CMC Markets selects Colt as preferred data centre supplier to support long-term growth

CMC Markets, a UK-based financial derivatives dealer, has selected Colt as its preferred data centre provider. The company has committed its data centre requirements to Colt for the next 12 years to improve operational efficiency and strengthen the company’s competitive advantage. Colt will also provide improved access to various FX liquidity venues through its connectivity service PrizmNet which is designed to provide the low latency and security required by financial services firms when trading foreign currency, or across other asset classes.

CMC Markets has been at the forefront of derivative trading for almost 25 years. In 2013, they executed more than 30 million trades. With ever increasing capacity and performance demands, CMC Markets sought a colocation provider that could offer a flexible, cost effective and efficient data centre to protect and secure its critical systems on a long term basis. After evaluating a number of data centre providers, the company selected Colt’s fully equipped London 3 data centre situated just outside of London.

Located in Welwyn Garden City, the data centre is suitably placed to pair with CMC Markets’ current data centre locations and was able to meet the company’s environmental efficiency standards. Colt supplied 68 rack positions with approximately 250kW of UPS capacity. This provided CMC Markets with the level of data centre capacity it needed to securely maintain its critical IT Systems. The improved efficiency allowed CMC Markets to halve its physical datacentre footprint whilst still supporting all of the business’ growing requirements. In addition, Colt’s ability to integrate data centre and network solutions, enabled CMC Markets to improve overall operational efficiency allowing them to easily connect a number of their key market providers with the new Colt managed data centre.

“At CMC Markets, technology really is at the heart of everything we do. We turn over billions of pounds globally each day on our feature-rich Next Generation trading platform, so it’s imperative that we have the most cutting-edge technology in place to ensure business continuity, data security and performance”, said Tom Faulkner, Head of IT Production at CMC Markets. “Colt’s combined Data Centre and Network Services offering provided us with the reliability and operational efficiency that we needed, as well as the flexibility to support the future growth of our business. This is the start of a long-term partnership with Colt and we are looking forward to building upon this new relationship to deliver even more innovation in the years ahead”.
“Just like our cutting-edge data centre technology, CMC Markets’ Next Generation trading platform is built to demanding specifications, using the latest technologies to meet their clients’ needs, such as high speed trade execution. The company had a need for flexible data storage requirements, so it was clear that there was a natural alignment with our modular and flexible datacentres”, commented Ian Dixon, Vice President and Operations at Colt Data Centre Services. “By putting flexibility at the heart of our data centre solutions, companies like CMC Markets are able to scale their data centre requirements in line with the future business needs, regardless of whether these are known or unanticipated.”

Colt’s London 3 data centre is a state-of-the-art, carrier-neutral facility situated 40km (25miles) from the centre of London. The data centre provides over 12,500m2 of data centre space with a total power provision of 33 MVA. The facility is one of Colt’s flagship facilities renowned for its operational excellence, state-of-the-art technology, resilience and security.