6.1. ERMUSR 04-10-2012 - Laserfiche WebLink

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UnitedHealth also recently built a $26 million, 220,000-square-foot data center northwest of the interchange of County Road 10 and U.S. 212 in Chaska. Mortenson handled the construction. Minnesota and the nation are experiencing a data center building boom as companies and other organizations increasingly store data and run software off-site, taking advantage of cloud computing. Data centers have become a hot commodity for economic development officials. They azgue that the centers can each create hundreds of technology support jobs, even though the centers themselves may only directly support a few dozen jobs apiece. To make Minnesota more competitive in landing data centers, the state budget passed last year included an expanded sales tax exemption for new data centers. Minnesota has had a sales tax break for data center equipment for about a dozen yeazs, but the centers had to provide content for the Internet or hold patient records. The new measure provides exemptions on equipment, softwaze and electricity and lifted the restriction on the type of data being stored. The city of Elk River has proved adept at bringing in lazge data centers. The city's advantages include Elk River Municipal Utilities. (Chaska has its own local electricity utility, too.) Having its own cooperative electricity utility gives Elk River more flexibility in negotiating rates - a major cost for a data center. Elk River and Sherburne County officials also have a track record of coordinating on data center projects, said Collin Barr, vice president of development for Ryan Cos.