Mass. pledges $25M for Holyoke computing center

By Mass High Tech staff

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The commonwealth’s planned data and computing center in Western Massachusetts has been handed $25 million by Gov. Deval Patrick, who also tagged the area around the center’s future home of Holyoke as the Holyoke Innovation District. All told, the new High Performance Computing Center will get $65 million in funding, including $40 million from a group of universities.

The university consortium consists of MIT, the University of Massachusetts, Boston University and the most recent member, Northeastern University. Industry backers include EMC Corp., Cisco Systems Inc. and Accenture PLC. The computing center has a target completion date set for late 2011. The project is designed to draw hydroelectric power from the river while serving as an example of a green, environmentally friendly data center.

The collaboration between industry and academia was one of the key recommendations of the Governor’s Readiness Project, which was chaired by EMC CEO and president Joe Tucci. Beginning in April, the university consortium will begin a search for an executive director for the project, according to officials.

The new Holyoke Innovation District becomes the 20th growth district in Massachusetts, according to the governor, who made the announcement during an address to the Holyoke Chamber of Commerce today. Plans for the green data center were originally announced by Massachusetts Secretary of Housing and Economic Development Greg Bialecki in June.

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