CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL) is providing its public sector customers a new infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) service option to its Government Cloud, rounding out its hybrid cloud services portfolio.
Government agencies can purchase the IaaS offering via CenturyLink's General Services Administration (GSA) Networx contract, and the carrier plans to make it available on other GSA contracts.
With the Government Cloud offering, CenturyLink offers a mix of public, private and hybrid cloud offerings, allowing agencies to migrate and extend their data center workloads to the cloud while complying with federal security standards.
Serving as the engine behind the new service is the VMware vCloud Air Network Managed Services Provider Model, including its VMware vCloud Government Services IaaS product. What's important about the product is that it is accredited under the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP), meaning it complies with the public sector's security standards.
Led by GSA, FedRAMP is a government-wide risk management framework that provides a standardized approach to security assessment, authorization and continuous monitoring for cloud products and services. The program was designed to provide what GSA says is a cost-effective, risk-based approach for the federal government's adoption and use of cloud-based services.
Being able to offer FedRAMP-certified solutions that combine VMware cloud with its network and secure data centers positions CenturyLink as a major provider of hybrid IT solutions to the government.
While CenturyLink does not specifically break out public sector revenues, it is clear that new services like Government Cloud are having an effect on its overall business revenue.
During the fourth quarter of 2015, the service provider reported that strategic business revenues were $1.6 billion in the quarter, up 1.4 percent year-over-year from the fourth quarter 2014. High-bandwidth data services revenues from business customers grew approximately 9 percent year-over-year.
For more:
- see the release
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