The new initiative will bring clarity and trust to UK businesses looking to take advantage of what the cloud has to offer. The objective is to provide medium sized UK businesses with a collection of technology choices that can be delivered via Star’s virtual private cloud platform, powered by HP technology.
Andrew Duce, HP Service Provider Programme Manager, said “Together, HP and Star will extend their already very positive relationship to offer more customers streamlined and integrated services that help promote new ways for UK businesses to become more agile and efficient, while ensuring better protection of their information assets that translate to lower risk and greater cost-savings.”
As a member of the programme Star will have early access to HP product roadmaps, jointly plan solutions and collaborate on a technical level. As HP aims to tap into global cloud services, which it estimates will reach $143 billion by 2013, it understands that it can better support new customers, particularly at the medium sized level, with the help of partners such as Star.
Paul Watson, Interim CEO of Star said, “We are now beyond the hype phase and cloud computing is in demand by a significant and growing proportion of UK businesses. Many of our customers are of a similar size to Star which means we share common cultural values and greatly appreciate the opportunity to work with each other, which is fundamentally important as cloud is all about collaboration to create the best customer experience. Together, with HP, we can not only provide the physical technology needed but develop ideas that will help our customers achieve their objectives.”
Duce concludes, “With HP’s technical ability and Star’s powerful customer relationships, customers will be treated to the opportunity they deserve to cost effectively access the best technologies available today and for the long term.”