Intel on Tuesday officially launched its Intel Online Services division for Internet Web hosting.
In making the announcement, the company unveiled industry partners with which it will work, and laid out a time line of the services it will offer.
On day one, Intel is providing co-location services for companies in which it offers the Web hosting infrastructure.
Marketing director, David Rowe, called the initial set of offerings from Intel "first-generation Web hosting".
"We will provide the P's: the ping, the power and the pipes," said David Rowe, marketing director at Internet Data Services Division, in Folsom, Calif.
By early 2000 Intel will ramp up its services from Web hosting to e-commerce operational services and provide the hardware, software and system integration to its customers. According to Rowe, Intel will work with its customers to create an approved list of best-of-breed electronic-commerce software solutions as well as processing and managing the data.
While Intel will be working directly with some of its customers, the company is also partnering with numerous consulting services which offer solution services and marketing strategies. Intel announced agreements to work with Atlanta-based iXL, PricewaterhouseCoopers, in New York, and Los Angeles-based U.S. Interactive, among others.
On the backend, Intel will partner with UUNET, an MCI WorldCom company for high performance networking and bandwidth services.
Among the companies using Intel, as of September 1, are Bex, a business-to-business e-commerce company, eHobbies, a hobbyist portal set to launch next month, HealthMagic, an information service for the health care industry, and Quokka Sports, a sports entertainment Web site.
The first services centre, a retrofit of an Intel office building near its Santa Clara headquarters, will eventually cost about $150 million when completed. The facility will house a server farm of up to 10,000 servers, and include three 1.5 megawatt generators, and a 5000 gallon capacity diesel tank to fuel the generators. The generators will be able to run the building at full power for about 10 hours in case of a massive blackout on the power grid.
The second service centre will open in London later this year, and a third in partnership with NEC will open in Tokyo next year. Initial plans call for 12 service centres around the world.