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South Australia becomes the IaaS FlexPod state

State Government commits to iiNet's NetApp/Cisco/VMware cloud

The Aussie state of South Australia has signed up for cloud services offered by local internet service provider iiNet.

South Australia adopted a cloud-first policy earlier this year, went to the market and chose iiNet's local arm for the gig of providing servers and software-as-a-service for a range of government agencies. A critical element of the deal is iiNet's local bit barns, inherited when it acquired South Australian ISP Internode, as those facilities mean it sits astride the Stat government's fibre networks.

Three departments – Premier and Cabinet, Planning, Transport & Infrastructure (DPTI) and Communities & Social Inclusion – have signed with iiNet, but there's a mutual expectation more will sign soon.

Agencies will pay only for what they use and iiNet will offer infrastructure-as-a-service and backup-as-a-service.

The Reg has learned that iiNet's cloud runs on FlexPods, the Cisco/NetApp/VMware reference architecture integrated systems offering. Agencies will be able to access elastic resources, but there's no expectation of limitless scaling.

iiNet would not disclose the scale of the rigs it will provide, but said the deal with the government is structured so that it can add extra servers and storage as certain usage thresholds are met. The three vendors backing FlexPod therefore have a nice pipeline in Adelaide.

The deal with iiNet will irritate Amazon Web Services and Microsoft, both of which have invested in local bit barns and security accreditations that make them fit for government work. Dimension Data has done likewise.

iiNet's presence in, and deep roots in South Australia's capital Adelaide, are doubtless a big factor in this deal, and perhaps offers an interesting case study of how niche cloud players can thrive. ®

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