Involta, the Iowa-based service –provider, has bought majority of the assets of Data Recovery Services (DRS), a data center services provider in Ohio and Pennsylvania, in a managed services ‘rollup’. Financial terms were not disclosed, however, the deal is expected to close by the end of the month. Involta recently opened a 31,400 square foot facility in Boise, Idaho on March 5th

Involta provides colocation services, and more hands-on managed services and consulting. It is hoped that the deal will be a successful managed services-rollup. The deal doubles Involta’s staff to 200 half of whom now work in Ohio.

Carl Gordulic, DRS President and COO said: “This positions Involta as a powerhouse in the Ohio market.” 

Involta Boise
Involta Boise

 State funding to build in depressed area

Involta, now owns eight data storage centers overall. Involta, headquarted in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, entered the Ohio market in 2012, building a $17m data center in a depressed, industrial area in South Akron. Involta received local and state financial incentives to build on land that previously housed a lumbar company.

 DRS in Youngstown was founded in 2000 as NSI Group and offers information technology consulting and managed services.

Involta obtains 5,500 miles of fiber optic cable in Ohio and western Pennsylvania, two data centers owned and operated by DRS and data center space in Pittsburgh that DRS leases, among other assets.

Chris Shroyer, Involta’s vice president of sales and marketing, talking to The Akron Beacon said: “This is all about growth. We’re in a growing industry,” he said. “Both organizations are growing faster than the industry,” to be able to quickly respond to growth in demand. “This is about creating an equation that one plus one equals more than two.”

The acquisition comes a year after Involta received a $50m infusion from private equity investors. Equity company M/C Partners of Boston led the group of private equity investors that includes Morgan Stanley Investment Partners.

There is increasing consolidation among regional providers serving secondary and tertiary cities. Ohio and the Midwest in general are also seeing a data center renaissance, including massive projects like Amazon’s $1.2 billion Ohio data center project and Facebook announcing a third data center in Iowa, helping to put both on the map as good states to build data centers in.