Pulsant and Megaport have been partners since 2020. In that time, we have explored standardised infrastructure, increased the connections between the two companies, and even celebrated Pulsant becoming a Prestige Partner.
But what does this mean for the people that matter most - our joint clients?
Why partner at all?
It is worth reminding ourselves what Megaport and Pulsant bring to the partnership.
The Pulsant portfolio of twelve strategically located data centres puts digital infrastructure within two hours of every major population centre in the UK.
Critically, it also means a point of contact is close, so these regional businesses can keep a keen eye on the infrastructure that enables their ambitions.
Our low latency, resilient private network connects these centres to create PlatformEdge.
Megaport then takes regional edge to the cloud and data centre providers across the globe. This hyper-connection opens a global ecosystem of best-of-breed service providers to drive growth.
This global perspective matters because of the ‘disproportionately international’ activity of the UK's high-growth, medium-sized businesses (MSBs) that are a typical Pulsant / Megaport client.
Recent UK Government figures show that MSBs make up 7.4% of the total number of businesses exporting goods but contribute 14.7% of the total value. According to the Department for International Trade’s (DIT) ‘National Survey of Registered Businesses’, around 40% of MSBs export and a further 11% of MSBs do not, despite having a product or service that could be exported[1].
To exploit this opportunity for growth, these businesses need to exert control over their digital ambitions by cherry-picking from a range of services. They must be able to put the right workload in the right place to get the best result.
The need to choose the best-of-breed capabilities has driven the increase in composability seen in recent years. In 2023, 86% of UK enterprises reported an increase in composable infrastructure. In 2024, that grew to 93%[2], and where enterprises lead, MSBs will follow.
The best of both worlds
For these high-growth MSBs, the partnership between Megaport and Pulsant offers the best of both worlds – local presence but a truly global reach. The multiple locations are seen through a single pane of glass, with Megaport enabling a consistent user experience and ease of access.
This visibility also enables the business to adapt quickly, adding new services or increasing capacity over time to reflect shifts in the industry.
Mike Jauncey of Megaport explains: “No other colocation provider is deployed across the UK as much as Pulsant, and for cities like Leeds, Newcastle or Sheffield, that is important. This reach is combined with a comprehensive set of services and a highly skilled technical team that keeps Pulsant in the top tier of our partners.
“Typically, our joint clients are driven by a need to embrace analytics, improve business continuity, or address regulatory demands. They have tried using public infrastructure and realise they need to embrace a hybrid option. This is built around a mixture of services across locations, putting the right workload in the right place, usually including a data centre.”
“The main financial benefit is cost optimisation. For example, organisations fail to realise that when they get data out of public clouds, data egress fees soon accumulate. Private connectivity can cut these fees by about a third, as well as delivering improvements in performance and security.”
Another consistent report from these clients is that their legacy infrastructure has been complex, unwieldy or isolated. As a result, the partnership prioritises agility, with new connections available in less than a day. Local presence and global reach mean the partnership offers infrastructure where the client wants it rather than where the provider happens to be.
This client-centric thinking will continue to dominate the Pulsant / Megaport partnership, enabling the digital ambitions of regional businesses to grow throughout the UK and beyond.
[1]See understanding-medium-sized-businesses-exporting-behaviour-and-the-role-of-DIT.pdf (publishing.service.gov.uk)
[2]See MACH Annual Research Report - wave 4 - 2024.pdf (machalliance.org)