Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT), the nation’s number one ICT solutions provider and the national backbone infrastructure services provider proudly announced the company’s partnership with Citrix Systems Inc., a global leader in providing cloud services, mobile workspaces, virtualization, mobility management and networking services to strengthen SLT AKAZA Cloud platform.

SLT believes that the Citrix Cloud Platform will empower SLT AKAZA Cloud offerings to make SLT customers’ IT infrastructures more agile and efficient infrastructures via AKAZA cloud applications. The state-of-the-art services currently offered by “AKAZA” includes: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Virtual Data Centres (VDC), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS), Communication-as-a-Service (CaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS).

With this partnership, SLT AKAZA Cloud services will provide enhanced offerings that give organizations easy to use, self-managed web-based portals of maximum flexibility for organizations to allow selecting the exact amount of resources they require – be it storage, computing power, RAM, software etc., as and when required. Most importantly organisations get the ability to build powerful ‘pay as you go’ as well as ‘pay as you grow’ model-based cloud solutions that users can access with consistent levels of quality and security wherever they are expanding.

Mr. Lalith De Silva, Group Chief Executive Officer of SLT commenting this partnership said, “With Citrix’s cloud platform solution, we believe our state-of-the-art AKAZA Cloud solutions that provide the next generation of computing, will definitely empower our valuable enterprise clients to focus on strategic directives of their core business by minimizing their daily fire-fights on hardware, software, infrastructure & applications to help broaden their business horizons. Also AKAZA is an important platform which is developer-focused with infrastructure readiness for the growing ICT sector in Sri Lanka”

Adding further Mr. De Silva said, “We see a huge potential in this cloud space and we invite organisations to adopt cloud strategy in their IT projects to benefit from the scalability and cost efficiencies of delivering IT services for their business needs. As the Cloud environment is changing the entire IT delivery model to a service-based mode that operates more efficiently, it will result in enhanced responsiveness to business needs as well as more efficient utilisation of companies’ resources. Further, it will also have a positive impact on Sri Lanka’s economy since it will reduce foreign exchange outflows resulting from the reduced import of IT equipment from foreign countries and the better utilisation of available resources.”

Mr. Kiththi Perera, Chief Enterprise and Wholesales Officer of SLT said, ”SLT’s island-wide fibre network and established fibre access networks with built-in redundancies and resiliencies connecting all key business establishments and two state-of-the-art data centres, AKAZA Cloud offers end-to-end cloud computing services to further transform the way organisations operate IT. The company’s fully-fledged data centre offerings manage organizations’ mission critical infrastructure and applications through its rich portfolio. The company helps to strengthen the stability of business organisations while ensuring reliability, security and scalability, backed by professional support.”

Mr. M.I. Deen Cloud Service Program Manager and General Manager Enterprise Solution asserts thus “I believe we are at a critical juncture where Enterprises are considering ICT solutions on an OPEX model wherein their ICT investments can be incrementally scaled with the growth of their business. Similarly Independent Software Vendors (ISV’s) are increasingly transforming their applications and capabilities from legacy to a cloud based multi-tenanted environment. SLT AKAZA, powered by the open standards of the Citrix Cloud Platform, is the catalyst in brokering the aforesaid supply and demand to deliver cutting edge ICT services to customers on an ‘As-A-Service’ model, deployed in the state – of – the - art Data Centre environment.

AKAZA IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) platform provides shared computing power to customers, eliminating the need for customers to invest in expensive infrastructure and equipment. SLT’s IAAS platform is spread across the Company’s trusted and secure top tier internet data centres (iDC) located in SLT Head Quarters and Welikada, thus assuring customers of a reliable and secure cloud platform with super-fast processing speeds. Through “AKAZA”, customers will be connected to SLT’s enterprise block storage, the largest cloud storage space in Sri Lanka. AKAZA will provide organisations access to fully automated self-service portals to serve local as well as global clients. a) AKAZA Virtual Data Centres (VDC) are implemented in the AKAZA Cloud and are based on VMware and Citrix technology, which provides full compatibility with any virtualisation environment. b) AKAZA Cloud Storage provides fast and reliable storage for I/O-intensive applications. In order to meet business requirements, companies can select Standard or Enterprise Block Storage volumes, both of which are connected to the Cloud Servers via SLT’s high-speed network. c) Cloud Backup is one of the most critical requirements in the IT industry. Once a backup of critical business data is taken, AKAZA Cloud Backup is in a position to ensure business continuity and restore the failed system.

