German software giant SAP has announced that it will spend $150 million over five years to open a data centre and establish its first Institute for Digital Government in Canberra.
SAP revealed its plans in Sydney at the German-Australian Chamber of Industry and Commerce's reception for Chancellor Angela Merkel this week. Both facilities are due to open in the second quarter of next year.
Damien Bueno, SAP Australia's general manager for federal government and defence, told CRN that the Institute for Digital Government would not just benefit public sector clients, but also for channel partners who serve government clients.
"Business ideas and innovations can be discussed at the institute – and partners will be welcome," said Bueno.
An SAP spokesperson declined to name the co-located provider.
The vendor opened its first Australian SAP Hana Enterprise Cloud data centre in Sydney in April, co-located in Equinix facilities.
The company is now hoping that the Canberra data centre will lure more federal government clientele.
"The data centre is designed to fulfil the Australian government's needs for capacity, security and data protection, as well as the capability to run innovative real-time applications with SAP Hana Enterprise Cloud in a private cloud environment," said SAP CIO Helen Arnold.
The Institute for Digital Government will be the first SAP has opened kind globally. Bueno said that Australia was chosen becuase public sector work in this country "is one of SAP's most significant markets – globally one of the top two".
A spokesperson for SAP Australia said that the institute would showcase solutions for not just the Australian government clients, but for the public sector all around the world.
"Today, from a relationship perspective, we don't have that proximity to the customer. We wanted to create constructs to allow them to participate in the solutions we develop that's more inviting then what we have now," Bueno said.
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