A historic event in the technology community happened this past week: Microsoft opened its new Canadian data centers.
This marks the start of a significant expansion of cloud services, one that will help providers, like us here at CompuVision, market cloud services to more of the Canadian market.
Why is this such a big deal?
Before this launch, data in Microsoft cloud services like Office 365 and Sharepoint was stored primarily in the United States. For Canadian businesses who are concerned about data residency, or that data stored within another country’s borders would be governed by the laws of that country, this meant that the cloud was not a viable option. However, these new data centers put Canadian business back in Canada – where it should be.
“Data sovereignty and data privacy concerns have reportedly heightened around the world since former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden leaked information about the agency’s widespread electronic surveillance capabilities,” wrote Yevgeniy Sverdlik, editor in chief for datacenterknowledge.com.
He is right. When dealing with clients, especially those in the public sector, we are constantly asked about where the cloud actually lives. In terms of marketing cloud computing as a service, this now opens up the ability to provide cloud services to those who have strict data restrictions needing to be governed in Canada.
“We strongly believe in the potential of Canadian private and public sector businesses and organizations, and we’re excited about the opportunities our local cloud will create for our ecosystem of partners,” reads the Microsoft website.
“From today on, our goal is to create Canada’s best and most complete cloud, enabled by world-class technology and a world-class cloud ecosystem,” said Janet Kennedy, President of Microsoft Canada, “We’re privileged to work with our team of Canadian partners who are perfectly positioned to help our Canadian customers innovate, grow and transform their businesses.”
In our past blog posts, we go into depth about what the cloud is, and what it can offer in terms of cost savings, productivity, scalability, and redundancy… capturing that one version of the truth in your documents and giving you the power of the anywhere workplace.
The data centers are located in Toronto, Ontario, and Quebec City, Quebec. These are the first cloud locations for Microsoft in Canada, with the promise of adding more to service the thousands of Canadian businesses that are today being served from outside of our country.
These data centers have launched with support Office 365 and Azure. Dynamics CRM Online is scheduled to go live in September 2016.
“By gaining access to these Canadian data centers we open up new customer possibilities such as banks, government agencies, health services and certain non profits, just to name a few. These customers and markets are new opportunities to whom we couldn’t previously offer services due to the data restrictions, but now we can support them,” says Lindsay Dodd, VP Strategy at CompuVision, a Microsoft Silver Cloud Productivity and Small & Midmarket Cloud Solutions Partner.
