For a time, other carriers followed MCI’s lead in leasing space on the roof. With more and more companies based in One Wilshire, the building managers set up a Meet-Me Room on the fourth floor in which free interconnections could be made between carriers.
Now if a Guatemalan phone card company needs to connect to Sprint, they simply run a fiber optic interconnect between their routers. Data networks use the Meet-Me-Room to make peer-to-peer interconnections without costly fees. One Wilshire’s function as a major hub in the global network and demand for access to this fountain of data allows it to serve as the most expensive real estate in North America, renting out at $250 per square foot/month.
