Equinix announced that both Rackspace and IBM SoftLayer are now accessible directly through the Equinix Cloud Exchange in multiple regional datacenters. The addition of the cloud services grows Equinix’ datacenter-to-cloud service offering, which already included Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Compute Engine (GCE) as connection options that can be established directly through the datacenter.
Equinix provides datacenter services for companies that want to have the benefits of a managed environment without the cost of supporting an entire datacenter. These multi-tenant regional datacenters allow customers to place a rack of their own equipment in them while Equinix handles the environmental details such as utilities and temperature.
An Equinix DatacenterThese multi-tenant regional datacenters, also called International Business Exchanges (IBX), include an option for those companies looking to migrate some or all of their services to the cloud. By placing edge hardware from the public cloud vendors directly into their datacenters, Equinix is able to provide a fast and reliable connection between the private clouds in the customer racks and the public cloud that is managed through the gateway devices.
IBM purchased cloud service provider SoftLayer in 2013, and with that purchase IBM was able to expand its cloud offerings to include an Application Programming Interface (API) accessible Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) solution. The inclusion of SoftLayer Direct Link Cloud in Equinix datacenters provides a connection between private and cloud servers without having to traverse the public Internet. Currently, SoftLayer Direct Link is available in Equinix IBXs in Amsterdam, Chicago, Dallas, Paris, Silicon Valley, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo and Washington, D.C.
Rackspace is a managed cloud service provider that includes more than a typical IaaS approach. Instead of provisioning IaaS services and letting the customers go about it completely on their own, its managed services include support from a team of cloud and system engineers to help speed up the transition to the cloud and help resolve issues that arise. Direct access is now available to Rackspace customers so that their hosted solutions are readily accessible from their Equinix datacenter.
Additionally, Equinix customers can add Rackspace managed services to some hybrid and multi-cloud deployments, including Microsoft Azure. Rackspace direct connections are available in Equinix Cloud Exchange platforms from Chicago, Dallas, and Washington D.C., though plans are already underway to expand the services into more regional datacenters.
[Source:- tomsitpro]
