Deutsche Telekom launches public cloud based on Cisco platform

• Public cloud service from German data center for Europe will support a highly secure Internet of Things

• Public cloud services for businesses of all sizes start at EUR 0.05 per hour

• New SaaS and PaaS offerings on the Cisco cloud platform are scheduled for delivery in the first half of 2016

From Germany’s high-tech data center to all over Europe: Deutsche Telekom (Telekom) today announced the introduction of a new public cloud built on the Cisco cloud platform and compliant with German data sovereignty legislation. T-Systems, the business division of Deutsche Telekom, will operate and manage the new infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offering -- DSI Intercloud -- from its highly secure data centers in Germany.

Starting in December, companies of all sizes will be able to order IT services such as computing, storage and networking in a pay-as-you-go model through Telekom’s new cloud portal. The service will be available without minimum purchase requirements and contract periods, starting from EUR 0.05 per hour. Additional storage starts at EUR 0.02 per gigabyte. Through this offering, Telekom creates the foundation for a secure European Internet of Things built on industry-leading security that offers highest availability and scalability for real-time analytics. Innovative platform-as-a-service (PaaS) and software-as-a-service (SaaS) offerings are slated to follow in the first half of 2016.

Data security expert Covata, which participated in a pilot test of the platform, will be the first customer to use the DSI Intercloud infrastructure services from Germany. Also unify, a communications and collaboration company, is interested in an open source cloud platform from Germany and has been testing the new service in the data centers.

For Cisco, this is an advancement of its Intercloud initiative, launched in 2014, with the aim of simplifying the complexity of hybrid cloud environments. Cisco has invested in highly secure hybrid cloud capabilities for customers around the globe, using its own data centers and SaaS capabilities with those from the company’s extensive partner ecosystem. To help realize the opportunity afforded by the Internet of Things with new SaaS and PaaS offers, Cisco and Telekom will focus on delivering the necessary high availability and scalability for real-time analytics at the edge of the network to make Telekom’s cloud the foundation for innovative IoT experiences.

Telekom expands its market position

For Deutsche Telekom, this alliance with Cisco is an important building block in expanding its cloud business. Telekom intends to expand its leading position in the European cloud services market for business customers and more than double its cloud revenue by the end of 2018. In fiscal year 2014, net sales of cloud solutions at T-Systems increased by a double-digit figure, mainly in the highly secure private cloud segment. It is expected that the market for public cloud services, including infrastructure, platforms and applications will grow further. Here, Telekom intends to compete more fiercely with companies like Google and Amazon in the future. Overall, Telekom aims to double its cloud revenue by end of 2018. To this end, Telekom’s business units are now intensifying their cloud activities across the group.

As one of the pioneers of cloud, T-Systems has been providing cloud services for business customers for ten years. Customers include multinational companies such as Shell, Daimler and Thyssen-Krupp, but also medium-sized companies.