Google’s Secret Mission to Beat Rivals

Google is secretly developing one of the world’s most powerful supercomputers to outstrip rivals Yahoo and Microsoft.

The internet firm is building a vast complex the size of two football pitches with cooling towers four floors high on a remote stretch of barren land in Oregon.

It is thought to house two massive data centres and thousands of Google servers that will help power the billions of search queries it handles daily, as well as an expanding range of other services.

The secret expansion on the 12-hectare site 129km east of Portland

This is thought to be part of an “arms race” as other online companies vie for Google’s crown.

Microsoft has unexpectedly announced that it will spend £1.08 billion (Dh7.3 billion) next year, primarily aimed at catching up to Google. Bill Gates’s company intends to quadruple its number of internet servers to 800,000 in 25 locations worldwide by 2011.

Google, which currently runs 450,000 servers worldwide, will boost its capacity with an injection of £814 million (Dh5,502 million).

Microsoft and Yahoo have also announced plans to build multi-billion-dollar data centers elsewhere in the Pacific Northwest, which is home to cheap electricity from hydropower and existing data networks.

The scope of the new Google plant, on the banks of the Columbia River in The Dalles, Oregon

It is seen as a key part of the company’s drive to develop the fastest and most comprehensive data search system. This is in line with its mission statement to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”

Analysts interpret Google’s growing range of services will expand into territories that its rivals have historically dominated. For example, computer operating systems, online shopping, email, music, and video technology.

The new Google “power plant” is shrouded in secrecy. Known as Project 02, it has already created hundreds of jobs.

The new Oregon center will form just part of Google’s global computing system, called the Googleplex. The Googleplex is growing at such a rapid rate that its exact size remains a constant topic of speculation. The company recently opened a similar data center in Atlanta, Georgia, under similar secrecy.

The building has no signs or logos, and local authorities are pledged to silence.

Excerpts posted from Catherine Elsworth.