AT&T managed hosting and application services unit offload plans include equipment and access to data center floor space
In an expansion of an ongoing relationship, AT&T said it will transition its managed application and hosting services unit to IBM as well as offload equipment and access to floor space in AT&T data centers currently supporting those operations.
The deal calls for IBM to include the former AT&T services into its IBM Cloud portfolio targeted at offering enterprise customers a broader suite of networking, application and hosting services. AT&T said it would continue to provide networking services, including security, cloud networking and mobility, working with IBM to deliver integrated solutions to enterprise customers.
“This is a natural expansion of our relationship, and it demonstrates our continued commitment to serve customers based on our respective strengths and capabilities,” said Jon Summers, SVP at AT&T Mobile and Business Solutions.
There was no word from the company on the financial impact of the move or whether any AT&T employees would be transferred to IBM.
A recent report from Ovum predicts cloud and appliances are set to boost the “next wave” of big data adoption and target “more of the enterprise mainstream that will have more modest IT and data science skills compared with the early adopters.”
AT&T and IBM last year announced a proof-of-concept cloud technology in partnership with Applied Communication Sciences designed to cut set up times for cloud-to-cloud connectivity from “days to seconds,” which the companies said could lead to sub-second provisioning when used with IP and “next-generation optical networking equipment.”
AT&T has been tapping its work using virtualization technology to bolster its cloud services operations, announcing earlier this year the creation of a PoC technology called software-defined storage it claims “creates a software layer on top of commercial disks to address enterprise cloud storage needs.” AT&T also said the SDS platform can produce more efficient storage solutions, noting the use of erasure coding to create an algorithm designed to reduce storage needs with greater integrity than current triple redundancy solutions.
AT&T’s work in the software-defined networking space received significant attention late last year with the company stating plans to virtualize and control more than 75% of its network using software architecture by 2020.
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