Managed Bare-Metal Colocation
Colocation in Frankfurt — Server Housing and Bare Metal Servers
Your own hardware — or hardware we source for you through our integrator partners — in a Tier III+ data center in Frankfurt. Rack space, power and uplink at a fixed monthly price; operations, monitoring and a secure connection to your sites on top. Built for private clouds, Proxmox, Kubernetes and Ceph.
Rack space from €79/month
Telehouse Frankfurt — Tier III+
ISO 27001 data center, NIS2-ready operations
12 months, or monthly from 3 months
Site-to-site VPN, dedicated line, cross-connect
14 years in Frankfurt, 10 at Telehouse
14
years in Frankfurt
10
years at Telehouse Frankfurt
2
independent 10 Gbit/s upstreams
III+
Tier III+ data center, ISO 27001
Initial situation
Renting compute forever — or paying office prices for a server room
Bare metal is where the cloud premium is largest. An m6i.metal in AWS Frankfurt — 64 cores, 512 GB — costs $7.36 per hour on demand: $5,372.80 per month, $64,473.60 per year, before a single byte of storage or egress (as of September 2026). With a three-year reservation and no upfront payment it is still $2,437.11 per month — $87,735.78 over the term, and at the end you own nothing. A server of the same class from a German integrator's public configurator — 64-core EPYC, 512 GB DDR5, 2 × 3.84 TB NVMe — lists at €36,175 net (September 2026). In our Frankfurt rack it takes 2U at €139 per month with 100 kWh included. At 0.5 kW it draws about 365 kWh a month, so 265 kWh × €0.40 come on top: €245 per month, €8,969 over the same three years including the €149 setup, €45,144 with the hardware. And the hardware is yours afterwards. The other starting point is the server room in the office. Electricity alone for one 0.5 kW server at the current German business tariff of 17.2 ct/kWh (BDEW, August 2026) is €753 a year — before the air conditioning that has to remove the same 0.5 kW as heat, the UPS batteries nobody replaces, and the door nobody logs. In our data center the same server costs €2,940 a year, with redundant power, cooling, fire suppression, access control and an engineer on site.
- Fixed monthly price per unit with 100 kWh power included, no hourly metering, no egress line on the invoice
- Tier III+ data center in Frankfurt — redundant power and cooling, ISO 27001, documented processes for your audits
- Your hardware — or hardware we size, source and rack for you via integrator partners
- Operations on top when you want them — monitoring, patching, backups, 24/7 on-call
The offer
What "Managed Bare-Metal Colocation" means at Hostzero
You own the hardware — bring it, or buy it through us
Rack space, power and uplink in Frankfurt at a fixed price
Operations by you — or managed by us, 24/7
Secure connection to your sites: VPN, dedicated line, cross-connect
Open standards on top — Proxmox, Kubernetes, Ceph — exit-capable
Who uses colocation with us
Mid-sized companies
The server room in the office is full, hot or due for new UPS batteries. Your servers move to Frankfurt, your IT team keeps root.
Software and SaaS companies
Cloud bills grow faster than revenue. Own hardware at a fixed monthly price, Proxmox or Kubernetes on top.
IT service providers and MSPs
Rack space for your customers' systems in Frankfurt, hands-on work by our engineers, one contact for power and network.
Regulated industries
NIS2, ISO 27001 audits, data in Germany. Certificates and the access concept are ready for your auditor.
Why companies move their servers to Frankfurt
Turnkey, Not Self-Service
We are not a mass-market dedicated host. Every setup is planned with you: sizing, procurement through our integrator partners such as Tarox, racking, cabling, burn-in, network — and the platform on top, whether Proxmox, Kubernetes or Ceph. One contact, one invoice, one engineer who knows your rack.
Data Center Grade Without a Data Center
Telehouse Frankfurt, operated as Tier III+: redundant power and network, UPS and generator, cooling, 24/7 monitoring, 100 % renewable electricity. Certified to ISO 9001, ISO 27001, ISO 50001, ISAE 3402 and PCI DSS — the documentation your auditor asks for already exists.
Connected to Your IT, Not an Island
Site-to-site VPN as a quick start, dedicated lines or cross-connects to other carriers in the same building, network segmentation and firewall concepts, admin access via bastion hosts with MFA. Your colocation becomes an extension of your network — hybrid with on-premises or cloud workloads included.
