Facebook's new server farm in the northern
Swedish city of Lulea is the firm's first outside the U.S. - in a location
chosen because the fierce cold will help to keep the company's racks of
high-performance computers cool.
Facebook looked at several sites across
Europe, and picked Lulea for its cold climate. The move will see Facebook
become faster for users across Europe.
The data center will have a floor space of
more than 900,000 square feet, which exceeds the size of 15 football fields.
According to the town of Lulea, the facility will be built in three phases and
eventually consist of three separate server rooms that are designed to handle a
substantial portion of Facebook's data traffic. The completion date is targeted
for 2014.
