CenturyLink brings public cloud service to Singapore

CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL) is enhancing the reach of its public cloud platform in the Asia-Pacific region by making the service available in one of its data centers in Singapore.

By extending the public cloud platform to Singapore, CenturyLink said it will be able to provide businesses in the Asia-Pacific region with a series of services, including public and private cloud network services, managed services, colocation, networking and hybrid cloud support.

Asia Pacific has been a growth target for CenturyLink's data center and managed hosting businesses. The service provider has expanded its data facilities and cloud offerings in China, Hong Kong, Japan, and Tokyo.  

In September, CenturyLink expanded its managed hosting services into China, a move it says was initially motivated by U.S.-based multinational corporations (MNCs) that want to establish a presence in the country. Earlier it made its new Private Cloud service available in all 58 of its global data centers.

Gery Messer, managing director for CenturyLink's Asia Pacific region, said in a press release that the debut of the public cloud services in Singapore is a response to regional businesses looking to increase their cloud footprints.

However, this recent expansion is just one of many the service provider has planned for 2015.

"We plan to explore additional international expansions and product launches in Asia Pacific in 2015," Messer said in the release.

In addition to Asia-Pacific, CenturyLink completed the buildout of data centers in several markets, including Minneapolis, Toronto and Phoenix. It also completed expansions of existing facilities in Chicago and Irvine, Calif.

According to a recent Frost & Sullivan report, enterprises across the Asia-Pacific region spent almost $6.6 billion on public cloud services in 2014, up 38 percent from 2013. Looking forward, the research firm predicts that cloud spending will exceed $20 billion in 2018 due to what it says is an "increasing openness to outsource workloads to cloud, greater collaboration between business and technology decision makers in the procurement of IT, and the availability of more mature cloud offerings in the market."

CenturyLink is hardly alone in its desire to chase the Asia Pacific cloud services market.

Verizon (NYSE: VZ) just announced that it is extending its Unified Communications and Collaboration as a Service (UCCaaS) solution into Europe and Asia-Pacific while adding Cisco Collaboration Meeting Rooms to its portfolio.

For more:
- see the release

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