DNB appoints Green Mountain

Norway’s largest and most prestigious bank, DNB, could soon have the world’s safest intelligence assets, after it appointed Green Mountain to look after its critical Information Technology in Stavanger, Norway. The high security facility is built into a secret mountain hideaway once used by NATO during the cold war.

After a rigorous due diligence procurement process, DNB has selected Green Mountain to host and manage its data centre equipment. Under the agreement, Green Mountain will host the data centre for Norway’s flagship financial institution in its high security facility.

The selection of the bank’s data centre location is now one of the strategically important decisions, since IT is now the nerve centre of any financial institution and runs all its mission critical applications.

The converted bunker, which now houses state of the art data centre and hosting equipment, is designed to guarantee the highest possible levels of security to DNB’s staff, customers and stakeholders. The impenetrability of the mountain containing the data centre building, together with its location, protect it against all kinds of dangers, including intruders, terrorist attacks, volcanoes, storms, earthquakes and crime. The location, puts the data centre next to a network of fibre optic cable and within range of several hydro-electric dams, makes this an ideal data centre location. High speed fibre optic cables can connect Green Mountain to financial hubs in Amsterdam, Frankfurt and London in milliseconds. The choice of three sustainable power supplies makes the data centre both green and shock proof. The cold deep waters of the Fjord also give Green Mountain the perfect resources for free cooling.

The capacity of Green Mountain is about 12,000 m2 of data rooms which gives ample room for expansion by DNB or for inclusion of partner’s equipment, should they wish to reside in the same hosting space.

The endorsement of Green Mountain by Norway’s flagship bank is expected to encourage many others to share the facilities.

The combination of high security and low emissions is perfect for Norway’s environment and compliance conscious banks, according to Knut Molaug, Green Mountain’s CEO.

“DNB is one of Norway’s largest users of data centre space and a user that has especially tough requirements on all aspects of the data centre quality, security and operations,” says Molaug. “Our centre’s already high security level and operational quality will be further enhanced as a result of this agreement.”