The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) is a global healthcare provider and insurer with over 100,000 employees across 40 hospitals and more than 800 clinical locations. As Pennsylvania’s largest non-government employer, UPMC has experienced tremendous growth over the past decade, driving innovations in patient care, research and insurance services. However, this rapid expansion highlighted the limitations of UPMC’s aging on-premises data centers. UPMC needed a secure infrastructure solution to support critical workloads, ensure regulatory compliance and enable cloud services flexibility.
UPMC’s exponential data growth from medical records, imaging and research data quickly pushed its on-premises data centers to their limits, and it lacked robust connectivity options to enable hybrid cloud architectures. The healthcare provider sought to reduce the costs and complexity of managing in-house infrastructure while keeping pace with capacity demands.
Safeguarding sensitive patient data was paramount, requiring a highly secure environment with redundant power and network to maintain 24/7 availability. As its technology demands became more dynamic, UPMC realized an outsourced data center solution was crucial to supporting the next phase of growth.
After a competitive RFP process, UPMC selected Ark as its data center services partner, impressed by Ark’s consultative approach and healthcare expertise. Ark worked closely with UPMC’s technology leaders to understand near-term requirements and long-term business objectives. The resulting solution was a 1 MW custom colocation deployment in an Ark-owned, HIPAA-certified Tier III data center.
As the anchor tenant, UPMC avoided the capital expense of building a new data center while gaining ample room for future expansion. The solution positioned UPMC to integrate cloud services for a robust hybrid architecture with carrier-neutral facilities and cloud on-ramps to simplify network connectivity.
Leveraging Ark’s redundant power, cooling and network infrastructure provided UPMC with maximum uptime and availability for its mission-critical systems, and the facility’s high-density racks provided the capacity and flexibility to support workload migrations over time. Ark’s physical security controls, including biometric access and 24/7 monitoring, also ensured that its sensitive patient data was protected and that it was compliant with HIPAA requirements.
Partnering with Ark empowered UPMC to modernize its technology infrastructure while preparing for future growth. Ark’s solutions have led UPMC to achieve:
By leveraging Ark’s purpose-built data centers, UPMC avoided significant construction and maintenance costs associated with building and maintaining its own data center infrastructure.
Ark’s HIPAA-certified facilities and rigorous security controls reduce UPMC’s regulatory risk and compliance-related expenses.
Ark’s 99.999% infrastructure availability keeps UPMC’s mission-critical clinical applications and EHR systems accessible with no downtime.
UPMC now has 50% more infrastructure capacity versus in-house data centers, with the flexibility to accommodate growing data volumes efficiently.
Enhanced cloud connectivity options allow UPMC to integrate public and private cloud resources to optimize cost and performance.
“We appreciated the elasticity of Ark’s colocation model,” said McCallister. “It gave us the flexibility we required to modernize applications and to once again lead the industry in our approach to IT.”
Partnering with Ark empowered UPMC to modernize its technology infrastructure while preparing for future growth. Ark’s solutions have led UPMC to achieve:
By leveraging Ark’s purpose-built data centers, UPMC avoided significant construction and maintenance costs associated with building and maintaining its own data center infrastructure.
Ark’s HIPAA-certified facilities and rigorous security controls reduce UPMC’s regulatory risk and compliance-related expenses.
Ark’s 99.999% infrastructure availability keeps UPMC’s mission-critical clinical applications and EHR systems accessible with no downtime.
UPMC now has 50% more infrastructure capacity versus in-house data centers, with the flexibility to accommodate growing data volumes efficiently.
Enhanced cloud connectivity options allow UPMC to integrate public and private cloud resources to optimize cost and performance.
“We appreciated the elasticity of Ark’s colocation model,” said McCallister. “It gave us the flexibility we required to modernize applications and to once again lead the industry in our approach to IT.”
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