Datacentre operator Telecity’s CEO Michael Tobin resigns

Telecity’s chief executive officer (CEO) Michael Tobin will step down from the helm at the FTSE 250 datacentre provider on 31 October, after 10 years in the role. 

Tobin told shareholders on 26 August he will stand down and hand over control to John Hughes, Telecity’s chairman. Tobin will receive a "termination payment" of £753,000 and an additional £70,000 compensation payout and share awards, according to a report in The Telegraph.

Tobin’s abrupt resignation saw Telecity’s shares fall by more than 6% during the day's trading session. Telecity has not yet announced Tobin’s successor, with Hughes taking charge of executive responsibilities from October.

For the first half of 2014, Telecity reported a growth in revenue of 9.3% to £174.1m.

At that time, Tobin said: “Demand across the European datacentre market is strong and our order wins continue to be encouraging. 

“We are focused on creating value for our customers by building a highly-connected datacentre infrastructure in Europe, and for our shareholders through delivering sustainable growth with good returns on capital.”

Telecity will welcome its new chief financial officer (CFO) Eric Hageman in September.

Tobin will remain a significant shareholder of the business, but will move on to explore other opportunities and make way for a new chief to lead Telecity on its next phase of growth, he told the shareholders.

“Having led the company for over a decade – through the merger of Telecity and Redbus, the successful initial public offering (IPO) of TelecityGroup, the significant growth of the business and the recruitment of an outstanding CFO – the board and I agree that, with the business in excellent health, now is the time for me to move on," he said.

With more than 25 years of experience in telecommunications and IT, Tobin was the CEO of RedBus before its merger with Telecity in 2006. Prior to that, he was heading Fujitsu’s e-commerce operations in Germany.

He was awarded an OBE for his services to the digital economy in the 2014 New Year Honours list.

Telecity operates 37 datacentres in Europe, with as many as eight in London and four in Manchester.

The London-based carrier-neutral datacentre provider, with a revenue of £325.6m in 2013, is one of the big four datacentre operators – alongside Equinix, Digital Realty and Interxion. Its customers include Atos, Walkers, Spotify, Think London, Transport for London (TfL), Toys R Us and T-Systems.

TfL uses Telecity’s services to power its popular journey planner site. “The performance of the site has been noticeably improved and the user experience is excellent. Feedback from customers has been very positive,” said David Coppins, technical manager for TfL.