IBM cloud expands its data centers to 18 new regions for enterprise clouds

Snip from https://www.ibm.com/cloud/data-centers/#datacentermap

IBM has announced a major expansion of its cloud capabilities. It will include the launch of 18 new availability zones for IBM Cloud.

An availability zone (AZ) is an isolated instance of cloud inside a data center region. Each AZ has independent power, cooling and networking to strengthen fault tolerance

IBM Cloud already operates in about 60 locations. But IBM will be adding more capacity and capability with these new locations. The new availability zones will be located across North America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific.

IBM Cloud locating its 18 new availability zones in high demand centers. These centers are in Europe (Germany and UK), Asia-Pacific (Tokyo and Sydney), and North America (Washington, DC, and Dallas, Texas).

In Europe, the data centers will help meet demand from corporations who under GDPR (General Data Protection Regulations) need to host data locally.

“The world’s biggest companies work with IBM to migrate them to the cloud because we know their technology and unique business needs as they bridge their past with the future,” said David Kenny, senior vice president of IBM Watson & Cloud Platform. “Our continued cloud investment and growing client roster reflect that companies are increasingly seeking hybrid cloud environments that offer cutting-edge tools including AI, analytics, IoT and blockchain to maximize their benefits.”

Additionally, clients of IBM cloud will be able to deploy multizone Kubernetes clusters across the availability zones via the IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service, simplifying how they deploy and manage containerized applications and adding further consistency to their experience.

According to IBM, ExxonMobil, Bausch + Lomb, and Westpac will be migrating their core workloads to IBM Cloud. Exxon Mobil Corp. has adopted IBM as the foundation for its Speedpass+ mobile app which is used at 11,000 gas stations across the United States. Bausch & Lomb Inc. will operate its Stellaris Elite cataract surgical system out of IBM data centers in Dallas and Frankfurt. Australia’s Westpac Banking Corp. has migrated to a secure and dedicated IBM Cloud infrastructure. Driving factor to shift to IBM cloud for the Bausch & Lomb and Westpac was the need to follow strict new privacy laws.

Amazon Web Services has by far the largest overall market share in the public cloud. The first quarter of 2018, AWS held 33 percent global cloud infrastructure services as per the report of the Synergy Research Group. That compares to about 14 percent for Microsoft Azure and 8 percent for IBM. But IBM has a solid reputation among large enterprises. As per RightScale's 2018 cloud survey, 38 percent respondents said to be either planning or experimenting with IBM public cloud.

IBM cloud revenue stood at $17.7B for their private, public and hybrid offerings.

This post is subject to the original announcement.