Colocation decisions are easy to rush and expensive to reverse. A clear framework keeps the evaluation grounded in your actual requirements rather than whichever facility tours best.
Start with the workload, not the building
Before comparing facilities, define what you’re placing there: power draw per rack, redundancy targets, latency-sensitive adjacencies, and growth over the contract term. Those numbers drive everything that follows.
Five factors that actually differentiate facilities
- Power and density — available kW per rack and the path to higher density later
- Connectivity — carrier count, cloud on-ramps, and cross-connect economics
- Redundancy — the real N+1/2N design, not the marketing tier label
- Location risk — flood, grid, and fiber-path exposure
- Commercial terms — escalators, renewal rights, and exit provisions
Score, don’t gut-check
Weight each factor by importance to your workload, score every candidate facility, and let the matrix make the comparison visible. The scoring conversation often matters more than the final number — it forces the trade-offs into the open.
Done well, site selection becomes a defensible decision you can put in front of a board, not a judgment call you have to hope was right.