IBM Expands Global Cloud Computing Network 

IBM today announced a continued expansion of its global cloud computing network to 40 cloud centers with 12 new locations serving a growing roster of enterprise clients looking to move to hybrid cloud computing.

IBM will reach customers in 12 new locations including IBM Cloud centers in Frankfurt, Mexico City and Tokyo, and nine more centers through a strategic partnership with Equinix in Australia, France, Japan, Singapore, The Netherlands and the US.

IBM's agreement with Equinix provides direct access to the full portfolio of SoftLayer cloud services via the Equinix Cloud Exchange in nine markets worldwide spanning the Americas, Europe and Asia Pacific, including Amsterdam, Dallas, Chicago, Paris, Silicon Valley, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo and Washington, D.C.  Through this partnership, SoftLayer provides customers with the ability to easily move production workloads in and out of the cloud, thus better enabling them to fully realize their hybrid cloud strategies.

The new IBM Cloud centers in Frankfurt, Mexico City and Tokyo mark the latest delivery of  IBM’s $1.2 billion committment announced in January 2014  commitment to grow IBM's cloud presence around the world to meet these local mandates with performance, security and data controls built in.

Hybrid Cloud Growth in Enterprises

Enterprise cloud deployments, specifically hybrid cloud, are growing at a significant rate.  According to leading technology research firm, Gartner, Inc., nearly half of all enterprises will have a hybrid cloud deployed by 2017.  Chief among the driving forces behind the adoption of cloud computing worldwide including hybrid cloud, are requirements for businesses and governments to store certain data locally to comply with data residency regulations, as well as a growing desire for startups to expand their businesses globally.  IBM estimates about 100 nations and territories have adopted laws that dictate how governments and private enterprises handle personal data.

The new centers further expand IBM’s global cloud footprint which includes facilities in Mumbai, London, Amsterdam, Beijing, Hong Kong, Singapore, Melbourne, Toronto, Dallas and Raleigh, N.C., opened this year. This effort includes IBM's business consulting division, which features thousands of cloud experts with deep industry knowledge who are located around the globe to help clients to move to cloud.   IBM consultants are dedicated to working face-to-face with clients to address all of their industry specific needs as they transform to the cloud era.

Open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the new facilities offer an array of solutions including proven cloud resiliency services. These services guarantee customers up times of 99.99 percent across any IT environment, including traditional IT, public, private, or hybrid cloud deployments. In the event of an outage, the centers’ support team can recover data in minutes to ensure that is has little to no impact on business operations while going virtually unseen by customers.

Clients around the world are using IBM cloud centers spread across every major market to help them adopt cloud for growth and innovation.  Since the start of November, IBM has announced more than $4 billion worth of cloud agreements with major enterprises around the world including Lufthansa in Germany, ABN AMRO in the Netherlands, WPP in the UK, Woox Innovations in Hong Kong, Dow Water and Thomson Reuters.

IBM today announced that  global transport operator National Express Group PLC is delivering a data-driven railway to improve both operational performance and customer experience on the IBM Cloud to provide up-to-the-minute train information and allow postcode-to-postcode journey planning – a first in UK rail.

In addition, born-on-the-web innovators are increasingly choosing to build their business on the IBM Cloud. In just the last month, IBM has announced wins with Diabetizer and Preveniomed in Germany, Hancom in South Korea, Musimundo in Argentina and Nubity Inc. in Mexico. Collectively these wins reflect IBM's unique ability to deliver a full range of services through the cloud in ways that other cloud providers cannot match.

“IBM recognizes that businesses and governments need the cloud to help them innovate, grow and operate more efficiently in concert with their existing IT investments," said Jim Comfort, General Manager, IBM Cloud Services.   "Everything IBM does is designed to help companies transition to the cloud in a responsible way at a pace that best fits their business model and industry.   Just as we helped major organizations transform in each preceding era of IT, IBM now serves as the cloud platform for the enterprise.”

IBM has announced key cloud investments throughout 2014.   In addition to expanding its global cloud footprint and the establishment of the Bluemix PaaS to bring enterprise developers into the hybrid cloud era, IBM also launched a new Cloud marketplace that brings together IBM’s vast portfolio of cloud capabilities and new third-party services in a way that delivers a simple and easy experience for the enterprise. The IBM Cloud marketplace serves as a single online destination serves as the digital front door to cloud innovation bringing together IBM’s capabilities-as-a-service and those of partners and third party vendors with the security and resiliency enterprises expect.