IBM and 21Vianet Announce Chinese Cloud Infrastructure and Services

The cloud is rapidly expanding in China if recent announcements from IBM and AWS are any indication. The latest comes from IBM, which has partnered with 21Vianet Group, Inc. to bring its premier private cloud infrastructure service to China as well as help build managed private cloud services in the country.

The new partnership introduces the IBM SmartCloud Enterprise+ (SCE+) to China, offering a secure and scalable private cloud based on open standards. IBM will also provide the physical point of distribution (POD) while 21Vianet will host the POD at its data centers in Beijing.

By working together, the companies hope to penetrate the Chinese market and keep up with increasing demand for cloud infrastructure and services. China’s Cloud Valley technology campus in the Beijing suburbs has been slowly building momentum, with AWS announcing a strategic partnership to provide cloud infrastructure and services there this week.

China’s enterprise market is ripe for cloud and managed services and the scalability, efficiency and cost savings they afford. "IDC believes that private cloud computing spending will increase dramatically in the next few years,” said Thomas Zhou, senior research manager, enterprise system and software, IDC China. “Although most SMB users will consider adopting their applications on the public cloud platform, some SMB users and majority of the large enterprise users will consolidate their infrastructures and shift to the private cloud platform. Virtual private cloud will also be one of their choices."

"Today, IBM and 21Vianet create the new era of enterprise cloud computing in China,” said Laurie Tropiano, general manager of GTS, IBM GCG. “Our clients, the pillars of China's economy, will see IBM further accelerating its efforts around driving innovation in China with enhanced IBM cloud offerings as a platform. We are setting a new benchmark for cloud computing performance in China."

IBM’s SCE+ cloud infrastructure is customizable and provides a flexible private cloud environment that may be set up quickly and easily. The solution uses a VPN to provide secure access to cloud infrastructure. It will be located at 21Vianet’s carrier-neutral facilities, which connect to China’s Internet backbone through an extensive fiber optic network. The service provider also offers proprietary smart routing technology for moving data among its facilities in 44 cities throughout China. 21Vianet also provides hosting, managed network services, cloud infrastructure and content delivery network services.