Growth in store as giant Scottish data centre serving two million people changes hands

A Scottish data centre and cloud services provider has acquired a giant Lanarkshire facility that provides IT services for an estimated two million people across the country.

DataVita has bought the Fortis data centre with £45 million of funding support from parent outfit HFD Group.

The deal sees the company gain full ownership of the data centre from a syndicate of private investors. DataVita has operated the facility since 2016 and was its first occupier, providing data centre and cloud services to businesses and public sector organisations.

The acquisition concludes the first phase of the company’s strategy for the facility, which when complete will see it valued at £160m.

Danny Quinn, managing director of Lanarkshire-based DataVita.

Danny Quinn, managing director of Bellshill-based DataVita, said: “The deal for Fortis has been enabled by DataVita’s success over the last few years, from more or less a standing start.

“We can now accelerate our plans to drive the data centre’s environmental and wider ESG [environmental, social, and corporate governance] focus, open up new opportunities with our existing clients, and support our market competitiveness and ability to work with larger users of IT services across the UK.

“From a wider HFD Group perspective, it underlines our support for, and investment in, IT services for our existing and prospective occupiers.”

He added: “As the disruption caused by Covid-19 continues and our economy and society rely more than ever on digital infrastructure, DataVita is in a strong position to support the IT and data needs of businesses and public sector services in a secure and sustainable way.”

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