Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2012/11/08/verizon_gets_bolshy_with_new_toys/
Verizon stakes claim as global cloud mobiliser
Asian push fuels ambitions for global services with all the buzzwords that matter
Posted in On-Prem, 8th November 2012 01:03 GMT
Armed with an expensive war chest of high end acquisitions in cloud and telematics assets, Verizon is re-positioning itself as “one of the handful” of global players that will survive in the enterprise sector.
“Not every species or company makes it to the next era,” said Verizon Enterprise Solutions chief marketing officer John Harrobin at an event in Singapore. He added that the combination of cloud and mobility represented the third major era in computing.
“The very technology that is delivering enterprise IT is shifting from premises-based, to cloud-based and this is massively disruptive. It is in this discontinuity that we see the opportunity for Verizon to re-position itself in the market place and capture additional value,” he told media in Singapore.
Following a heady acquisition spree which included the US$612 million acquisition of Hughes Telematics, a maker of wireless systems for vehicles and the $1.4 billion purchase of cloud-computing company Terremark Worldwide, Verizon is focussing on leveraging its new capabilities with a strong focus in the Asia Pacific market.
“The assets that we have enable us to do that. The IT delivery model now requires cloud and mobility. Broadband whether wired or wireless not only enables cost savings but business transfer opportunities,” he added.
In Australia, Verizon has bolstered its data centre presence following the Terremark acquisition and has two data centres in Canberra and one each in Sydney and Melbourne.
While coy on further Australian specific investments plans it did not rule out further data centre expansion. “We have very significant plans for our security and cloud services and in Australia these are our biggest pushes,” Harrobin said.
It also operates metro fibre networks in Sydney and Melbourne, inherited from its MCI Worldcom acquisition connecting over 150 CBD buildings. The opportunities brought on by the rollout of the NBN would most likely bring on a slew of partnerships and alliances, the executives said.
“We would seek to partner appropriately to that market (on NBN) . The wholesale interconnect through the region is very key to us,” said Verizon Enterprise Solutions assistant vice president for APAC strategy Robert Le Busque. He added that NBN-style deployments and LTE rollouts gave Verizon two key opportunities in the region to provide enterprises with ubiquitous access.
“All of a sudden we have the potential to access infrastructure and to provide secure links for our corporation or enterprise in a far more agile and dynamic way than ever before.
The Australian market’s LTE development would also provide opportunities to, “take the private IP network as a fixed entity and look at ways to extend that to an LTE environment so in effect providing a private LTE connection over the 4G network for an organisation,” Le Busque said.
He added that Verizon’s legacy as a telco provider and longstanding relationship with carriers across the globe and Asia Pacific assist in the “dialogue around a different way to being able to deliver similar types of services that we are delivering today.” ®