Managed data centre solutions for global investment group

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Fidelity International (FIL) is a leading global investment group that provides a wide range of investment products and services to institutional and individual customers around the world. Fidelity has international assets of approximately £140 billion under management.

The ability to conduct secure, high-speed transactions for millions of customers globally is a core requirement of Fidelity’s business. It is vital for its agility and future market leadership that it has in place a scalable and secure IT infrastructure.

The business challenge

Fidelity’s data centres underpin its worldwide operations housing everything from its Voice over IP communications system to email, business applications and security.

The company’s current data centre was reaching the end of its life and Fidelity took the opportunity to revitalise its ICT infrastructure. It needed a flexible data centre strategy that would support new technologies and in turn drive business growth.

Fidelity started the search for a new data centre with low latency connectivity to the City of London that could meet its business requirements for the next decade. Since security and business continuity are paramount for Fidelity, it ruled out a shared data centre and looked for a dedicated facility that could be customised to the highest industry standards, classified as tier IV. It would be permanently connected to a second primary facility to ensure maximum resilience.  

As well as the highest standards in security and availability, Fidelity’s criteria included space for expansion, the most energy efficient design and the ability to monitor and manage the centre remotely.

“We had a complex requirement and tight timescales,” said David Hefford, Head of Systems Operations at Fidelity International.  

“There were very few suitable locations around London with dedicated power offered by companies with the expertise we required. We looked across the market at diff erent approaches and suppliers, including the possibility of acquiring our own data centre infrastructure. Colt’s proposition to construct a bespoke facility at an existing site was the best option for us, and by some margin.”  

Why Colt?

Fidelity selected Colt to build and then manage a dedicated 1,000 square metre facility for ten years within one of its London data centres.  

Fidelity chose Colt for its track record in serving the finance sector and expertise in providing managed data centre and connectivity solutions. Colt also offered a centre with proven power capability and high speed telecoms connectivity that could be customised and delivered within the tight one year deadline.  

“We had worked together before and we knew Colt had the expertise and finance sector experience as well as the facility we needed,” said Hefford.

High Performance

Fidelity International’s worldwide offices all rely on the performance and stability of the systems and applications run out of the data centre. Colt designed it to power and cool 1,500W per square metre so that it could accommodate the newest technology, including blade servers, and increase the performance and functionality of its services.

Stringent security

Fidelity’s business-critical applications must be managed in a highly secure environment. The data centre has extensive physical and network security, including full CCTV and 24x7 security guards as well as remotely locked data cabinets. At any given time, Fidelity can remotely validate and confirm the security, power and connectivity status of its data hall and individual cabinets.

Reducing power consumption

Energy efficiency and environmental considerations were high on the agenda when designing the centre. It uses the most thermally efficient cooling techniques, including ’free cooling’, where outside air is used to chill the data centre when temperatures fall below 13 degrees, hot aisle/cool aisle design and the latest coolers and chillers. Since most of the infrastructure and installations within the data centre can be controlled remotely, there is rarely a need to access the data hall and lights are only switched on when someone enters. These efficiencies not only save power, but also the operational costs of the data centre.  

Rolling out the data centre

Colt delivered the tier IV data centre within the set timescales and budget by using careful planning and the Colt project management methodology. As well as the resilient data hall, Colt built out the racks, structured cabling, rack monitoring and door locking systems required to start operations immediately. By taking a collaborative approach with the Fidelity team, the detailed design was finalised in just three months and the complete installation took less than nine.  

“The teamwork between Colt and Fidelity, and the involvement of Colt’s management, gave us confidence that they would deliver the solution within budget and on schedule,” said Hefford.

Platform for the future

Colt now operates and monitors the new facility around the clock for Fidelity. It offers a state-of-the-art and scalable platform which Fidelity can use to increase the performance and complexity of its applications and extend them to new markets as the business demands.  

“The resilient and scalable IT infrastructure we put in place is unique in the market place today and we would be happy to use Colt again,” concluded Hefford.