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SAP to invest $150 million in Digital Government institute and data centre

By Freya Purnell
SAP will deliver SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud via a data centre in Canberra to support Federal Government agencies to deliver transformation initiatives and citizen-centric services.

 

At a reception in Sydney last week for German Chancellor Dr Angela Merkel held by the German-Australian Chamber of Industry and Commerce, SAP Australia announced an investment of $150 million over five years to establish this data centre, as well as the SAP Institute of Digital Government, which it plans to open in the second quarter of 2015.

The additional infrastructure and staff will help government agencies in Australia to execute cloud-first policies, and to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of government-delivered services through the elimination of waste and duplication of services. SAP aims to provide not only a platform for modernisation of government services in Australia, and as a hub for the development of best practices for public sector organisations globally.

Kevin Noonan, research director, public sector at Ovum, said the announcement was a “big win for the government sector in Australia, and a vote for confidence in Australia’s capacity for digital innovation”.

“This announcement addresses some of the important pieces of the digital government jigsaw by providing a secure onshore cloud platform, together with investment in local talent to develop new government services for both a local and global market,” Noonan said.

The SAP Institute of Digital Government will be the first of its kind from SAP, and will bring together 250 SAP staff, including developers, solution architects and services professionals, to work with government agencies, universities and partner organisations. Project teams will work in virtual and physical innovation centres aligned to domains in government services, including social protection, defence and shared services.

The Institute will also include a showcase facility and briefing centre to house outcomes from the innovation centres, including prototypes and proofs of concept leveraging cloud, mobile and analytics solutions under HANA.

On the announcement, Andrew Barkla, president and managing director, SAP Australia and New Zealand.

“At the SAP Institute for Digital Government, SAP’s global technology leadership will meet Australian government’s strength in public services to deliver more value to taxpayers and redefine the digital experience for citizens.”

The Canberra data centre will help SAP build on its cloud provisioning footprint, including its existing SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud data centre in Sydney, which opened in April 2014, as well as data centres for its SuccessFactors and SAP Business ByDesign solutions.

 

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