SSE Fareham Data Centre acquired by Rigby Group (owner of systems integrator SCC) and Interoute acquires Vtesse

SSE Fareham

The 60,000 sq ft, 9MW SSE flagship data centre on the south coast near Fareham has been acquired by SCC – a Birmingham based systems integrator with their own data centre located on the company’s Tyseley campus in south east Birmingham.

When I first heard about this I was a bit surprised – data centres (big energy consumers) seem such a logical fit for a large electric utility company like SSE – managing and maintaining high voltage switch gear and generators is surely second nature to these guys??  Secondly of course is the fit with SSE’s own national network, SSE Telecoms , so surprising really the data centre is not seen as a good strategic fit with the rest of the business.

SCC’s focus seems to be about shifting hardware, public sector and cloud based services, ie a broad based systems integrator.  SCC has a strong track record in delivering services to both public sector and large enterprise.  Probably worth noting that SSE has two very large corporate clients as customers in Fareham.

Colo-X comment:

The SSE facility has always been seen as a very high quality site backed by a very stable (huge) utility company who at one time apparently had ambitions to push further into the UK data centre market.  Perhaps the increasingly competitive nature of the UK colocation market over the past couple of years has dampened the appetite for this ambition?

Furthermore the lack of a full service model to support customers with more than just kilowatts alone explains why the site is perhaps a better fit with an established systems integrator like SCC.  Certainly at Colo-X we believe that people and service are a key differentiator in this marketplace and an aspect we work hard to keep on top of when advising customers.  We are watching with interest many of the new entrant data centre operators develop very focussed service models, a trend we will update in our 2014 UK Colocation Market Overview.

The full deal press release can be found here: http://bit.ly/1vA1oJE

Pan-European network operator Interoute acquires Vtesse

Yet more network consolidation (hot on the heals of the recent acquisition of Geo by Zayo).  Also worth remembering Vtesse own and operate their own 30,000 sq ft data centre in Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire, to the north of London (pictured).

Vtesse has a very broad network footprint across the entire UK data centre market (claiming to pop over 60) whereas Interoute (in our experience) is much less commonly found, especially away from the central London data centre market.

Colo-X comment:

As a strategic fit this looks like the marriage of local UK access with a pan-European backbone, so makes complete sense – and perhaps given Interoute’s limited penetration into the UK data centre and wholesale marketplace will not have that great an impact on market choice, certainly much less so than the recent Geo/Zayo deal.  In fact today’s announcement reminded me that Interoute is also a dark fibre provider – so perhaps could benefit as one of the few remaining competitors and options for choice (especially for dark fibre) in the UK market.

Full details of the transaction can be found here: http://bit.ly/1ryqngx