MCI Recognized By Network World for Web Hosting Capabilities

MCI, Inc. (www.mci.com) today announced it received two prestigious industry awards for Secure Data Center of the Year and Data Center Manager of the Year from AFCOM, the professional association of data center managers and professionals, and Network World magazine. These awards recognize MCI for its vision, innovation and inspiration to the data center space.

The Secure Data Center Award went to MCI's Smart Center in Beltsville, Maryland, located in the Washington, D.C. area, for changing the security paradigm and operating a flexible, highly resilient and secure data center.

"At MCI, security is embedded into everything we do," said James Callahan, MCI director of Data Center Security. "Our Smart Centers present a safe and sound environment for critical data. Being named Secure Data Center of the Year is yet another example of our industry-leading capabilities."

Ray Detheridge, data center manager for MCI's Internet Data Center in Elmsford, NY, was named Data Center Manager of the Year for his ability to effectively manage people, resources and technology.

"This year's award winners exemplify a commitment to best practices in data center management which are helping to set the industry standard," said Jill Eckhaus, president of AFCOM. "We applaud MCI for delivering excellent performance, service and reliability to its customers."

John Gallant, president of Network World, and Len Eckhaus, founder of AFCOM, presented the awards to MCI representatives during a special ceremony at AFCOM's Data Center World(TM) Conference, which celebrated its 25th anniversary as the data center industry's premiere educational event.

MCI owns and operates more than 130 data centers in 22 countries, providing a secure, fully redundant environment for customers to host Web servers, data networking or voice equipment. MCI's Smart Centers are engineered to house the Web operations for companies who choose to outsource their hosting needs.