AKAZA PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service) enables software developers to instantaneously code, develop and run software. AKAZA cloud platform provides cost-effective, easy-to-use, flexible and multiple development environments such as Java, .Net, PHP and Python with promises of greater developer agility, significant cost savings and expedited time to launch apps in the market. PaaS gives organizations the option of selecting required platforms to develop and run the applications and enable authorized users to access them through the Internet. SLT offers cloud-based tools for coding, testing, deploying and hosting the application with AKAZA. University students and entrepreneurs alike get the opportunity to experiment their developments that fit the global markets. Local developers will get the opportunity to develop their software apps on top of SLT AKAZA PaaS (App Market place) which will give them immense possibilities and opportunities to go global by bringing new foreign currency to the country, which will also support economic developments in the country.

AKAZA SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) provides a Cloud based App Marketplace that enables users to select an array of open source and commercial applications so that they can use them within their workloads. The App Marketplace is populated with over 60 popular applications in a wide variety of categories - including CMS, CRM, Business Intelligence, Database, Collaboration and others.

AKAZA DaaS (Desktop-as-a-Service) transforms the traditional desktop into a cloud-based service where customers can get all the desktop features and functionalities from the Cloud. As a solution, DaaS eliminates upfront investments associated with the traditional model and instead provides a cost-effective and low power consumption service model to meet customers’ PC requirements and changing business needs. DaaS provides enterprise-level security, best-in-class monitoring and a highly secure facility to provide around-the-clock support for customers. Also, the productivity of workers would increase due to a significant reduction in the time required to perform desktop management and associated support tasks. On the other hand, households and government segments also can gain special benefits through AKAZA DaaS service where PC requirements can be facilitated with a minimal initial investment. Also this DaaS service is not a device-dependant application therefore users can access data through multiple devices including basic level PC, Laptop, SmartTab or SmartPhone.

AKAZA CaaS (Communication-as-a-Service) will be providing Cloud PBX & Contact Centre solutions and Cloud VIDEOMEET services. Cloud PBX & CC is an OPEX based solution that focuses on SME and large enterprises. Cloud IVR solution for businesses including small and micro level companies to enhance their brand image by improving clients’ first impression with the company when contacting the hotline to obtain information about their services. It will also provide automated operator assisted services.

About SLT AKAZA

“AKAZA” is a fully fledged cloud platform that enables diverse businesses ranging from top enterprises, government institutions, small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and micro level business organizations as well as individuals to leverage on SLT’s vast ICT resources which includes being connected to the largest fibre optic backbone infrastructure in the country. It eliminates the need for organizations to invest heavily in large servers, data centres and complicated software as well as technical experts. Thus, organizations have the freedom to focus on their capital and other resources in relation to what they do best - their core business. With the current transformations that Sri Lanka is undergoing and the economic developments in the country, ”AKAZA” will especially help SMEs and micro level businesses to expand their businesses quickly and easily with economical infrastructure solutions and minimum capital investments.

About Citrix

Citrix is a leader in mobile workspaces, providing virtualization, mobility management, networking and cloud services to enable new ways to work better. Citrix solutions power business mobility through secure, personal workspaces that provide people with instant access to apps, desktops, data and communications on any device, over any network and cloud. This year Citrix is celebrating 25 years of innovation, making IT simpler and people are more productive. With annual revenue in 2013 of $2.9 billion, Citrix solutions are in use at more than 330,000 organizations with over 100 million global users. Learn more at www.citrix.com.