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Russian hosting firm RUVDS takes server tech to the South Pole for high-speed data tests in extreme conditions

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  • RUVDS expands hosting to Earth’s coldest, remote regions
  • Tests promise high-speed data access for extreme remote environments
  • Antarctica mission tests data center limits and innovation

Russian hosting firm RUVDS has announced plans to deliver a server to one of Earth’s most isolated locations: the South Pole.

Building on its previous Arctic experiment, the company aims to explore the feasibility of providing high-speed, uninterrupted data access from Antarctica's remote, freezing landscape.

According to the company’s schedule, this ambitious venture will take place next year and it seeks to prove that reliable server infrastructure that can operate even under the harshest conditions.

World’s most challenging climates

This venture follows RUVDS’s earlier success at the Barneo Ice Camp, a temporary station on an ice floe near the North Pole. Earlier in 2024, the company delivered a “data center in a box” to Barneo via an airdrop from an Ilyushin Il-76 aircraft.

The server is equipped with weather-resistant materials and connected to RUVDS’s satellite. It is designed to provide internet access and data hosting capabilities in the Arctic. While the server was intended to operate for a month, an emergency evacuation due to a crack in the ice cut the experiment short after just one week.

Learning from its Arctic experience, RUVDS is now preparing the Antarctic server with advanced insulation and backup power systems.

The equipment will include uninterruptible power supplies to counter power failures and ensure continuous operations. RUVDS’s goal is to create an “Antarctic data center” capable of providing high-speed data access to users, regardless of the extreme temperatures.

The server’s connection will rely on a high-speed communication channel, expected to be delivered alongside the hardware. RUVDS has not yet specified the exact technologies it will employ for this channel, but its Arctic experiment leveraged its own satellite, the StratoSat TK-1, which was launched in June 2023 in collaboration with Russian aerospace firm Statonautica.

This satellite, a Low Earth Orbit pico-satellite, is a key part of RUVDS’s Arctic and Antarctic operations. Despite memory damage during launch, StratoSat TK-1 remains operational, broadcasting a simple HTML page from space.

The company has a couple of options for the delivery of the server. It will engage transport planes and ships that can withstand the challenges of reaching the South Pole.

If successful, the server installation could pave the way for future data centers in remote polar regions, contributing to scientific research and potentially opening new avenues for communications in inaccessible parts of the world.

"We already have a successful experience of test launching a server at the North Pole - this was a kind of first approach to testing. And Antarctica, as a region with much more complex logistics and conditions, allows us to continue research at a new level," said Nikita Tsaplin, CEO of the VDS server hosting provider RUVDS.

"As part of the mission, the possibility of establishing satellite communications, including high-speed channels, will be studied, and I do not rule out that we will carry out a kind of beta test of commercial use of the server," Tsaplin continued.

Via DCD

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