The cloud computing arm of Alibaba has opened its first data centre in Sydney, the latest in a string of new centres launched globally this month.
New facilities in Germany, Japan and the United Arab Emirates brings Alibaba Cloud’s brings the company’s total to 14. Other centres serve mainland China, Hong Kong, Singapore and the east and west coasts of the United States.
The Australian data centre is understood to be co-located, although the company would not say where.
Services offered include data storage and analytics services, enterprise-level middleware, and cloud security services. The company said a local team will help “build up a cloud ecosystem with local technology partners”.
“As a global leader in cloud computing and big data, Alibaba Cloud has successfully established critical commerce infrastructure to enable cross border businesses, online marketplaces, payments, logistics, cloud computing and big data to work together seamlessly. We look forward to working closely with our local partners and customers to drive technological innovation and development in Australia, and empower businesses of all sizes across different sectors,” said Simon Hu, president of Alibaba Cloud.
Established in September 2009, Alibaba Cloud provides a suite of cloud computing services to support enterprises, including sellers and other third-party customers and businesses participants in Alibaba Group’s online and mobile commerce ecosystem.
The company said its strength and scale in the Chinese market meant it could offer Australian businesses operating there a variety of cloud products and services “beyond that which is available from any other provider”.
"The new data centre in Australia will enable us to better serve the needs of existing clients who are expanding globally and require scalable and secure cloud computing services. Our global network will enable customers to truly manage their IT infrastructure in different regions with one global account,” said Ethan Yu, vice president of Alibaba Group and general manager of Alibaba Cloud Global.
The platform recently demonstrated computing power and scalability by successfully handling a record peak order volume of 175,000 orders per second during Alibaba Group’s Global Shopping Festival on November 11.
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