Ingram Micro and Microsoft announced a strategic partnership to help businesses build, scale and monetize cloud and digital services. Under the new agreement, Ingram Micro’s CloudBlue commerce platform will operate on Microsoft Azure, and Microsoft will co-sell the CloudBlue platform to new service providers joining Microsoft’s Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program.
Microsoft Azure will power the CloudBlue commerce platform, which enables cloud service providers of any size and any business model to automate, aggregate and monetize their own cloud and digital services as well as those from third-parties. CloudBlue – announced today as a new, independent software division of Ingram Micro – is the result of years of investment and more than $500 million by Ingram Micro, and is comprised of hundreds of engineering, product management, operations, marketing and sales experts. CloudBlue includes all the intellectual property and software assets from six different acquisitions including Odin and Ensim.
CloudBlue’s flagship software platform is the industry’s leading cloud commerce engine, powering not only the Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace, but also the cloud businesses for many of the world’s foremost telecommunications companies, managed service providers, technology distributors and value-added resellers – including Telefonica, O2, Telenor, Telekom Austria, AmericaMovil, Cobweb, GTI, Copaco, Telstra and many more. With more than 200 pre-integrated solutions from leading ISV’s such as Microsoft, Dropbox, DocuSign, and Symantec, CloudBlue’s commerce platform manages more than 27 million enterprise cloud subscriptions globally.
“The cloud market has reached a tipping point and we are well-positioned to ensure businesses can benefit. We are removing barriers to entry to enable businesses to move quickly and access the growth promised by cloud technologies,” said Richard Dufty, Senior Vice President, CloudBlue. “They need the right solution to automate and accelerate their cloud businesses. With Microsoft Azure powering our CloudBlue commerce platform, our customers will be able to scale faster and deliver to their customers the market leading technologies they need.”
With Microsoft Azure, the CloudBlue commerce platform will leverage the productive, hybrid, and intelligent public cloud infrastructure solution trusted by enterprises globally. Developers, IT professionals and partners around the world are utilizing Azure’s comprehensive set of cloud services to build, deploy, and manage applications through Microsoft’s global network of datacenters. Microsoft’s CSP program enables partners to expand their business by creating packaged solutions and offering managed services based on Microsoft cloud services. Under this new agreement, both companies will collaborate to give more partners and service providers access to a winning combination of best-of-breed technologies that will deliver tangible business results fast.
“Our partnership with Ingram Micro, and their commitment to Azure, will ensure our partners have access to a great set of tools to help accelerate the return on their cloud investments,” said Gavriella Schuster, Corporate Vice President, One Commercial Partner, Microsoft. “The trusted Azure cloud platform, combined with our CSP program and CloudBlue’s expertise in supporting service providers’ cloud operations, will enable our customers to maximize their investments in the cloud and grow their businesses.”
Leading services providers around the world are already lined up to take advantage of CloudBlue hosted on Azure. Ingram Micro also announced today that Liquid Telecom has successfully deployed the CloudBlue platform on Azure in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya, with expansion planned throughout Africa later this year. Further, Cobweb, a leading distributor in the UK, announced today that it has migrated its CloudBlue platform to Azure for the large-scale provisioning of Office 365 and other third-party ISV solutions.