​NSW government to 'considerably' extend GovDC datacentres

The New South Wales government said it will "considerably" extend its datacentre capacity at its two GovDC facilities this year, signing with Metronode to provide the extra space at both its Silverwater, Sydney and Unanderra, Wollongong facilities.

According to Metronode managing director Josh Griggs, construction on the addition of data halls is slated to begin soon, with the Australian-based provider offering the state government its experience in energy efficient datacentre provision.

"Energy efficiency is a key deliverable for the GovDC program and our engineered technologies, along with our superior security systems, have more than satisfied the government's requirements," Griggs said.

GovDC was officially launched in October 2013 to enable the consolidation of 130 government datacentres into two, with all state government agencies required to move into, or migrate its IT into GovDC by August 2017.

The GovDC Marketplace launched in parallel to provide NSW agencies with a one-stop-shop for finding telecommunications, cloud, infrastructure, managed services, and software providers.

"Metronode has housed NSW Government data since the GovDC program began in 2012 at both facilities. We constructed another data hall in Unanderra in 2015 to provide additional capacity and we are now further expanding both facilities in 2017," Griggs added.

The state government said the motivation behind shifting to the GovDC model was that at previous sites, back-up and disaster recovery systems were sometimes non-existent.

"Demand was growing at an unprecedented rate, chief information officers were entering contracts which included unused capacity to ensure continuity of expansion, contractual conditions were problematic, and risk allocation unfair, which resulted in hidden costs and risks to the state," the government said. "No existing facility could meet projected government demand over the 15 years."

According to the state government, it experienced an overriding benefit by entering into a whole-of-government arrangement to minimise total costs, make contractual terms and costs more transparent, and guarantee reliability and service standards.

"Our priority is driving digital innovation to improve access to services for the citizens of NSW," New South Wales government director for GovDC Derek Paterson said on Thursday. "We are pleased that this additional capacity will support more agencies and allow services to be added to the GovDC Marketplace, helping us to meet our objectives".