DESPITE a recent survey on Slough being one of the worst places to live in the UK, the town is to be the location for the world’s second largest data centre hub.

According to The Times, nearly half of all the data transferred in online shopping activity to social media, video games to streaming television programmes, will go through the Slough Trading Estate.

Home to successful companies including Mars, Telefonica, O2 and Ferrari, the premises is the world’s second largest data hub, coming after one in Ashburn, Virginia.

And, of course, the estate was also known after Ricky Gervais’ popular TV series, The Office, was set there.

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It is also referenced in the song ‘Slough’ from the 2016 film David Brent: Life on the Road.

Soley owned by Segro, the Trading Estate has 320 businesses on site employing around 10,000 people.

James Craddock, managing director, Thames Valley, SEGRO, said: “Over the last 100 years the Slough Trading Estate has evolved in terms of the customers based there and data centres are the latest evolution.

"They are increasingly a key part of our national infrastructure and play a critical but unseen role in everyday life.  

The Estate is home to 400 tenants from countries including the US, France, Italy, Japan, Germany and South Korea.

Mr Craddock added: "We anticipate they will be an important part of the Slough Trading Estate’s future, alongside a diverse mix of companies from other sectors.”

The company has begun to develop data centres which are several storeys tall.

Speaking to The Times, David Sleath, chief executive of Segro, who joined the company in 2006, said: “The great thing about Slough is that it’s a really dynamic and diverse business community.

“We could see that, in an increasingly more digitally connected world, being able to provide high-speed internet to our corporate customers was going to be pretty important, but we didn’t necessarily see that it could be the bedrock of a huge data centre business.

“As always in business, and in life, there is luck — but then there is also trying to take advantage of that good fortune. That’s what we’ve tried to do.”

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Last month, a landmark seven-storey office block that could pump £25.4m into the economy was given support by councillors.

The plan will see two vacant buildings in the estate, which dates back to the 1930s, will be knocked down for a large building that will host small and medium-sized enterprises.