Hyperscaler bare metal, mass-market dedicated or managed colocation — the honest comparison
| Criterion | Hyperscaler bare metal (AWS / Azure) | Mass-market dedicated host | Hostzero Managed Bare-Metal Colocation |
|---|---|---|---|
Cost model | Per hour, plus storage and egress by the GB | Low fixed rent per server, catalogue price | Fixed monthly price per unit with 100 kWh included; hardware one-off or sourced via partners |
Hardware ownership | None | None — rented, returned on cancellation | Yours — bring it or buy it through us |
Provisioning | Minutes | Minutes to hours, self-service | Days to weeks — planned, racked, tested |
Sizing | Full-host instances only (m6i.metal = 64 cores / 512 GB) | Fixed catalogue configurations | Exactly what you specify — from one server to a cluster |
Location | Frankfurt region, one of 30+ | Provider's own sites — often not Frankfurt | Frankfurt, Telehouse, Tier III+ |
Connection to your sites | VPN or Direct Connect at extra cost | Public internet; VPN is your job | VPN, dedicated line or cross-connect — planned with you |
Operations | You, or paid support tiers | You | You — or us: monitoring, patching, backups, 24/7 on-call |
Platform on top | Managed services ecosystem | You | Proxmox, Kubernetes, Ceph — designed and run by us |
Data jurisdiction | US CLOUD Act applies to the provider | Depends on the provider | German company, German data center |
Best for | Elastic, global, managed-services architectures | A single box today, price first | Companies that want to own the hardware and outsource everything around it |
Transparent pricing
Packages & prices — from rack space to managed private cloud
All prices net per month, plus a one-time setup fee. Exact terms depend on hardware, power draw and connectivity.
Colocation Starter
Your hardware moves to the data center, operations stay with you
Setup: €149 one time
Each further U: +€30, with 100 kWh and 30 TB
Above 100 kWh: €0.40 per kWh. Up to 1.5 kW peak per 16 A circuit, second circuit €25/month, A/B power via ATS €29/month
Term: 12 months, or monthly for €20 more, minimum 3 months
Quarter, half and full rack: on request
Bare Metal Servers
Hardware we source, rack and test for you — sized to your workload
Managed Colocation
Own the hardware, outsource operations
Private Cloud on your hardware
Proxmox or Kubernetes, designed and run by us on the servers in your rack: platform design & HA, operation & upgrades, incident handling, network segmentation, operational reporting. Proxmox from €690 /month, Kubernetes from €990 /month, setup from €1,900.
Colocation costs
What does colocation in Frankfurt cost?
Five things decide the monthly price. Power is billed by use: 100 kWh are included, the rest by the kWh.
| Cost driver | What you pay |
|---|---|
Space | From 1U at €79, 2U €139, each further U €30 |
Power | 100 kWh per month included, then €0.40 per kWh; A/B feed via ATS €29/month |
Network | 1 Gbit/s port and 20–30 TB traffic included, 10 Gbit/s +€30/month, DDoS mitigation included |
Setup | €149 one time (installation, cabling, uplink, IP routing) |
Operations | Yours, or ours on request |
Rack space from €79/month
Setup €149 · managed operations on request
Your exact price depends on hardware, power and connectivity. Send us your setup and we will send you a quote. All prices net, per month, plus one-time setup.
Specifications
What every unit in our rack includes
| Component | Specification |
|---|---|
Data center | Telehouse Frankfurt, operated as Tier III+ — ISO 9001, ISO 27001, ISO 50001, ISAE 3402, PCI DSS, TÜV-certified; 100 % renewable electricity |
Racks | 4-post 19-inch racks, 1000 mm deep, locked, accessed by Hostzero staff only |
Power | UPS and generator backed, A/B via ATS, up to 1.5 kW peak per 16 A circuit, 100 % renewable; 100 kWh per month included, above that €0.40 per kWh |
Network | Own network AS201251, two independent upstream carriers on 10 Gbit/s, IPv4 and IPv6, DDoS mitigation; BGP with your own ASN (setup €99) |
Connection to your sites | Site-to-site VPN as a quick start; dedicated line; cross-connect to carriers in the same building; network segmentation and firewall concepts |
Access | Racks accessed by Hostzero staff only; work on your hardware is done by our engineers. Logical access via bastion hosts with MFA; documented access concept for audits |
Hardware | Your own after a compatibility check — or sized and sourced via integrator partners, delivered racked and tested |
Operations | Rack, power and network by us 24/7 in every package; server operations by you — or by us under Managed Colocation with monitoring, patching, backups and 24/7 on-call |
Contract | 12 months; monthly for €20 more, minimum 3 months; invoice monthly |
Which model fits?
Not every server belongs in colocation
Stay with a mass-market host or the hyperscaler
If you need one box today by credit card, if the monthly price per server is the only criterion, or if your architecture lives on autoscaling and managed services — a dedicated host or the hyperscaler is the right tool. We do not sell servers from a catalogue, racking takes days rather than minutes, and a turnkey setup costs more per month than the cheapest rental. We will say so in the first call.
Hostzero Managed Bare-Metal Colocation
When you want to own the hardware and outsource everything around it: sizing, procurement, racking, network and operations. When Frankfurt, a cross-connect to your office or an audit trail matters. And when the servers are the foundation of a private cloud on Managed Proxmox or Managed Kubernetes with Ceph storage. Need a single machine, not a rack? A Sovereign VPS is the smaller step.
