Data centers, including Sabey, play crucial role

QUINCY — A lot of work and thought has gone into making online access as easy as possible for consumers. Pick up the phone or open the computer, and it’s possible to connect with anyone almost anywhere in the world. It seems easy. In reality – as anyone knows who’s dealt with a tech failure knows – it’s a complex network of connections and reconnections that must move fast and without interruption. At the base of it all is the machine that coordinates all of that electronic activity. Ryan Beebout, western vice-president for Sabey Data Centers, said the servers that power the system are the equivalent of the electrical grid. “Almost everything you do on your phone runs through a data center,” Beebout said. “People want their phones to be small and lightweight, and they want their batteries to last a really long time. A lot of the things that you do are very computationally intensive. You can’t do that on a device like (a cell phone).”