It’s amazing that we were able to do that with such small adjustments to our business, says David Heinemeier Hansson, chief technology officer and co-owner.
Millions of people use the American company’s online productivity and project management software, which includes products like Basecamp and Hey.
Like many other businesses, it contracted with a third-party company, a “cloud services provider,” to handle its computing and data storage needs.
They own sizable data centers where they store data that is accessible online from other companies.
These services will cost 37 signs $3.2 million in 2022.
Mr. Heinemeier Hansson claims that he became extremely radicalized after seeing the bill every week.
“Wait!” I exclaimed. How much does a week’s worth of rentals cost us? With just one week’s worth of [cloud] money, I could purchase some incredibly powerful PCs.
Thus, he acted. The annual cost of purchasing hardware and hosting it in a shared data center is $840,000.
While expenses compelled Mr. Heinemeier Hansson to take action, other considerations were also relevant.
The internet is designed to be extremely durable.
He alludes to the three top cloud providers when he says, “I saw the distributed design erode as more and more companies gravitated essentially to three owners of computers.”
A big data center failure might cause the internet to fall offline in substantial portions.