Onboarding
This is how the move goes — usually within 2 to 4 weeks
Initial consultation
Inventory, requirements, and whether you bring hardware or we source it — plus an honest word on whether colocation is the right model at all
Target design
Rack plan, power budget, connectivity, access concept and SLA — with a hardware quote from our partners if needed
Relocation or delivery
Planned move of your servers with fallback — or delivery, racking, cabling and burn-in of new hardware by our engineers
Operation
Rack, power and network run by us 24/7; the servers by you — or by us under Managed Colocation with SLA
Why companies choose Hostzero for colocation
We run our own infrastructure in the same racks: the hosts behind our VPS, Proxmox, Kubernetes and Ceph offerings stand in our Frankfurt data center. Colocation is not a product line next to the core business — it is the floor everything else stands on.
Own Racks, Own Network
Juniper MX204 routers, redundant uplinks and our own engineers on site in Frankfurt — no reseller between you and the rack. 14 years in Frankfurt, the last 10 at Telehouse.
Integrator Partners, Not a Catalogue
Hardware is sized for your workload and sourced through partners such as Tarox, delivered racked, cabled and tested — warranty handled by us.
Direct Engineer Access
No ticket tiers, no middlemen — you talk to the people who cabled your servers and run the network they hang on.
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does colocation in Frankfurt cost?
Rack space starts at €79 per month net for 1U; 2U €139 with 100 kWh power and 20 TB traffic, 3U €169, 4U €199, each further U €30, plus a one-time setup of €149. Managed operations are priced on request. For an exact price, request a quote.
Is power included?
From 2U, 100 kWh per month are included. Above that we bill €0.40 per kWh. One 16 A circuit carries up to 1.5 kW peak; a second circuit costs €25 per month.
Can we rent a half or full rack?
Yes. Quarter, half and full racks are priced on request; send us your setup.
What is the minimum term?
12 months. Month-to-month is possible for €20 more per month, with a minimum of 3 months.
Can we visit our servers in the data center?
The racks are accessed by Hostzero staff only. Our engineers do the hands-on work on your hardware, by ticket.
Can I bring my own existing hardware?
Yes — Bring Your Own Hardware is the core of the Colocation Starter package. We check your servers for rack, power and network compatibility before the move and plan the relocation with a fallback, so your systems stay reachable until the cutover.
Can you buy the hardware for us?
Yes. We size the servers for your workload and source them through our integrator partners such as Tarox, then deliver them racked, cabled and burned in. Warranty and replacement run through us. The hardware is yours; it is quoted per project together with the colocation package on one invoice.
How does remote hands and access work?
Physical work on your hardware — reboots, swapping a disk, reseating a cable — goes through a remote hands ticket to our engineers on site. Logical access runs over site-to-site VPN or a dedicated cross-connect; administrative access goes through bastion hosts with MFA and is documented for audits.
What connectivity options are available, including hybrid setups?
Site-to-site VPN for a quick start, dedicated lines for higher bandwidth, and cross-connects to other carriers and providers in the same building. Hybrid architectures are the normal case: we connect your colocation securely to your on-premises systems and to cloud workloads.
Can we run Proxmox, Kubernetes or Ceph on the servers?
That is what most customers do. Managed Proxmox, , Managed Kubernetes, and Ceph storage clusters are designed and operated by the same team that runs the rack — and you can upgrade from Colocation Starter to Managed Colocation or Private Cloud at any time.
How is this different from a dedicated server at a mass-market host?
A mass-market host rents you a catalogue configuration in minutes at a low monthly price, and you operate it yourself; the hardware is never yours. We plan a setup with you, source the hardware you actually need, rack it in Frankfurt and — if you want — run it. That costs more per month than the cheapest rental and takes days instead of minutes. If a single rented box is all you need, the mass-market host is the better deal, and we will tell you so.
Does colocation in Frankfurt help with GDPR and NIS2?
It keeps the data in a German data center under German law with a German provider — no third-country transfer to explain. The data center is ISO 27001 certified and our operations are documented, which makes the supply-chain part of your NIS2 risk management easier to evidence; NIS2 has applied in Germany since the NIS-2-Umsetzungsgesetz entered into force on 6 December 2025. Your own obligations — registration, incident reporting, risk management — remain yours.
How quickly can we start?
After the initial consultation and hardware check, usually within 2 to 4 weeks — faster if rack space is free and the setup is standard. For hardware sourced via our partners, add the delivery time of the configuration.
Start now
Ready to own your infrastructure?
Talk to an engineer — 30 minutes, no sales pitch. Tell us what runs today, and we will tell you honestly whether colocation, turnkey bare metal, a VPS — or staying where you are — is the right call.