ALIBABA OPENS FIRST U.S. CLOUD CENTER,ENTERS HOTLY CONTESTED MARKET
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ALIBABA OPENS FIRST U.S. CLOUD CENTER,ENTERS HOTLY CONTESTED MARKET
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd is launching a cloud computing hub in Silicon Valley on Wednesday, the e-commerce giant’s first outside of China, underscoring its global ambitions in the face of stiff and entrenched competition. The new California data center marks the Chinese company’s latest measured expansion onto American soil, and into a hotly contested U.S. market now dominated by Amazon.com Inc , Microsoft Corp and Google Inc.
Alibaba’s Aliyun cloud division intends the new data centre to cater initially to Chinese companies with operations in the United States, including retail, Internet and gaming firms. It will later target U.S. businesses seeking a presence in both countries, Ethan Yu, a vice president at Alibaba who runs the international cloud business.
Aliyun, which has been likened to a budding version of Amazon Web Services, began as part of the company’s in-house technical infrastructure but has since expanded to lease processing and storage space for small and medium Internet businesses in China.
“This is a very strategic move for us,” Yu said, declining to say how much Alibaba invested in the data centre or disclose its location for security reasons. “International expansion is actually a company strategy in the coming few years.” Aliyun, which has been likened to a budding version of Amazon Web Services, began as part of the company’s in-house technical infrastructure but has since expanded to lease processing and storage space for small and medium Internet businesses in China.
Alibaba is kicking off its U.S. cloud business as American corporations and politicians are protesting what they see as Beijing’s efforts to curb foreign technology at home.
The northern California data node would serve internal Alibaba businesses, like AliExpress, its online B2C platform for buyers outside of China, as well as external public cloud clients, Yu said.
“Gradually we will start to attract international customers,” Yu said. “There are actually lots of U.S. customers, U.S. enterprises who look forward to setting up lots of data centers in China to serve their Chinese-based customers.”