01 June 2018

Founded 10 years ago in Portsmouth, Elite has more than 10,000 customers for its connectivity, data centre and voice services.

They range from multinationals to small businesses and from charities to government agencies.

Among its customers, Elite names Interflora, Qatar Airways, Heineken, Portsmouth City Council, Dogs Trust and Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, et al.

With growth came the need for a high-quality data centre partner to add to itsnetwork. Among Elite’s requirements were that the data centre had to be based in London with a highly resilient power network and a large range of network carriers so that it could confidently host customer data with no restrictions.

In addition, the firm required competitive pricing and the ability to scale as its business increased.

The company chose Clerkenwell-based Volta which is a joint venture between funds managed by Apollo Global Real Estate (the real estate investment management arm of Apollo Global Management), and Glebe London.

Elite MD David Simmons says: “We chose Volta because we are highly impressed with the power resilience, which is a crucial part of our own service offering, to provide high uptime internet connectivity 365 days a year.”

Volta claims its power resilience is one of the most advanced in the UK, being located on two separate power rings on London’s upgraded 33kV network. As a result, the company reckons that its data centre, which is brand new, will always offer the power supply its customers need because there are two main grid stations and transformers on site.

According to Volta, all this allows it to be in control of its power supply and consequently provide Elite with a guarantee of 100 per cent power supply to its racks. The company adds that  its “power by the hour” pricing – said to be a first in the industry – means customers pay only for the power they consume as opposed to rack space.

Furthermore, Volta says that because it’s facility is carrier neutral, Elite and its customers have the freedom to negotiate directly with the carrier of their choice.

“Like us, Volta have made a significant investment in data centre infrastructure and has ample capacity to support our own business growth,” says Simmons. “All of this, along with their flexible pricing structure and the excellent customer service we’ve received, has reinforced our decision that we made the right choice.”