Carmel-based nFrame plans a multimillion-dollar expansion of its high-tech data center near Pennsylvania and 116th Streets, the company disclosed Wednesday.

The project will include a $500,000 upgrade to its virtual cloud-hosting platform later this year—and an expansion of the 40,000-square-foot data center beginning early next year. NFrame operates one of the state's largest commercial data centers, which hosts, monitors and manages information technology infrastructure for hundreds of clients.

Company officials told IBJ the expansion is in the planning phases and they are still determining total costs for the project.

However, nFrame’s sister company, Expedient Communications, has spent in the range of $2.5 million to $6 million in data-center expansions in recent years, said Shawn McGorry, chief operating officer of Expedient. The company runs a network of eight nationwide data centers in cities including Baltimore; Boston; Cleveland; Columbus, Ohio; and Pittsburgh.

“We would expect to complete that [Carmel] build next year,” said McGorry.

He said it was unclear how many additional jobs could be created by the expansion of nFrame, which currently has 40 employees.

“I do anticipate growing the sales team here a little,” said Ray Vallillo, a veteran of the Indianapolis technology scene who was recently named regional vice president for nFrame.

The newly created position was added in part to increase the company’s hosted-cloud-computing services.

The demand for such centers is growing as companies increasingly use external centers for data needs rather than spending on costly internal computing infrastructure.
 
In 2007, nFrame was acquired by Continental Broadband LLC, which also owns Expedient. Continental in turn is owned by Norfolk, Va.-based Landmark Media Enterprises.

Vallillo’s past roles in Indianapolis include vice president of worldwide services for Indianapolis software firms Consona Corp. and Made2Manage Systems.