When I did it before, our company bought the hardware in bulk. We prep it, provision it and have it good to go. Then ship it off to wherever. PM has the local DC staff (if they provide that service, else a local IT company install the box and bring it online. The moment it is online everything is managed remotely. The local install costs is usually a few 100, once, just like the shipping.
We even shipped full racks (assembly required) with a complete connection diagram. All it needed was power and 2 internet cables everything else was done already.
If companies like google expand, this will surely be similar. But then at even larger scale. I cannot imagine them going around trying to find equipment everytime. You just have a contract with dell/HP/IBM/NetApp/Oracle and ask your account manager to ship you x number of type A server.
When I did it before, our company bought the hardware in bulk. We prep it, provision it and have it good to go. Then ship it off to wherever. PM has the local DC staff (if they provide that service, else a local IT company install the box and bring it online. The moment it is online everything is managed remotely. The local install costs is usually a few 100, once, just like the shipping.
We even shipped full racks (assembly required) with a complete connection diagram. All it needed was power and 2 internet cables everything else was done already.
If companies like google expand, this will surely be similar. But then at even larger scale. I cannot imagine them going around trying to find equipment everytime. You just have a contract with dell/HP/IBM/NetApp/Oracle and ask your account manager to ship you x number of type A server.