9621 Agnes Crossing, Lake Suzanneview, New Mexico Island 84604-9295.
Have you ever seen petabytes of data in real life? This is possible at Youston in Genk. The company stores and digitizes paper archives on an impressive scale.
Have you ever seen petabytes of data in real life? This is possible at Youston in Genk. The company stores and digitizes paper archives on an impressive scale. The sheets of paper contain so many bits and bytes that an ordinary network creates a bottleneck for the company. This paper requires fibers.
As we arrive at the closed gate of the Youston branch in Genk, we are overcome by a feeling of misplaced recognition. The large square building without windows, the security measures for access… for the IT journalist, these signals point to one thing: there must be a data center behind the fence. The fact that we went there to look for a story about the fiber optic specialist Eurofiber confirms our suspicions.
We are all wrong, and yet we are not. “We hardly have any servers here,” smiles Pieter Vansynghel, Corporate Relations Manager at Youston Group. “Would you like to take a look at it?” Together with CTO Wim Vanoeveren we walk through the modern and bright office space towards the warehouse. The Limburg sun is setting outside as Vansynghel uses his ID to lead us past several secure doors to the non-data center.
There are currently around 4 billion pages here.
Pieter Vansynghel, Corporate Relations Manager, Youston Group
In the large warehouse we see towering shelves full of boxes, which are in turn crammed with paper. The shelves seem endless as they run into the darkness. There are pallets of boxes out front, ready to go on the road to be scanned or re-archived. We are dealing with tens of petabytes of analog data.
“There are currently about 4 billion pages here,” says Vansynghel. “Another billion copies will be added soon.” Youston manages these archives for customers and digitizes the requested data. This can be anything, or just certain documents if desired.
“We distribute the boxes on the shelves,” he continues. “Otherwise the building would collapse under the load. In this room, the temperature and humidity are controlled to optimally store the paper. For the same reason, there are no heat sources such as lamps above the shelves and the archive is dark.”
Youston specializes in archiving and scanning outdated archives and takes care of paperwork for hospitals, health insurance companies and banks, among other things. To modernize and expand its operations, Youston last year bought the larger company iGuana, which specializes in digital document management. Youston himself is the originator: Digital document management requires digital documents, and a lot of data is still on paper for the time being.
The Youston site in Genk opened in 2020 following approval from the necessary government authorities and the fire department. “If there is a fire here, it will melt the companies next door and they will have to put it out on the other side of the Albert Canal,” says Vansynghel. “Burning won’t work here. All the paper is stacked so tightly that it hardly gets any oxygen. Think of the Gouden Gids of the past, you couldn’t just light them.”
On the way back to the meeting room at the front of the building, Vansynghel explains how Youston serves as a kind of archaic hard drive to clients. Customer papers are mixed in boxes, but the location of each archive item is stored via a code. If a customer wants to view a document, the question is directed to Youston. Within an hour, a forklift driver has found the correct box and brought it to the scanning aisle, where other employees prepare the relevant documents (e.g. by removing staples), scan them and inject them directly into the customer’s systems.
“Since taking over iGuana, we have had two other locations in addition to this location,” says CTO Wim Vanoeveren. “In the past, customers have made agreements that run through this location, the one in Zaventem or the one in Prague. For contractual and security reasons, we need to deliver documents securely through the correct website.”
This is easier said than done. The data processed by Youston is very sensitive and cannot be easily made available over the public internet. If the data is stored in Prague but then needs to be delivered via Genk, the scans also need to travel from the Czech Republic to Belgium before being sent digitally to the customer’s systems. Because Youston grew rather spontaneously, the IT infrastructure to organize all of this wasn’t really ready yet.
“We were constantly moving data from A to B and C over traditional Internet connections,” explains Vanoeveren. “We managed to overcome firewalls, MPLS and other mechanisms, but we encountered limitations in terms of security, speed and reliability.” Vanoeveren and Vansynghel say they have already experienced escapades with traditional Internet providers where an Internet connection suddenly disappeared and the company ended up in a queue with the other companies and private individuals. “I was tasked with expanding functionality while reducing operating costs,” says Vanoeveren. “So I started looking for a total solution.”
This is how Eurofiber is created. Vanoeveren has developed a completely new IT infrastructure together with the fiber optic specialist. The CTO was looking for more than just an internet provider. “Eurofiber is a partner that thinks for itself. They connect us with other parties relevant to our IT needs, regardless of connectivity. Eurofiber itself didn’t notice anything about it. The company didn’t have to do that, but it helped us.” The appreciation can be seen on the man’s face.
