Thierry Labro: Today (Tuesday 17 December 2024) you are announcing the launch of a cloud product with Deep by Post. Can you tell us about it?
: It's a project we've been working on for just over three years and it's going to be launched over the next 12 months. Its main objective is really to bring the cloud to Luxembourg. There are two aspects. Firstly, the installation of an entry point to the Microsoft network on Luxembourg soil, which will avoid dependence on external communications players. At present, private and public sector customers are obliged to connect via Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Paris and soon Brussels. The aim is to provide a direct connection here in Luxembourg, using the high-quality infrastructure available. In addition, an infrastructure managed entirely by Microsoft will be set up in Luxembourg to support use cases requiring data localisation in the country or low latency for enhanced performance. This will also guarantee enhanced security thanks to the direct connection to Luxembourg.
Where will the data be hosted and how will it travel?
The data will be hosted in a data centre in Luxembourg. As a general rule, Microsoft does not disclose the location of its data centres. But I must stress that the data and metadata will be in Luxembourg, and will be operated under what are known as EU Data Boundaries. All information relating to the storage and operation of data and metadata under this project is publicly available in a transparent manner. In addition, information on energy performance and environmental impact, such as CO2 production, water use and waste management, will be available as for any region in the world.
The investment we are making in Luxembourg is fully in line with our objectives and ambitions in terms of sustainable development, namely to have a negative carbon footprint, to be 'water positive' and 'zero waste' by 2030.
You have these objectives, but your Luxembourg partners have had to invest? How does that work?
In general, Microsoft has detailed standard specifications for the construction or rental of its data centres, including strict requirements in terms of security and environmental impact. Although the data centres in Luxembourg are modern and of high quality, significant additional investment was required to meet these criteria.
This solution is part of a holistic vision of the cloud.
From a commercial point of view, can you give details of who the offer is aimed at and how you will handle it, either directly or with your traditional partners?
Firstly, this new solution will be made available to the Luxembourg market and only to the Luxembourg market. Only Luxembourg companies and public authorities will be able to use the available capacity.
From a commercial point of view, we have a team covering the private and public sectors in Luxembourg, but we also have a partner-driven approach to supporting our customers and marketing our solutions. We have over a hundred active partners in Luxembourg. This ecosystem of partners, developed over our 20 years in business, is one of our strengths.
It's a very diverse ecosystem in terms of service offerings, in terms of size, from global to local, whether it's the Big Four, the GSIs [global system integrators], such as Accenture, Capgemini, NTT and Fujitsu, or local integrators, such as Devoteam, Sword, Deep, Proximus... and finally, we also have partners with very targeted offerings, such as the Luxembourg company SK Consulting on the Business Central part. As part of this project, Deep provided us with a great deal of support from the outset in gathering the needs of our Luxembourg customers. They participated in the co-construction of specific architectures for the use cases identified. By force of circumstance, they already know the solution in detail and have defined the 'go-to-market', but this solution is really made available to all our partners and all our Luxembourg customers.
To put it simply, the target audience is really all of our customers, public sector players who are interested in both data localisation and performance issues, but also large and small private companies who need to respond to regulatory aspects or who are simply looking for a trusted solution for internal use or for services exposed to their customers. There really is an important aspect of trust when it comes to data localisation. We also have startups that are more interested in performance aspects. Regtech and fintech [firms] are more interested in data localisation. This solution is for everyone.
For us, this solution is part of a holistic vision of the cloud. We are aware that not all organisations consider the public cloud for all their data or workloads. This Luxembourg solution meets some of these needs in a multi-cloud and/or hybrid cloud approach, depending on the criticality, regulation and/or sensitivity of the data.
All these initiatives, including our own, mean that every player in Luxembourg will have as wide a range of choices as possible.
Not all SMEs are digitalised in the same way. Will you also be giving them access to cloud solutions, in other words helping them to adopt this solution?
At Microsoft, we provide the platform. Our partners then build highly targeted go-to-market solutions. It turns out that Deep - and there will be other partners - is very interested in this market. We are also in discussions with the Ministry of the Economy about the digitalisation of Luxembourg's VSEs and SMEs. The aim is to integrate this solution into packaged offers, with clear concepts, obvious and rapid benefits, easy to market so that there is an immediate gain in maturity in terms of digitisation.
The government is expected to present its new AI strategy before spring. Your solution adds another card to the ecosystem, in a competitive environment. How does that inspire you?
We have regular exchanges with the various ministers and ministries in charge of the new AI strategy, here in Luxembourg, but also during study visits to Silicon Valley, to share our knowledge and feedback.
We welcome every initiative taken by the Luxembourg government and even those of our competitors to encourage the emergence of innovative solutions around AI, because we believe that this is very important for the Luxembourg market in terms of attractiveness and competitiveness. All these initiatives, including our own, mean that every player in Luxembourg will ultimately have as wide a range of choices as possible. Everyone will be able to choose the best solution according to their own criteria. Overall, our solutions are complementary rather than competitive, so I think this is a very positive signal for the market.
Read the original French-language version of this interview here / lire en français