Pulsant Newcastle Central NE-1

Colo-X analysis

The Pulsant Newcastle Central data centre was originally opened by Databanx, a subsidiary of Onyx in 2003, so it has been in operation for some time now.  Today it offers about 220 racks of capacity in single-level data hall, with about 0.5MW of IT load, so a small site overall. Onyx was acquired by Pulsant in June 2016 and this site now forms one of a string of 12 data centres across the country, from Edinburgh down to Croydon, as Pulsant seek to reposition themselves as one of the UK’s “edge” operators.

The site has a claim to fame as apparently being the first data centre in the world to acquire the ISO27001 certification, now an industry standard.

Pulsant Newcastle Central NE-1 facility description

The Pulsant Newcastle Central data centre is located just 1km east of the main Newcastle railway station, so is very central and indeed is now somewhat at odds with the local area as so much student accomodation has sprung up around it (see the external pictures). It came to market originally under the Databanx Ltd name, but was a subsidiary of The Onyx Group.  It was very much Onyx’s “flagship” site until their acquisition in 2016.

Pulsant is one of the UK regional colocation market leaders with 12 data centres offering some 25MW of capacity in total and the company is now making much of their focus on “edge” colocation. Besides colocation (rack and power) Pulsant offer both network and a full suite of managed services. The Pulsant Newcastle Central site is one of Pulsant’s smaller sites, at 0.5MW of total capacity, though larger than Pulsant’s Newcastle East data centre, which is only 200kW.

Technical stats