Intelligent CIO Europe Issue 32 | Page 9

NEWS Equinix to open new flagship data centre in Milan The ML5 IBX is the fourth data centre for Equinix in Italy, where existing Equinix data centres provide access to a wide choice of network service providers, Internet exchange points, content delivery networks and cloud service providers. Equinix, a global interconnection and data centre company, has announced the development of a new data centre in Milan, due to open in Q1 2021. Known as ML5, the International Business Exchange (IBX) data centre will offer state-of-the-art colocation, as well as a host of advanced interconnection services, including Equinix Cloud Exchange Fabric (ECX Fabric) and Equinix Internet Exchange. The innovative, modular construction of the site incorporates Equinix’s Flexible Data Centre (FDC) principles, which leverage common design elements for space, power and cooling to ensure longterm maintenance predictability. This approach provides customers with high standards for uptime and availability while lowering operating risk and complexity. This expansion further supports Italian businesses with advancing their Digital Transformation strategies, as well as enabling global companies across industries to expand their operations in Italy, spurring innovation. Organisations working to accelerate their evolution from traditional to digital business can utilise the new site to dynamically scale their IT infrastructure, adopt hybrid multicloud architectures and interconnect with strategic business partners within the Platform Equinix global ecosystem of nearly 10,000 customers. HMD Global founding new Centre of Excellence in Finland for R&D HMD Global, the home of Nokia phones, has announced it is acquiring assets of Valona Labs and launching a brand-new Centre of Excellence in Tampere, Finland. Combining HMD Global’s commitment to delivering secure, reliable and dependable mobile experiences with Valona Labs’ expertise in mobile, enterprise and cybersecurity software, the acquisition of assets will further build upon the company’s reputation as a global leader in smartphone software updates and security. the centre to include imaging and audio technologies in the future. The centre will create an immediate need to hire new technical talent in the region and will be led by the former award-winning Head of Unit for Valona Labs, Ari Heikkinen. The new Centre of Excellence in Tampere will specialise in software, security and services, propelling HMD Global’s transition from a purely hardware business, to a combined hardware and services company, diversifying its intellectual property and differentiating its unique go-to-market offering. In March this year, HMD Global entered a new service category with the launch of its global data roaming service, HMD Connect, which enables people around the world to benefit from a hassle-free data SIM. Over the coming months, the centre in Tampere will concentrate on developing this service further and begin work on other services such as remote device locking, enterprise mobility management, mobile device software security, secure network communication and black box testing. There are also ambitions to expand the scope of www.intelligentcio.com INTELLIGENTCIO 9