Telstra announced recently that it is partnering with IBM to offer the company's SoftLayer Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) platform to its customers on a pay-as-you-go, on-demand model directly leveraging IBM's newly opened data centers in Melbourne and Sydney.Telstra believes that the new service - Telstra Cloud Direct Connect - will help deliver cost savings for Australian businesses, reducing the need for up-front capital expenditure on IT, along with the cost of ongoing IT maintenance and refreshes.
According to Telstra, its customers can connect to IBM’s services via the internet or with a simple extension of their private network. By adding the Telstra Cloud Direct Connect offering, they can also access the IP VPN connectivity, giving them a smooth user experience between Telstra's Next IP® network and the customer's choice of global cloud platforms. Under the partnership, Telstra’s Australian customers, from large scale enterprise to start-ups, will have access to the full-range of SoftLayer infrastructure services, including bare metal servers, virtual servers, storage, security services and networking.
Telstra customers will be able to access IBM’s hourly and monthly compute services on the SoftLayer platform, a network of virtual data centres and global points-of-presence (PoPs), all of which are increasingly important as enterprises look to run their applications on the cloud. SoftLayer is a platform that lets businesses quickly migrate, build, test, and deploy their applications and innovations.
Mark Brewer, General Manager, Global Technology Services Australia and New Zealand, IBM
Australian businesses have quickly realised the benefits of moving to a flexible cloud model to accommodate the rapidly changing needs of business today. IBM Cloud provides Telstra customers with unmatched choice and freedom of where to run their workloads, with proven levels security and high performance.