New team housed at the Microsoft Technology Centre, consisting of Leon Smith; Paul Kristensen; Tyrone Theodorides; Katharine Clement and Gary Buckmaster Credit: Microsoft

Microsoft has opened a new multimillion-dollar technology centre in Sydney, backed by strategic partnerships with DXC Technology and the NSW Government.

Located at 1 Martin Place, the state-of-the-art facility is designed to help customers accelerate digital transformation deployments across Australia, leveraging expertise across cloud and artificial intelligence.

Targeting enterprise and government customers, the Microsoft Technology Centre (MTC) houses a dedicated team of eight staff, including a director, five technical architects with experience in different sectors, a technology manager and a briefing coordinator.

The team comprises of Tyrone Theodorides as director, as well as Leon Smith, Paul Kristensen, Gary Buckmaster, Katharine Clement, Viren Joseph, Jivtesh Singh and Verdip Singh.

Both Microsoft and channel partner solutions are available, with end-user engagement options spanning strategy briefings, architecture design sessions, data centre tours, in addition to workshops, proof-of-concepts and hackathons.

Other facilities include an envisioning theatre, an exploration showcase where Microsoft and partner solutions are demonstrated and an innovation factory, alongside a social hub, cyber security room and workshop and boardroom areas.

“This is a significant and important investment by Microsoft in the Australian market,” said Steven Worrall, managing director of Microsoft Australia.

“The Microsoft Technology Centre will help our customers accelerate their digital journeys by bringing together the right resources - people and technology - in one location to demonstrate what can be achieved in their organisation and then to work with them to bring that to life.”

Deal with DXC

To coincide with the launch, Microsoft also announced a five-year strategic partnership with DXC Technology, centred around transitioning enterprise and public sector customers to Microsoft Azure.

Billed as a “first of its kind worldwide”, the alliance is designed to support both “current and future” customers of DXC seeking to transition workloads to the vendor’s cloud platform.

“Microsoft Azure is a trusted, secure and high-performance cloud with an already comprehensive and growing array of services,” added Seelan Nayagam, managing director of DXC Technology.

“Together we can provide solutions that our government and commercial clients can confidently deploy today while being prepared for changing market conditions or expectations.”

In partnership, Microsoft and DXC plan to target key customers across banking, commercial and public sectors, as part of plans to migrate enterprise-grade workloads to Azure.

According to Nayagam, key benefits include providing customers with increased compute capacity, delivered through an “elastic environment”.

“The combination of our deep understanding and experience and Microsoft’s cloud and technical expertise is going to be a game changer for existing and new clients to realise and expand their digital transformation ambitions,” he added.

Government credentials

Meanwhile, Microsoft also signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the NSW Government’s Department of Finance, Services and Innovation, strengthening the vendor’s ties with state government in the process.

The agreement will bring NSW Department leads into the new centre to assess how department services and operations can tap into digital technologies, with a focus on data and cyber security.

“NSW is already benefiting from the impact of digital transformation in terms of streamlined services and access for residents and businesses,” added Greg Wells, chief information and digital officer at NSW Government.

“This memorandum of understanding will allow us to bring department heads to the MTC where they can see what more can be achieved with digital services, improved efficiencies and good value solutions.

“We expect there will be significant positive impact for citizens and businesses as well as operational efficiencies for Government.”

Both announcements follow a number of large investments made by Microsoft in Australia during the past 24 months, including the launch of two new Azure data centre regions in Canberra.

This was also supported by the opening the Microsoft Reactor in the Sydney StartUp Hub to aid the development of local start-ups.

“We are delighted that both the NSW Government and DXC Technology and their clients are trailblazers that will be among the first to benefit from our investment in the MTC and Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to Australia,” Worrall added.