European carrier-neutral datacentre facility provider Telecity Group has bought Finland-based datacentre operator Academica for €28m (£22.4m).
The Academica acquisition provides Telecity with a capacity of 3 megawatts (MW) in Helsinki.
Helsinki is a growing datacentre hub and offers easy access to Russia and the Baltic countries.
"Access to the Russian market is one of the biggest reasons big IT facilities operators are interested in having a presence in Finland," Ian Brown, senior analyst for IT services at Ovum, told Computer Weekly.
Lack of Russian capacity
There is a lack of good quality and secure datacentre infrastructure in Russia.
Building and operating datacentres in Russia is difficult, according to the analyst.
"We know of IT service providers who had planned to operate datacentre facilities in Russia through joint ventures but later pulled out because of the difficulties," Brown said.
This means there is a growing demand for efficient datacentres in Finland not just by Russian enterprises.
There is also demand from big retailers and oil and gas companies in the Nordic region who want to extend their reach into Russia and Baltic countries, Brown said.
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Academica's acquisition marks Telecity's second datacentre acquisition in Finland in a span of four months. It purchased Tenue Oy in August for £3.7m gaining access to 2MW of operational capacity.
Following the completion, Academica's managing director, Marko Vanninen will become managing director of Telecity Group – Finland.
Combining Academica, Tenue OY and Telecity's own facilities in Finland will help it take advantage of the growing demand from Finland and the wider Nordic region and Russia, said Telecity chief executive, Michael Tobin.
Telecity will add another 7MW of capacity in two new facilities in due course.
In addition to access to Russian markets, Telecity may be keen to acquire Academica's big enterprise customer list too, Brown said.
