Palmer Street, Birmingham, B9 4EX
Colo-X analysis
The first carrier-neutral data centre in central Birmingham opened in the summer of 2016. Phase one offered an initial hall of 1.5MW customer power, or 10,000 sq ft net, with a second similar size hall ready for fit out.
Pure Data Centres Group originally developed the facility, which was then owned and operated by GTP3 Data Centres, led by Sandeep Sharma (ex-Virtustream). In June 2022 the facility, including freehold, became the eighth UK regional data centre to be acquired by Proximity Data Centres, who are now the leading UK regional operator with ten sites in total. In September 2023 Proximity were acquired by nLighten who also run 16 “edge” data centres across Germany and France.
The site is also one of the few in the UK to have an official UTI (Uptime Institute) Tier 3 Design Certification, so quality is assured. UK managed-services provider Six Degrees were the initial wholesale tenant and they continue to offer a full suite of services from simple colocation at one rack (or less) through to fully managed solutions. Part-racks for 1/4 or 1/2 racks also available.
We expect the customer list to now expand rapidly under the carrier-neutral model that Proximity operate.
Proximity Data Centres Edge 8 Birmingham facility description
This Birmingham data centre is only a mile to the east of Birmingham’s New Street station and the newer HS2 terminal. The data centre comprises a five-acre parcel of land bounded by Great Barr Street to the north and Glover Street to the west.
The first phase offers two data halls each of 10,000 sq ft, the first of which was fully fitted on opening and the second hall ready for fit out. The building is on a single level and offers some fairly impressive boardroom, meeting room and breakout facilities for customers. There is ample off-street parking inside the site security perimeter. The longer-term plan includes a second similar-sized data centre building (3MW/20,000 sq ft net) making 6MW in total on the site with yet more possible up 12MW.
The area has ample networks in situ and our site survey in August 2016 found evidence of Tanet (now part of Level3 or CenturyLink) and Fibreway (now part of Sky). Initial carrier networks in the building includes BT, Virgin Media and Zayo as well as managed services from Six Degrees (6DG).
Technical stats
| Size | 10,000 sq ft of net tech initially, up to 60,000 sq ft possible |
| Total customer power | 1.5MW initially, 6MW possible |
| Percentage occupied | 10% |
| Operational since | 2016 |
| Installed clients | 5 |
| Networks available on site | 5, including BT, Lumen/COLT, Virgin and Zayo |
| Standard power | 1.5kW/sq m or 16Amps/3.5kW rack on average |
| 24/7 on-site support | Yes |
| 24/7 access | Yes |
| Pricing | POA |
We usually supply costs and information within 60 minutes during office hours.
