March 04, 2010

The official opening of a shared data centre, the first of its type for central government, took place yesterday (3 March) with IT Directors from Ordnance Survey and Land Registry cutting the ribbon.

The opening sees Ordnance Survey and Land Registry become two of the first government organisations to embrace the Government Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Strategy and follow the programme of shared data centres. This strategy aims to reduce IT infrastructure costs by up to £300 million a year and support the achievement of environmental and sustainability targets.

The mutually beneficial agreement for Land Registry to lease Ordnance Survey 219 square metres of serviced and managed space meets industry best practice for Ordnance Survey. They will have two data centres at separate sites running IT infrastructures and services, and physically separate their organisation’s workforce from its ‘live’ IT systems. By the end of 2010 Ordnance Survey will have both the Gloucester Data Centre and their second site – at their new head office currently being built in Southampton – fully operational. Meanwhile, Land Registry meet their shared service strategy by using the extra capacity available at their data storage centre.

Key members of the Ordnance Survey and Land Registry teams involved in the successful venture celebrated the opening with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and lunchtime event.

Key members of the Ordnance Survey and Land Registry teams involved in the successful venture celebrated the opening with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and lunchtime event.

Land Registry’s Director of Information Systems, John Wright, also took part in the opening event and said, “We’re delighted to be working in partnership with Ordnance Survey; we hope this will set a trail for other public-sector organisations to share their services and cut costs. Our state-of-the-art venting system on-site will reduce energy consumption and we look forward to monitoring this going forward.”

Representatives from both organisations will be presenting at the Public Sector Data Centres Conference in Manchester on 10 May 2010 to share how they achieved this successful and mutually beneficial outcome.