Server Infrastructure

Server infrastructure engineered to last a decade, not a sprint.SimplyRem designs and operates bare-metal Linux fleets, colocation footprints, virtualisation platforms, and storage architectures for organisations whose business runs on servers that have to stay up. Every engagement is led by a senior systems engineer with two decades of production Unix and Linux behind them — paired with modern infrastructure-as-code discipline so the platform you inherit is documented, automated, and reviewable. No GUI-clicked snowflakes. No reseller-shifted hardware you do not need.What we build & operate

• Bare-metal server fleets — Dell PowerEdge, HPE ProLiant, Supermicro, and Lenovo ThinkSystem builds sized and procured for the actual workload, not the vendor's spec sheet.
• Virtualisation platforms — Proxmox VE, VMware vSphere, Nutanix, KVM/libvirt clusters, and Xen where the legacy demands it. Live migration, HA, and backup integration designed in from day one.
• Storage architectures — Ceph, ZFS, MinIO, GlusterFS, TrueNAS, and traditional SAN / NAS designs. Block, object, file. Replication, snapshotting, and disaster-recovery plans your auditor will sign off on.
• Database server engineering — PostgreSQL, MySQL / MariaDB, ClickHouse, Redis, MongoDB on bare metal — tuned for the IOPS profile, replicated for HA, and backed up for real (tested restores, not just dumps to disk).
• Linux server administration & hardening — CIS-benchmarked Ubuntu, Debian, RHEL / Rocky / AlmaLinux fleets. SSH, sudo, audit, SELinux / AppArmor, and CVE-tracked patching pipelines.
• Colocation & data centre engineering — rack design, power and cooling sizing, cabling, IPMI / iDRAC / iLO out-of-band, and a documented build sheet for every U.
• Hybrid & on-prem-to-cloud platforms — bare metal for the steady-state, cloud for the bursty edges, connected by IPsec or Direct Connect, managed as one fleet.
• Managed hosting & operations — full-service operation of a fleet we built (or one you inherited) — patching, monitoring, on-call, capacity planning, and the slow boring discipline of keeping servers honest.

Why teams choose our server infrastructure services

• Senior-only delivery. A staff-level systems engineer owns the engagement — not a delivery manager with a vendor catalogue and three offshore juniors.
• Hardware-agnostic. Dell, HPE, Supermicro, Lenovo, custom whiteboxes — we recommend by workload fit and TCO, not channel margin. No reseller relationships shaping the answer.
• Built like code, not clicked through GUIs. Every server is provisioned, configured, and re-buildable from Ansible, Terraform, and Git. If the data centre burns down, we rebuild in a week — not a quarter.
• Cost-honest. We will tell you when bare metal beats cloud (steady high-throughput workloads), when cloud beats bare metal (spiky or experimental loads), and when the answer is "both, behind a load balancer".
• Operability over cleverness. We pick the smallest set of moving parts that solves the problem. Ceph only when you need Ceph. Kubernetes only when you need Kubernetes.
• Documented for the operator. Every engagement closes with current-state diagrams, a written runbook, a documented IP and rack plan, and a recovery-from-zero procedure your on-call engineer can actually follow at 3 AM.
• Stay-on retainers. Most clients keep us on a monthly retainer covering patching, on-call augmentation, capacity reviews, hardware lifecycle planning, and the slow steady work of keeping a fleet honest.

