Sungard Availability Services® announces significant Irish expansion

Sungard Availability Services has announced a significant expansion in the Irish market to date, in partnership with Digital Realty Trust, Inc. a leading global provider of data centre solutions. This latest investment will increase Sungard AS’ presence and capability within Ireland, and highlights its commitment to driving substantial business growth across the region. This expansion expects to see the creation of approximately 50 new job opportunities within Ireland for Sungard AS, across multiple areas such as technical operations, customer services, sales and marketing.

As a crucial gateway for US based organisations seeking to do business in Europe, Sungard AS has witnessed increased demand from organisations looking to host their data in Ireland, and to benefit from the latest infrastructure and knowledge economy that is rapidly developing within the country. With demand ranging from financial services organisations looking for the highest level technology solutions, through to government bodies who are increasingly moving towards a digital first approach, Sungard AS’ expansion will ensure that rapidly growing organisations located both in Ireland and across the world can benefit from its global cloud platform and managed services, based on Irish soil.

The partnership with Digital Realty will provide a state of the art Certified Tier III facility and underlying infrastructure from which Sungard AS can host its award-winning[1] global cloud platform and full range of production and recovery solutions. Customers will also have access to Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) - for which Sungard AS was recently identified as a leader in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Disaster Recovery as a Service[2].

Gary Watson, General Manager of Sungard AS, Ireland said: “We already work with notable brands within Ireland, such as providing Fujifilm with our Private Managed Cloud solution, and Transics with our Managed Services offering. This expansion will not only help us evolve our current services for these rapidly growing organisations, but also enables us to attract more business from across the world – and in return, jobs – to the area.”

Commenting on the decision to work with Digital Realty, Watson stated: “When selecting a data centre partner we wanted to find the right premises that could provide a robust infrastructure needed to underpin our services. And we needed a data centre environment that boasts strong resilience and backup facilities, as well as high levels of security accreditation. We work with Digital Realty in other territories, and know that its technology is of the highest standard, so we are proud to be able to continue to offer our customers best of breed services.”
As well as addressing Ireland’s growing demand for agile, flexible and resilient IT services, this expansion will enable Sungard AS to further invest in its dedicated Workplace Recovery capabilities. Staff productivity has been a frequent concern in the post-austerity digital world, and attracting and retaining talented people is vital to organisational success, whether in normal or crisis operations. A new technology hub in Dublin enables the building out of Sungard AS’ Park West facility to create up to 300 additional dedicated end-user positions, to which firms can relocate their critical personnel.

State of the art facility

Based in Digital Profile Park; a modern business park near Dublin’s city centre, Digital Realty’s facility boasts high speed connectivity and network access to the US, UK and Europe, combined with Sungard AS’ high capacity, low latency internet connectivity to provide high performance all day, every day. The centre is also located alongside global technology leaders including Microsoft and Google. The agreement with Digital Realty offers Sungard AS the potential to expand on the amount of data centre space required over time, allowing it to meet its ambitious growth plans and long term goals for the region.
Commenting on the partnership with Sungard AS, Bernard Geoghegan, Managing Director EMEA, Digital Realty said: “The Irish market continues to benefit from the investments that many large and successful technology organisations such as Sungard AS are making in the country. Ireland’s infrastructure supports the high speed, low latency networks that are vital to a variety of businesses, ranging from cloud providers through to large financial organisations and social media giants. We are impressed with the portfolio of services that Sungard AS provides, which we are already helping to deliver across the US. We believe that this latest partnership will attract even more investment into Ireland, as well as giving organisations access to world class production and recovery solutions.”

Spotlight on compliance and sustainability

Companies are now facing increased pressure and scrutiny for their data protection and compliance policies, and this will only increase with the new EU General Data Protection regulation laws currently set to come into force in 2017. Digital Profile Park, along with being the first Tier III facility in Ireland, is also ISO 27001 accredited - complementing and extending on Sungard AS’ own ISO 270001 certification awarded at the beginning of 2015.

This new facility in Ireland also marks a move towards higher levels of sustainability for Sungard AS. The facility is in compliance with BREEAM[3], having scored Excellent in both its design and post construction assessment. The design was awarded first prize in the inaugural Brill IT Awards run by The Uptime Institute. The design also delivers TUI ‘Tier III’ level of resilience certified at both Design and Post Construction assessments.

Commenting on the expansion Garry Connolly, President of Host in Ireland said: “It's a great day for Ireland when a global company like Sungard Availability Services, who has built an award-winning reputation for providing cloud services to its clients, decides to significantly increase its presence here."
"By partnering with Digital Realty in its new Dublin campus, Sungard Availability Services demonstrates how Ireland is a well-established location for hosting critical data, leveraging the 5Ps - Policy, Pedigree, People, Power, and Pipes. Host in Ireland would like to wish Sungard Availability Services every success."
The new facility will go live and will be available for customer operations in Q3, 2015.