Equinix, Inc. and XO Communications (XO) have announced an agreement to provide enterprises with dedicated connectivity to multiple cloud service providers through the Equinix Cloud Exchange.
"We're delighted to have XO's networking services available on the Equinix Cloud Exchange to offer enterprise customers another great option for connectivity to the cloud in an easy-to-manage and secure environment. As our customers' IT needs change, it's our goal to provide direct access to the network and cloud services they need in order to build sophisticated multi-cloud solutions inside Equinix data centers," said Chris Sharp, vice president, cloud innovation, Equinix.
Traditionally, security and performance concerns have deterred businesses from accessing cloud environments via the public Internet. Today, enterprises leveraging the Equinix Cloud Exchange along with secure, scalable and reliable XO Internet Protocol Virtual Private Network (IP-VPN) technology can accelerate their cloud strategies unencumbered by the challenges and reduce risks associated with public Internet access.
"As businesses of all sizes migrate more services and applications to the cloud, XO is taking a leadership role in enabling dedicated network access to a wide range of public cloud resources through both direct connections and cloud exchanges. As such, XO is very pleased to be one of the first network service providers to access the new Equinix Cloud Exchange. For enterprises, the evolving hybrid cloud architecture demands the security, visibility, high speed and flexible connectivity that XO will deliver via the Equinix Cloud Exchange," said Nicola Jackson, vice president, product and marketing, XO Communications.
XO will offer high speed, direct access to multiple cloud services on the Equinix Cloud Exchange in five Equinix IBX data centers across the United States including Washington, D.C., Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Silicon Valley.
By bringing together cloud and network service providers with enterprises and enabling them to establish private, high-performance connections, the Equinix Cloud Exchange gives cloud users direct access to the services they need to build sophisticated hybrid cloud solutions.
While the desire for multi-cloud solutions is well documented, the challenge for service providers lies in determining how to effectively serve this demand. According to a commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of XO Communications And Juniper Networks, 72% of IT respondents surveyed stated that application developers want a multi-cloud environment to compose business services across multiple platforms. [Forrester Consulting, Building for the Future: What the New World of Cloud IT Means for the Network, September, 2013].
Businesses can join the Equinix Cloud Exchange in 17 markets globally – Hong Kong, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo, Silicon Valley, Washington D.C., New York, Toronto, Seattle, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Dallas, Chicago, London, Paris, Amsterdam and Frankfurt – with expansion planned to a total of 19 markets by the end of 2014.
This article was originally posted “Equinix And XO Communications Collaborate On Multi-Cloud Solutions” from Cloud Strategy Magazine.
