Area 71 is the unofficial title for
Walmart
Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...
's
data center, located in
Jane, Missouri
Jane is a village in McDonald County, Missouri, United States. It is located on Route 90 at its intersection with U.S. Route 71. The original settlement is approximately one mile east on an older alignment of US 71. It had been an unincorporated ...
, near the
Arkansas
Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...
border. The facility has a capacity of over 460
terabyte
The byte is a unit of digital information that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, the byte was the number of bits used to encode a single character of text in a computer and for this reason it is the smallest addressable uni ...
s (460 trillion bytes) of data. The facility is built directly on
bedrock to better withstand natural and man-made disasters. It is self-sufficient, with
generators and the capability to retain data connection with the Walmart network using
copper wire
Copper has been used in electrical wiring since the invention of the electromagnet and the telegraph in the 1820s. The invention of the telephone in 1876 created further demand for copper wire as an electrical conductor.
Copper is the electri ...
,
fiber optic cable
A fiber-optic cable, also known as an optical-fiber cable, is an assembly similar to an electrical cable, but containing one or more optical fibers that are used to carry light. The optical fiber elements are typically individually coated with ...
, or
satellite communications
A communications satellite is an artificial satellite that relays and amplifies radio telecommunication signals via a transponder; it creates a communication channel between a source transmitter and a receiver at different locations on Earth. ...
.
Sales patterns are analyzed here to identify trends in purchasing before major events (e.g.,
natural disasters,
holidays) so that Walmart executives can better stock store shelves in anticipation of this event.
Walmart uses the data facility to control many functions of its stores, including control of lighting, adjusting the
climate control
Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) is the use of various technologies to control the temperature, humidity, and purity of the air in an enclosed space. Its goal is to provide thermal comfort and acceptable indoor air quality. HV ...
, and playing the
in-store music. The data center maintains the
computer system that employees use to "clock in" at every location, and provides
email
Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a method of exchanging messages ("mail") between people using electronic devices. Email was thus conceived as the electronic ( digital) version of, or counterpart to, mail, at a time when "mail" mean ...
to keep employees informed of events pertinent to their job function.
References
{{reflist
External links
Wal-Mart's Use of Collected Data"Inside Wal-Mart's 'Threat Research' Operation" WSJ article about Wal-Mart's data collection.
Walmart