Bare metal, cloud, or hybrid — what should you choose?We are agnostic, and we will tell you honestly. Cloud wins for spiky, bursty, or experimental workloads, regulated edges where managed compliance is easier, and teams under twenty engineers who should be writing product, not racking servers. Bare metal / colocation wins for steady high-throughput workloads — databases at scale, analytics, GPU training, video processing — where the cloud bill becomes the second-largest line item on the P&L. Hybrid wins for almost everyone over a hundred engineers: bare metal carries the steady-state, cloud absorbs the spikes, and a properly designed network makes them feel like one fleet. The pattern we see most: bare-metal databases and storage on-prem or colocated, application tier in the cloud, connected by Direct Connect or IPsec.Our server infrastructure engagement process1. Audit & sizing (1–2 weeks)We profile your workload, read your monitoring history, and walk through the existing fleet — racks, networks, storage, databases. You receive a written audit: capacity headroom, single points of failure, hardware lifecycle risk, top cost line items, and a prioritised remediation plan — even if you choose not to hire us for the build.2. Architecture & procurement (2–3 weeks)Target architecture written up with a bill of materials priced from at least two vendors, a TCO model versus cloud equivalents, a capacity plan against three-year growth, and a documented cut-over plan with rollback for every step. Reviewed with your team before a single server is ordered.3. Build & deployment in reversible cutsRacking, cabling, OS install, configuration, and burn-in — all Ansible-driven, all Git-tracked. Workloads migrate in cuts you can roll back. You see a working environment every two weeks, not a month-three reveal.4. Hardening, observability & launchCIS hardening passes, patch baselines, backup verification (tested restores, not just backups), Grafana / Prometheus dashboards, alerting that actually pages on the right things, and a written on-call runbook handed to your team. Security review is included for every public-facing surface; deeper engagements pair with our cybersecurity practice.5. StewardshipMost clients retain us on a monthly retainer — patching, on-call augmentation, capacity reviews, hardware lifecycle tracking, and the slow steady work of keeping a fleet reliable as the product evolves. Servers drift; a retainer is how you keep them honest.The server infrastructure stack we ship

• Hardware: Dell PowerEdge, HPE ProLiant, Supermicro, Lenovo ThinkSystem, custom whitebox where it earns its keep.
• OS: Ubuntu LTS, Debian, RHEL / Rocky / AlmaLinux, with a small fleet of FreeBSD where it still wins (storage, networking, security appliances).
• Virtualisation: Proxmox VE, VMware vSphere, KVM / libvirt, Nutanix, Hyper-V where the customer footprint demands it.
• Storage: Ceph (RBD, CephFS, RGW), ZFS on Linux and FreeBSD, MinIO, GlusterFS, TrueNAS Scale, traditional SAN / NAS.
• Networking on-host: bonded LACP, VLAN trunking, Open vSwitch, FRR for routing on Linux, BGP-to-the-host designs where it earns its keep.
• Databases: PostgreSQL with Patroni / Stolon HA, MySQL / MariaDB with Orchestrator, ClickHouse with replication, Redis Sentinel / Cluster, MongoDB replica sets.
• Automation: Ansible, Terraform, Packer, Foreman, Cobbler, Netbox / Nautobot as the source of truth.
• Observability: Grafana, Prometheus, Alertmanager, Loki, Tempo, Telegraf, smartmontools, IPMI / iDRAC / iLO collection.

Who we work withOur server infrastructure clients are typically Series B+ scale-ups whose cloud bill has crossed seven figures a month, mid-market organisations running legacy on-prem fleets that need modernisation without a forklift upgrade, fintechs and healthtechs with real compliance and data-residency requirements, and product companies running steady-state workloads (databases, analytics, GPU training, video) where cloud economics stop making sense. We do our best work when the brief is concrete — a measurable performance target, a cost ceiling, a cut-over date — and the team on the other side cares about operability as much as we do.Engagement models & pricing

• Infrastructure audit & architecture — $20k–$80k, two to six weeks. Current-state report, target architecture, BOM, TCO model, prioritised remediation plan.
• Build & migration — $80k–$400k+, three to nine months. Procurement, racking, OS / virtualisation / storage build, workload migration, documentation, and a documented cut-over with rollback.
• Cloud-to-bare-metal repatriation — $100k–$300k, four to six months. Sizing, procurement, network bridging, workload migration, and a TCO report your CFO can show the board.
• Managed hosting & operations — monthly retainer, from $15k. Patching, on-call, capacity planning, hardware lifecycle, and named senior systems engineers on rotation.
• Embedded systems engineer — monthly retainer. Senior bench depth for teams scaling without a full-time platform engineering hire.

We are booking new server infrastructure engagements one quarter at a time. Tell us what you are running — we respond to every brief within one business day, with NDA enclosed.