re seeing a huge demand for local, sustainable solutions for data destruction and decommissioning services. SLS’ newest Circular Center opened in November in Kilbeggan, County Westmeath, and is already busy serving the needs of our global cloud service providers and corporate clients in Ireland.
Over 5,000 miles to the southeast, SLS’ Circular Center opened in Guadalajara, Mexico, in August, accompanied by a newly incorporated local business entity, Sims Lifecycle Services, S.A. de C.V. to facilitate local billing. Sean Magann, SLS’ Chief Commercial Officer, stated, “We continue to see our data center and ITAD clients grow in Mexico, and this facility will help us better serve them. I have spent a fair amount of time in Guadalajara, and I have an appreciation for the culture and business environment.”
In Sydney, Australia, we opened a new ITAD-specific Circular Center. This large building, separated from e-waste recycling, offers a secure, hygienic environment with antistatic safeguards in place to process sensitive data center assets.
In the US, SLS made a $7 million investment opening two Circular Centers in West Chicago, Illinois, and La Vergne, Tennessee. These focus on “postponement” for hyperscale data center clients. Clients sends used servers to SLS, which we inventory and upgrade to their specifications. We hold the partial or near completed servers and, when the client orders equipment with a particular configuration, we install the required components and complete the order.
The West Chicago Circular Center, located adjacent to our existing ITAD and recycling building, opened last summer with 15 full time employees. La Vergne’s 100,000-square-foot Circular Center with 12 full time employees opened in December, a few miles from our longstanding ITAD and recycling Circular Center.
All eyes are now on Atlanta, Georgia, US, where we’re getting ready to open our newest Circular Center. The 100,000-square-foot facility will handle redeployment work for companies and operators setting up new data centers in the region. SLS will take in used assets, refurbish them, then ship out custom-configured devices requested by clients.
Our existing Circular Centers are also expanding to meet growing demand. Last spring, our Gustavsburg, Germany, Circular Center competed an expansion that allows us to process 300,000 assets annually. We created additional overflow capacity at our Circular Center in Eindhoven, Netherlands in summer 2021, expanding our dedicated server area so it can process 10,000 units per month.
Everyone at SLS is invigorated by this growth and welcoming new engineers and technicians into our global team. Our eyes are firmly focused on delivering best in class, standardized, global ITAD services for the data center and IT landscapes of today, tomorrow and well beyond.