Shaun joins MDS as Head of Sales to maintain the company’s rapid growth and expand upon its impressive client base. “MDS Technologies is set to lead the way in UK data centre provision and this appointment will enable me to be instrumental in the company’s ongoing development,” he said. The company operates data centres across the South of England, helping businesses to streamline their IT function by offering high availability, co-location services. It has recently opened a new high-tech facility in Crawley, West Sussex, and is expected to announce further expansion plans in the coming weeks.

Phil Dawson, Managing Director, MDS Technologies, added: “Shaun has an impressive track record in relevant markets and boasts more than 20 years experience in sales and business development. “We’re delighted to have him on board and look forward to working with him during what is set to be exciting period in the company’s evolution.”

Shaun joins from Vision Consulting where he was a client partner. Previous companies he’s worked for include SAIC, Mastek (UK) and Energis Communications.

AMAR II (Assessing, Monitoring, Alerting and Reporting) monitors a wealth of variables from server temperature, fan speed and environmental humidity to power usage, connectivity and bandwidth usage.

"The principal of business continuity is at the hub of data centre management and AMAR II is at the hub of our operations, helping us to deliver the highest levels of availability for our clients," said Phil Dawson, MDS Technologies’ Managing Director.

"The software suite enables us to take infrastructure management and route cause analysis to a new level, allowing us to predict potential problems before they happen."

Encoded within AMAR II is an alerting system with tiered priority levels based on the nature and extent of tolerance breaches. Alerts to IT engineers include pager, email and text message notifications.

"AMAR II has been 18 months in development and follows tens of thousands of pounds worth of investment," Phil added.

"As one of the most sophisticated server monitoring software suites of its kind, it will prove pivotal to MDS Technologies’ ongoing expansion and development."

Lord Erroll will also address the importance of Data Centres to the UK economy – heading an all star cast of technology leaders tackling key issues affecting businesses on Monday September 21.

Speakers at the event include Navman Wireless IT Director Barry Neill, discussing real world virtualisation; Martin Large, CEO tibboh Internet, outlining their deployment of a secure ISP using Vodafone’s mobile network; and Elekta Director Simon Telfer-Smith, addressing cost savings through IT consolidation..

Phil Dawson, Managing Director of MDS Technologies, will welcome guests to the centre, provide an overview of its services as well as offering attendees a guided tour of the facility.

“The new centre not only more than doubles MDS’ capacity but also marks a significant development for companies striving to streamline their IT function and reduce costs in this challenging economy. More importantly, our collaboration will secure significant environmental improvements,” he said.

Those interested in attending should contact Shaun Sheppard on 01225 816220; or email crawley@mds.gb.net

Gordon Liddle, Head of Service Delivery and Implementation at Corsham-based data centre operator MDS Technologies, is planning a trip to Kenya later this year to help build a classroom and accommodation for teachers at Sherston Musul Primary School. The school serves a deprived Maasai community.

The mission is the latest phase in what is an ongoing project administered by Wiltshire’s Sherston Primary School, supported by private fund raising and corporate donations from MDS Technologies.

“I have seen at first hand the hardships many of its people have to endure,” said Gordon.

“Children regularly have to walk several miles to school, often without shoes and with empty stomachs. The opportunity of an education however is invaluable and we have already achieved a great deal, including the building of schools and water towers.

“Our work continues and all financial support for our efforts is gratefully received. A fully equipped classroom can be built for as little as £5,000. In a bid to further raise awareness for the cause, my wife Debbie and I are also planning to trek up Mt Kenya in the coming months.”

Sherston Musul Primary School, 50 miles northwest of Mt Kenya, teaches English, math, Swahili, RE and science to some 95 pupils.

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“MDS Technologies is delighted to help such a worthy cause and support the effort of not only Gordon, but everyone who has worked tirelessly to help provide an education for young people in Kenya – something so many of us in Britain take for granted,” added MDS Technologies’ Managing Director Phil Dawson.

“At MDS we have recently been working to help enable the tibboh service that offers safer, secure, mobile internet access for children, both at home and in the classroom. We are in a privileged position, however, to be living in a society that boasts such next generation technology to help protect the welfare of our children.

“Very few of the families and pupils of Sherston Musul have ever received an education, let alone benefited from the internet age. By providing then with basic educational resources, from classrooms to exercise books, we can have a considerable impact on their community.”

To discover more about the Sherston Musul project, or to make a donation, visit www.sherstonmusul.com.

The company operates data centres across the South of England, helping companies to streamline their IT function by offering high availability, co-location services.

International standard ISO 27001 is the globally recognised information security management system (ISMS) that demonstrates compliance to a wide range of security controls. It also establishes a framework for information security that conforms to best practice.

“This accreditation reflects our commitment to providing the highest standards of operational excellence,” said Phil Dawson, MDS Technologies’ Managing Director.

“It is independently validated following an extensive audit and ensures our customers can have peace of mind knowing their data is safe from potential security threats and vulnerabilities.”

MDS Technologies, which has already achieved ISO 9001 quality management certification, boasts such high profile clients as Vodafone, Navman Wireless, Guys & St Thomas Hospital Trust, and Tibboh.

The 3,000 sq ft centre will more than double MDS’s capacity and will enable the company to offer an even higher level of IT resilience, ensuring software applications keep running in the event of power or internet connectivity failures.

The Crawley centre will boast half a meg (0.5MW) of power availability and high level physical security, including reinforced steel doors, CCTV and a coded biometric access system.

“This move marks a significant development for companies striving to streamline their IT function and reduce costs in these difficult times,” said Phil Dawson, MDS Technologies’ Managing Director.

“UK data centre capacity is limited, and this is particularly true of England’s South East. Consequently, this new facility will radically boost data service provision as well as offering businesses, and other organisations, a more robust disaster recovery solution.”

MDS Technologies offers high availability, co-location, services and support with the deployment of complex applications using Software as a Service (SaaS) architecture across more than 30 countries. Multiple lines of gigabyte fibre communication are used to transmit data to and from Tier One carriers for internet and inter-site connectivity.

Online journey planning specialist Trapeze opts for MDS Technologies to deploy SaaS

Trapeze supplies online journey planning systems to over half of the UK’s traveline regions, enabling travellers to plan door-to-door journeys using public transport. Their contracts are to provide a 24/7 service so they demand utmost reliability and the most efficient service. It was natural, therefore, to turn to specialist data centres operator MDS Technologies to host its servers.

Running several co-located racks at their Corsham facility, MDS Technologies host the servers that process millions of queries each year, delivering essential passenger transport data that enable people to plan entire journeys online.

The safety and accessibility of that information is vital to the smooth running of the system, explains the company's ICT Manager, James Blannin. "On a weekly basis we receive information covering tens of thousands of bus, coach and train services which is processed into regional datasets.  These datasets are then uploaded to the servers hosted at MDS.  The reputation of Trapeze and our Traveline clients is heavily dependent upon the reliability and resilience of the MDS solution."

Blannin says Trapeze has been impressed by the flexibility of the service offered by MDS, which enables them to run the system from its own offices while being able to call on the technical expertise of the MDS team at any time. "MDS are very flexible and the solution they provide us with is completely tailored to suit our needs. I can’t say enough good things about them and how helpful the whole team has been, from the Managing Director, Phil Dawson, down to the junior IT staff. On a technical level it seems there's nothing that they can’t do - I certainly haven't found anything!"