Global Micro Solutions and Microsoft are working together to empower the local reseller market by providing practical advice on how to become a cloud provider – and highlighting the benefits of using a local cloud partner.
At an event held yesterday at Microsoft, the companies provided perspective on the cloud market in South Africa, the opportunity that exists for resellers to add cloud services to their offering as well as practical steps on how and why to partner with a local provider.
“The hosting service provider market is part of the Microsoft Cloud Strategy and as such Microsoft will continue to invest and support our HSP partners,” says Nick Keene, cloud sales manager at Microsoft SA. “Our hosting partners have many years of cloud experience as they have been providing cloud services since 2000.
“Recently Microsoft announced further integration between the hosting providers and the Microsoft public cloud that will allow our customers to obtain Public and Hosted Cloud from a one stop shop. Global Micro Solutions has been a long standing strategic hosting partner for Microsoft.”
Microsoft has long been promoting cloud solutions as a way to cut costs, save hardware space and bandwidth and use software as and when it is needed. Through its Azure platform, it provides a cloud space for building, deploying and managing applications and services through a global network of Microsoft-managed data centres, like the one with Global Micro.
“People see one of the benefits of the cloud as being the opportunity to buy into a global framework anywhere in the world, from anywhere in the world, but this isn’t strictly a benefit,” says JJ Milner, founder and chief cloud architect at Global Micro. “In truth, you want your data in the same country as you, bound by the same laws as you, who will support you in your own language in a familiar accent. This is why you should have a local cloud partner.”
He lists the following benefits to working with a local provider:
* Data sovereignty – simply put, your data is in the same country as you and governed by the same laws as you and your business, which are understood by any local legal advisors and technology consultants you may engage.
* Local contacts – when and if something goes wrong, you can be confident that there is a viable, real, local contact that you can get in touch with who can, if necessary, come and see you to resolve the issue.
* Efficient functionality – you will be able to easily and quickly control the uploading or downloading of your data whenever it is needed.
The Global Micro reseller programme has been created to allow consultants, web hosting companies or service providers to leverage the company’s enterprise infrastructure and expertise, and offer value-added services that are locally relevant and robust to their customers.
Global Micro provides hosting infrastructure, the administrative control panel, and the 24/7 technical support and that all exist within South Africa’s borders, ensuring all the benefits of local cloud provisioning.
“We work with two independent data centres and two independent ISPs. We provide our channel partners with the ability to get to market faster with automated management platforms,” Milner says.