The Insolvency Service has brought in the receivers to wind up UKCloud, the public sector focused cloud computing managed services business
A winding up order was issued 25 October 2022, the government agency reported. It covers both the Virtual Infrastructure Group Limited and UKCloud Ltd.
The appointment of Gareth Jonathan Allen as the liquidator was also announced.
“Following an application made by the official receiver, the court has appointed Alan Hudson and Joanne Robinson of Ernst & Young LLP as special managers of the companies,” the statement added. As special managers, Ernst & Young will manage the liquidation, and the official receiver will also investigate the cause of insolvency.
UKCloud provided cloud migration, sovereign cloud, disaster recovery-as-a-service, digital workplace and cloud services for storage, Microsoft Azure, Redhat and VMWare technology stacks.
Possibility of sale
The possibility of a sale of the business will also be considered. Public sector organisations that use UKCloud are advised to contact [email protected].
UKCloud was acquired, with full government approval, in April 2022 by Hadston 2, which UKCloud described as “an investment vehicle led by well-known entrepreneur and UKCloud chairman, Jeff Thomas”. The deal was approved under the National Security and Investment Act and followed an investment of £25 million in March 2019 from Digital Alpha Advisors, which works with network technology provider Cisco.
Digital Alpha Advisors were part of the April 2022 acquisition.
UKCloud was a member of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) E-alliance, which works with the UK government technology community to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2030.
