Quicken Loans Opens Corktown Technology Center (Video)

By Edward Cardenas

DETROIT (CBS Detroit) - Detroit's oldest neighborhood is now home to one of advanced data centers in the Midwest.

Quicken Loans opened its state-of-the-art 66,000 square foot data center and office complex on Rosa Parks in Detroit's Corktown neighborhood.

The modern cement and glass structure houses two, 10,000 square-foot rooms which house nearly 400 servers for Quicken Loans and its family of companies. In addition to housing the servers, training, office and support space for Quicken, there is also 33,000 square feet available for lease.

"We are technology company that happens to do home loans," said Dan Gilbert, Quicken Loans Founder and Chairman. "We not only wanted to handle our needs, but we wanted to have the space to attract other technology focused businesses."

Quicken Loans officials stated that the 1,300-member technology team was involved throughout the design, engineering and development of the new facility. Their touches could be found in the color of the cables, finish of the server cabinets, movable walls, showers and even sleep pods in the kitchen area.

"This is a great addition for this growing area," said Linglong He, Quicken Loans chief information officer.

The facility also offers indirect air conditioning units which use large heat wheels to cool the servers without bringing outside air into the room, 2.5 megawatt backup generators, heated sidewalks along with security features such as biometric readers and facial scanners.

Over the past five years since Quicken Loans moved from the suburbs to downtown Detroit, Bedrock has purchased or manages nearly 70 buildings in the city.

But with the opening of the Z lot, and now Technology Center, these buildings could mark the shift in strategy for Gilbert.

He said the city to continue to move forward you need "to have cranes in the air that are building things and constructing things."