What is co-location hosting?

[geline]

To start this category/forum, will somebody please explain what co-location web hosting is all about and who needs it? Thanks.

[QuietLunatic]

I found a definition at Wikipedia, but I don't know if it's much use to you:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colocation
That should cover it. :)

[geline]

Thanks, QL, I find the benefits of this co-location hosting much clearer in understanding me what co-location hosting means :)

Increasingly organizations are recognizing the benefits of colocating their mission-critical equipment within a data centre. Colocation is becoming popular because of the time and cost savings a company can realize as result of using shared data centre infrastructure. Significant benefits of scale (large power and mechancial systems) result in large centers, typically 50,000 to 100,000 feet. With IT and communications facilities in safe, secure hands, telecommunications, internet, ASP and content providers, as well as enterprises, enjoy less latency and the freedom to focus on their core business.

Additionally, customers reduce their traffic back-haul costs and free up their internal networks for other uses. Moreover, by outsourcing network traffic to a colocation service provider with greater bandwidth capacity, web site access speeds should improve considerably.