Global IT group IBM (NYSE:IBM) announced plans on Tuesday to triple IBM’s cloud data centre footprint in Britain.
Sebastian Krause, Europe’s general manager for cloud services, said the investment reflected the strength of the UK economy and the size of opportunity in cloud computing.
“UK customers truly understand the capabilities of cloud to drive innovation, to be more flexible on their business model, to have better insight for decision making, and to deliver better customer service,” he said.
IBM joins companies including Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) to increase investment in the UK following Brexit.
“Everyone has concluded the UK economy will continue to be very strong and there will be significant opportunities with or without Brexit,” said Krause.
The multi-million-pound investment will help that company’s clients gain access to its portfolio of cloud services to run mission-critical enterprise workloads as well as innovations. Plans are that the growth will strengthen IBM’s ability to help clients manage their data with greater control, flexibility and transparency.
Commenting on the move, Minister of State for Digital and Culture Matt Hancock said, “We are already among the most digitally connected countries in the world, with a globally successful digital economy worth more than £118bn a year and strong cyber security defences to protect consumers and business. Today’s announcement by IBM is a further boost for this thriving area and another vote of confidence which shows Britain is open for business. These new cloud data centres will help our firms work smarter and quicker to become the world-leading businesses of tomorrow.”
These announcements made by IBM on Tuesday, as well as those made recently by Google and Facebook are expected to support the British Prime Minister Theresa May’s efforts in spreading the message that the UK will remain open for business even after it leaves the European Union.