Alphawest launches a pilot program to deliver customers cloud based infrastructure
SYDNEY, Australia – Alphawest, a national provider of ICT (Information and Communications Technology) services and a wholly owned subsidiary of Optus Networks Pty Ltd, today announced its participation in VMware’s global vCloud Beta program. Alphawest is one of approximately 15 companies internationally to be involved in the program, and one of several service provider partners in Australia.
The vCloud Beta program is a pilot that Alphawest will run with a select group of customers for the delivery of cloud-based infrastructure that allows customers to provision and upload virtual machines into the Alphawest cloud on the MPLS-based Optus Evolve™ network.
The VMware vCloud is the next instalment for enterprise-ready private cloud, enabling the customers to interact on demand and control external clouds – thereby delivering IT infrastructure as an easily accessible service. The private cloud federates computing between on and off premise environments, giving IT teams the cost savings and efficiency cloud computing promises with greater flexibility, security and control. The vCloud helps organisations retain flexibility of choice – independent of hardware, operating systems and applications, so they can feel confident about deploying current and future applications in the internal or external cloud.
Working closely with VMware, Alphawest will help deliver a more reliable, enterprise ready cloud computing experience for customers’ applications, without the lock-in associated with many ‘hosted’ infrastructure services available today. This cloud model will offer Alphawest’s customers greater choice of the best suited environment to execute their workloads. This environment not only provides resources in an elastic way but also retains appropriate service levels.
Rob Parcell, CEO, Alphawest said, “Organisations are looking to cloud computing to realise cost savings and improve efficiency by accessing infrastructure resource pools how and when they choose. Additionally they want the flexibility, security, service levels and control needed for production applications, such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Document Management (DM) and Enterprise Content Management (ECM). By utilising cloud computing on the Optus Evolve network, our customers will be able to invest their hard earned capital where they see the greatest value – close to customers – rather than spending on back-end infrastructure. "
"Participating in the VMware vCloud Beta puts Alphawest in a leading position in the Australian cloud services market. In addition, we are the first Cisco partner in the Asia Pacific to have procured the Cisco Unified Computing System, so that we can provide the scale and performance required by enterprise customers who are utilising the Optus Evolve network. This makes our virtualisation and data centre customer offering compelling and unique."
"Through Alphawest’s relationship with the SingTel Group, alongside our partner relationships with VMware and Cisco, we are building innovative next generation services into our Managed Services, Virtualisation and Data Centre offerings. These services can help our customers realise greater cost savings, service reliability, a better understanding of utilities, impeccable security, flexibility and unified billing from a trusted provider. “
This announcement builds on Alphawest’s recent accomplishment of being one of the first to be invited to achieve the Cisco Data Centre Unified Computing Authorised Technology Provider status and collaboration with Cisco to help customers navigate the architecture transition to optimise virtualisation – using VMware as the virtualisation platform – to reduce the total overall cost of the data centre and amplify business results.
Paul Harapin, Managing Director, VMware Australia and New Zealand, said “We are pleased that Alphawest are amongst the first organisations in this region to participate in our global vCloud beta program. "
“VMware’s cloud model being delivered by Alphawest enables organisations of any size to access a flexible, dynamic and scalable cloud computing infrastructure, providing a practical fulfillment of VMware’s vision of IT as a service. “
About VMware
VMware (NYSE: VMW) is the global leader in virtualization solutions from the desktop to the datacentre. Customers of all sizes rely on VMware to reduce capital and operating expenses, ensure business continuity, strengthen security and go green. With 2008 revenues of $1.9 billion, more than 130,000 customers and more than 22,000 partners, VMware is one of the fastest growing public software companies. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is majority owned by EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC). For more information, visit www.vmware.com.
