Strong demand and escalating power bills helped push data centre tariffs 8.5% higher last year, figures collected from 60 hosting companies have revealed.
Countries that saw the highest price rises in 2008 were Portugal (30%), Denmark (24%) and France (17%), the company behind the numbers said.
The prices reflect the average monthly charge made for a 19-inch rack, something that has been adopted as a standard measure to compare data centre charges.
According to Tariff Consultancy Ltd, it is likely that there will continue to be moderate price increases in most countries in 2009.
The main price determinant for a data centre operator is now the cost of power, rather than the actual physical space cost. Industrial electricity costs continue to rise, with an increase in price of more than 20% during the past 12 months.
“Power prices in France are pretty stable” explained Keith Breed, “but in the UK and Spain there has been a good amount of volatility, quarter on quarter.”
The consultancy’s Data Centre Price Tracker is a subscription service published every quarter that surveys pricing in 14 European countries. It takes tariffs from the likes of Telecity, Verizon, Colt and Equinix.
Latest data collated for the tracker shows that there remains a large difference in average rack prices per country in the regions surveyed.
Operators in Italy and a very fragmented German market are rated as the most competitive, while London and Copenhagen rank as the most expensive hosting locations.
“Average monthly rack rates are €1,200 in Demark and €1,050 in the UK compared with the lowest average priced country for rack space of €545 per month” Breed said.