It all started with the choice of fiberglass: not a given, because that too dark fiber (unused fiber optic lines) were not finished yet. Eurofiber laid the lines specifically for Youston. “It went smoothly,” recalls Vansynghel. “The planning application actually took the longest. Everything was rebuilt at their expense.”
“Eurofiber only offers dedicated Fiber optics for companies,” explains Hans Witdouck, managing director of Eurofiber in Belgium. “We are not stuck in shared networks, but that also means that we have to bring our dedicated fiber to where the companies are.” On the one hand, this requires a certain investment from us, but on the other hand it is also part of our strategy to focus on business parks to concentrate. In some situations, this means you need to start with one business to expand locally. That’s why we install the infrastructure at our own expense and never pass the investment on to the customer.”
The fiber optic cable was installed in accordance with coastal regulations, with redundant lines arriving on both sides of the archives building and exiting on other sides. For example, an error by an excavator worker will no longer impact connectivity at Youston in the future.
Redundancy and security are critical to Youston as confidential documents need to be delivered digitally within an agreed timeframe. For example, digitized documents can contain medical or banking information.
Witdouck: “With a dedicated fiber optic line you can eliminate many cyber threats. Eurofiber only offers dedicated fiber optic connections, so companies do not have to share the physical connection with others. Additionally, with a fiber connection, you know that all your data is transported encrypted, so even intercepted data has no value to hackers.”
The importance of safety and reliability is very clear given Youston’s customers. It remains almost inconceivable that a company that works with data on paper would also need the enormous throughput capacity of fiber optics.
But that is the case, explains Vanoeveren: “For some customers we scan up to a million pages per day. Calculate an average of 200 KB per image.” Vanoeveren wants to get these images and PDFs out of his own systems to his customers as quickly as possible. As long as they have not been forwarded and are stored digitally on Youston’s systems, the company is responsible for them.
For some customers we scan up to a million pages per day.
Wim Vanoeveren, CTO Youston Group
“Also, some documents are much larger,” Vanoeveren adds. For example, we also scan legacy material from old newspapers or microfilms. X-ray examinations are also discussed. In such a case, quality comes first and individual files can easily reach a size of 500 MB.”
With Eurofiber, Vanoeveren brought Youston’s sites together quickly, securely and redundantly, but the story doesn’t stop there. The CTO wants to benefit from the new opportunities that fast connections bring with them in the coming months.
Vanoeveren: “In the next phase I would like to collect all scan data in a central point. Then we may need a server in our local office to buffer the scans, but that’s it. Ultimately, we continue to send data in and out inefficiently.”
First, Vanoeveren plans one Lift and move your own infrastructure. “We are considering a temporary consolidation of our infrastructure. Eurofiber also wanted to help. In the long term, we want to move to the public cloud.” Youston can only offer real added value when the locations are connected to a secure cloud environment. Vanoeveren dreams of a multi-tenant cloud platform where scans are securely delivered.
Fiber optics offer a solid and future-proof foundation for every company
Hans Witdouck, Managing Director of Eurofiber in Belgium
The fact that fiber optics opens the door to further innovation is typical, according to Witdouck. “The technology provides a solid and future-proof foundation for every company,” he says. “When you look at what the economy of tomorrow will look like, solid connectivity is hard to imagine. It’s a kind Goods has become what everything is about.”
For Vansynghel and Vanoeveren, the investment in the future is more than worthwhile. After all, scanning will not disappear immediately. Both men laugh at the idea. “There are situations where we scan files, companies print, and new versions end up here to be scanned again,” says Vansynghel.
“We are also digitizing organizations’ mail,” adds Vanoeveren. “So that instead of receiving this mail on paper, they receive it by email in the morning and then sometimes they print it all out, maybe sign it and send it in the mail again. It is quite possible that this mail will end up with us again.” We are listening with our mouths open and it is not the first time that Vansynghel and Vanoeveren have observed this reaction. “Microsoft also fell off its chair.”
With Eurofiber, Youston has its infrastructure for the future. The paper data center in Genk benefits from a fast and reliable fiber optic connection that the IT department can continue to build on. Paper production continues and Youston is ready to send customers the necessary scans upon request.
Source: IT Daily
As an experienced journalist and author, Mary has been reporting on the latest news and trends for over 5 years. With a passion for uncovering the stories behind the headlines, Mary has earned a reputation as a trusted voice in the world of journalism. Her writing style is insightful, engaging and thought-provoking, as she takes a deep dive into the most pressing issues of our time.
