Writing on the wall for Australian Technology Park

Atlassian miffed at missing out, western Sydney furious at bank relocations

Software developer Atlassian’s well-and-truly-off-core-mission tilt at property development has failed, with the state government preferring a Mirvac-led proposal for the Australian Technology Park at Redfern to a bid that didn't make the deadline.

And it's not just the soon-to-IPO vendor (still laughingly referred to as a startup more than a decade after its launch) that's feeling face-slapped: IT workers based in Sydney's middle-western suburbs have woken to the news that by 2020, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) is going to shut three facilities and relocate them to become an anchor tenant of the ATP redevelopment.

The CBA has announced it will hive off properties in Lidcombe, Parramatta and Olympic Park, with around 10,000 jobs to move. Lidcombe hosts the bank's ATM operations, while Olympic Park has operated as a call centre, training facility, and disaster recovery site for less than 10 years.

It's been a year since the state government launched the sale process under the aegis of its property development arm, UrbanGrowth NSW. For most of that time, the sale has been a relatively low-profile process, as the bureaucrats winnowed down proposals to a shortlist that included the ultimate winner, Mirvac.

Atlassian's interest in the site became public late in the process, after the government proposed a new “tech hub” at another site (the “Bays Precinct”, which includes a shipping terminal slated for relocation, and a historic power station).

That raised a red flag that the ATP would lose its status as a technology hub, and Atlassian launched a media blitz after the tender deadline in August, saying if the ATP stayed, it would move in as anchor tenant and work to attract other technology companies to the location.

The ATP, opened in 1996, was created after the NSW government shuttered the 19th-century-era Eveleigh railway workshops.

Its status as a “technology park” is mostly nostalgic, these days. While it's home to the soon-to-merge-with-CSIRO National ICT Australia (NICTA) and a couple of private sector tech ventures, its tenant list is no longer tech-dominated.

It is, in fact, already a general business park, home to some state government department satellite offices, various creative businesses, conference organisers, and TV broadcaster Channel 7.

It's not only Atlassian whose nose has been disjointed by the decision, however.

Western Sydney councils set to lose a total of 10,000 CBA jobs have hit the ceiling. The bank announced a memorandum of understanding to take 93,000 square metres in two buildings at the redeveloped ATP.

Even that much space won't house all the jobs the bank's decided to bring closer to the CBD: some are heading for CBD-fringe site Darling Park.

The viability of Olympic Park as a business/office destination will also be in serious doubt. The location lost its direct rail links some time ago, and even a few thousand square metres of data halls ready-to-go might not attract a buyer for the site.

The government is already hinting as much, saying the bank's move “provides an opportunity to re-imagine the precinct”. ®