In our second interview in the series on cloud services and partner ecosystems we talked to Richard Roersma, Head of the cloud computing portfolio (BT Compute) in the Benelux – and a driving force behind BT opening its fifth data centre facility in the Benelux on partnerships.
In a previous interview with Zscaler the importance of partnerships and ecosystems was stressed as the way to go in serving rapidly changing demands of end customers. In interviews with among others Cisco and EMC, this was even stressed more.
But first we asked Richard why BT is investing so heavily in data centres, with the brand new Rotterdam data centre being the fifth one in the Benelux?
Richard Roersma (Head of Product Management BT Compute Benelux)
Richard Roersma: In the past IT services were run from a “data centre” within the office where it was needed. Now data is everywhere. Business processes become more and more connected; ubiquitous and real-time access to data and applications is a standard requirement. Being end-users ourselves, I believe we all recognise this. It has made our work and lives a lot easier, more efficient – I myself can collaborate with my peers anywhere in the world, just as easy as I could if they were next to me.
Yet under the hood, this has made this services delivery and management from an IT perspective more complex. What we see is a major surge in demand for secure, resilient and cost effective managed services. In the interviews with some of the partners joining us at the festive opening of the data centre, this demand for flexibility – and thus by definition a hybrid approach with strong partnerships – it’s a recurring theme.
Our own network and data centres are fundamental to offer these services to our customers. Our new data centre in Rotterdam will expand our capacity in the Benelux with 50%. And we will need it.
Why Rotterdam specifically?
Richard Roersma: Rotterdam is ideally located and will be a key hub in our global network to disclose cloud services to our Benelux and European customers. We already have facilities in Amsterdam – a data hub that is already named as the third mainport of the Netherlands, after Schiphol and the port of Rotterdam.
Partnerships: working with the best to ensure true value
Why is the cloud partner ecosystem so important to BT?
Richard Roersma: It is not only important to BT, I have to say. BT and our partners recognise that we cannot deliver end-to-end services to our customers by ourselves. You simply cannot be good at everything. So for the end-user these partnerships are key.
Edwin Prinsen (Cisco): “In today’s complex ICT landscape, no business can deliver it all. That’s why, with BT but also with our common partners such Citrix and EMC, we build this ecosystem together – and bring end to end services to market side by side”.
We ourselves take a services brokering role and shape services ecosystems; managing communication between different providers and thereby making it easier for our customers to procure and combine different cloud services. Moreover service levels will also be easier to manage. The result is that customers will gain access to a more complete end-to-end service and user experience.
BT aims to only work with the best to ensure true value ad and high quality services to our customers. The basis of our cloud proposition is driven by an ecosystem that includes Cisco, EMC and Citrix;
- Cisco because of their platform that is truly designed to support cloud solutions. Cisco really stands out in the crowd in that sense.
- We partner with EMC because we primarily aim for high availability solutions. EMC is the top end in storage. Yet they are making an impressive shift and to us are a front runner in the area of big data analytics – and what I would call intelligent storage in the cloud, or software defined storage: having the right data, stored in the right way, and accessible to the right people at the right time, presented in the right way.
- Citrix brings a lot of experience and track record in the equation in the area of virtualisation of IT environments and are a leading innovator in cloud. They are in the core of our cloud platform management. They are best of breed. Apart from that they offer a strong portfolio of cloud services, like cloud desktop solutions, that are to become part of BT’s standard portfolio.
Rens Koopman (EMC): “We don’t look at service providers such as BT as customers but as real partners and, as opposed to many other companies, we even have built the partner model into the core of the way we do business”.
What is BT added value in bringing this ecosystem together?
Richard Roersma: BT is one of the few companies that has the ability and capacity to bring this all together. We have the datacenters and the network infrastructure to connect it all. Based on the sturdy foundation of our cloud infrastructure proposition – we can disclose services to our customers and user communities in the Benelux, and worldwide.
Also read: The truth about cloud: Here today, gone tomorrow?
