Sky’s the limit: Alibaba Cloud looks to take on Amazon as it talks up a partnership with BT
Chinese tech giant Alibaba is in talks to provide its cloud services to BT, in an apparent bid to take on Amazon’s dominance of the European market.
Alibaba already holds a cloud services deal with Vodafone in Germany, where its first European data centre is located. If the partnership with BT were to look similar, business customers would be able to purchase Alibaba Cloud hosting and services from BT without the need for separate billing.
A spokesperson for BT confirmed that the two parties are in talks, however they could not elaborate on what is being discussed at this stage.
Alibaba Cloud is now the fourth largest provider of cloud computing services in the world, with Amazon taking the top spot. Microsoft and Google come in second and third place respectively.
In Europe alone, Alibaba has yet to feature in the top five. But as the trade war between China and the US ramps up, the company is keen to make its mark in new territories.
BT’s group chief executive Gavin Patterson is set to stand down from his role at the end of 2018, after the company unveiled a new strategy in May that involves cutting 13,000 jobs over the next three years.
Read more: BT chief executive Gavin Patterson will step down this year