Flexible colocation and open source cloud services to become integral part of The Sharp Project proposition

The thriving digital and media businesses located at and around The Sharp Project will have access to DataCentred’s low-cost, highly secure colocation and cloud capabilities. The integrated and flexible nature of DataCentred’s services supports growing businesses’ colocation and computing needs as they expand, allowing them to quickly scale up and respond to unpredictable demand, and is expected to help attract new, high growth companies to the building and the region.

The requirement for DataCentred to establish a second site in the Greater Manchester area at The Sharp Project is due to the continuing strong demand for the company’s colocation and cloud storage services, currently serviced from its first data centre, a 850 rack facility located in Michigan Park MediaCityUK, Salford.
By providing its services from both The Sharp Project and MediaCity, DataCentred will bridge the two biggest digital hubs outside of London, giving the company access to the substantial number of media organisations and fast growing digital business located there. The acquisition of The Sharp Project more than doubles DataCentred’s rack capacity.

DataCentred’s vision is to become an integral part of Manchester’s digital infrastructure. The cloud and colocation computing services that DataCentred will provide at The Sharp Project and MediaCity, combined with the physical network that it installs linking these hubs with the Manchester peering point, IXManchester, will enhance the overall proposition that the region can offer to businesses.

The company’s expansion to The Sharp Project underpins its commitment to creating at least 270 jobs in the Greater Manchester area over the next five years which will include highly skilled and technical next generation DevOps positions as well as site engineer roles and apprenticeships.

DataCentred was established in 2012 by Dr. Mike Kelly, a pioneer in the data centre sector. Big Data, Video-on-Demand and compute-heavy applications are driving substantial growth in the demand for compute and storage capabilities. The company will capitalise on these fundamental market drivers and address the colocation and computing requirements of the 80% of UK businesses who are currently managing their computing estates in-house.

Its unique strategy of providing dedicated colocation capacity and cloud as an integrated offering has been designed to support its clients and enable them to evolve their legacy IT systems and enhance their cloud capabilities. Through partnerships with proven market leaders and innovative players in the development community, as well as with clients, DataCentred works collaboratively to provide bespoke customer solutions.

Mark Canning at Canning O’Neill advised DataCentred on the acquisition.

Dr Mike Kelly, CEO of DataCentred, said: “We are delighted to be working with The Sharp Project to provide Manchester’s iconic and pioneering creative hub with scalable colocation and open source cloud storage solutions to support its occupants’ growing businesses. DataCentred will soon span The Sharp Project and MediaCity, the two biggest digital business hubs outside of London, which will enable us to establish a much needed local internet network, supported by multiple telecoms providers, linking these key locations. Our presence at The Sharp Project brings DataCentred one step closer to implementing our strategy of increased regional connectivity, which we are leading, as companies increasingly seek regional solutions to their data centre requirements.”