The Catalyst

York, North Yorkshire

The Catalyst consists of 48 offices ranging in size to suit a variety of user requirements, with associated meeting room facilities and a hot desk area for tenants. Businesses based at The Catalyst benefit from all inclusive, flexible, short term agreements with an optional range of additional services to help their businesses run smoothly.

The state-of-the-art premises, which was completed in 2011, has a modern, high quality Information and Communications Technology (ICT) infrastructure with an emphasis on security and reliability, in line with other successful office premises on York Science Park. The model of ICT facilities and services adopted at the Catalyst has been tried and tested in other York Science Park buildings and was designed in from the outset.

The Catalyst offers a high-speed, flexible broadband service to tenants. The Internet provision is through a local company located on the Science Park itself and is based on a Service Level Agreement with backup provision and technical support. Tenants are given an option of broadband packages to suit their needs, all of which offer a 20MB download, 1MB upload service. If tenants require additional dedicated speeds a leased line service is also available from 1MB scaling upwards. Tenants also have the opportunity to utilise a data centre with rack mountable cabinets for an additional cost. Here the network is fully integrated with the Catalyst network; ensuring tenant confidentiality and data security are managed efficiently.

Internet and telephone services are provided at every potential desk location or every other place where a user may be located, which means the Catalyst is classed as Ready to Occupy. Offices at the Catalyst all have raised access flooring allowing under-floor cabling so network and power points can easily be moved around the floor to allow flexible positioning of desks. Each office space is given sufficient network connectivity to ensure all users are working to full capacity. Free WiFi to tenants is also available in meeting rooms and hot desk areas behind a secure wireless infrastructure.

Telephone reception services are provided as well as a range of extended services such as voicemail, itemized call logs, a directory service and conference call facilities. VOIP telephony services are also available as a standard service. Mobile phone coverage was found to be consistently good throughout the buildings.

The Catalyst offers a high level of security with key fobs for entry and a recorded system to identify who has entered the building. The Reception area is manned during working hours after which out-of-hours access is available to tenants via a locked and alarmed door.

Overall the ICT offerings on site are to a high standard and the operator clearly pays a lot of attention to the current and future needs of their tenants.