Macquarie Telecom to invest AU$17 million in initial build of new Canberra data centre

Macquarie Telecom has announced an initial investment of AU$17 million to build a new data centre at its Canberra campus to meet the rise in demand for Macquarie Government's cloud and cybersecurity services.

Construction of stage one of the Intellicentre 5 (IC5) -- which will feature an initial capacity of 1.5MW -- will commence in July and is due to be completed by December.

Once completed, the full Canberra campus comprising of IC4 and IC5 will have a total capacity of 4MW, with the option to expand further if additional capacity is required.

Macquarie also touted the facility was being designed to achieve Tier IV data centre standards and would be SCEC Zone 5 ready to manage government cloud workloads.

"Government departments need to have clarity over data sovereignty -- who controls the data, where does it reside, and who has access. We cover these bases by ensuring Australian control and access only by Australian government-cleared specialists," Macquarie Government managing director Aidan Tudehope said.

"The IC5 South Bunker at Macquarie Data Centres' Canberra Campus will also provide a safe haven for agencies that don't want all their eggs in one basket, whether that's splitting data between our facilities or other providers."

This latest investment into its facilities by Macquarie Telecom follows the company's ongoing construction of its Intellicentre 3 East (IC3 East) facility at the Macquarie Park data centre campus. Construction of the facility, which will provide an initial capacity of 2.4MW, began in January.

When fully fitted out and coupled with the yet to be built IC3 West, the company will have 33MW of capacity between IC3 East and West, and 10MW of capacity in IC2.

"We are injecting circa AU$100 million into the economy this year with stage one of the build of our IC3 hyperscale Sydney facility at our Macquarie Park Data Centre Campus and the new IC5 South Bunker at our Canberra Campus," Macquarie Data Centres group executive David Hirst said.

At the end of last year, the group scored a AU$20 million contract with the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) to deliver secure internet gateway (SIG) and cybersecurity services.

Under the initial three-year contract, Macquarie Telecom is delivering its SIG services to secure the connection between the ATO's IT environments and the internet. This will include leveraging the company's security operations centre, data centres, and ASD-certified cloud computing platforms.  

During its first half-year results of 2020, the company reported 9% growth in group revenue to AU$132 million, and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) increase 8% to AU$27.6 million. This flowed through to a 7% drop in net profit after tax to AU$7.6 million.

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