Interview


and AI. Terefore, they can innovate faster and compete on a par with enterprise-scale companies.


How does Leaseweb see the role of MSPs in the current market? Te current lacklustre economic outlook and ongoing concerns around elevated energy prices has led to businesses battening down the hatches. In response to this, many of our channel partners are focused on how they can provide value added services to their hard- pressed business customers. Since the definition of value looks different to different customers,


MSPs are adopting an agile approach to this challenge. By tailoring pricing, contract length and service portfolios they are demonstrating their commitment to helping customers sustain their businesses for the foreseeable future. In the process, they are forging closer and highly trusted customer relationships. As part of this process, MSPs are helping customers navigate


when and where it’s appropriate to utilise public cloud and why. Tis includes guiding them on how offerings from the likes of Microsoſt and AWS public cloud will work with other cloud offerings. By working in close partnership with cloud and IaaS service


providers, MSPs are able to deliver both high quality cloud services and strategic consultancy to their customers. Forward thinking cloud providers understand that today’s


businesses want to work with MSPs that can help them adapt their IT rapidly to new demands and changing business needs. By working with MSPs that have deep strategic partnerships with cloud service providers, they get to tap into benefits such as full pre-sales support, comprehensive 24/7 technical advice – and are able to make better, more informed infrastructure choices.


How can organisations ensure they are getting the most out of their AI implementations? Selecting a platform that is aligned with AI business goals will be key. Making the most out of AI implementations in a cloud environment depends on one key thing: optimising AI cost and resource management. So, organisations should be on the lookout for cloud solutions that provide auto-scaling features and tools that will minimise costs during low demand periods. Because not all clouds are created equal, cloud service providers and


plan options will need to be evaluated according to their availability, reliability, scalability and compatibility with an organisation’s AI frameworks, tools and data sources. Similarly, careful consideration needs to be given to the features,


prices and services cloud providers offer for AI components like compute, storage, networking, security and analytics. Tese resources will need to be efficiently allocated and dynamically scaled based on real-time demands. Added to this, how underlying data and the output is consumed will also be important and data transportation costs will need to be factored in. Ultimately, choosing a cloud provider that offers flexible pricing


models and tools for managing and tracking resource usage is the key to effectively managing cloud AI resources and achieving the right balance between performance and cost.


How does Leaseweb support its clients? In a year when AI has truly taken centre stage, it’s good to know that


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we’ve been keeping a close eye on AI for a long time. It’s something we do for any major technology that impacts our business and that of our clients. For example, we’ve acquired deep expertise in understanding


how different AI models have different underlying infrastructure requirements. What clients choose will depend on a number of key criteria that includes data size and structure and the desired output accuracy. By mapping out all these factors, we can help clients tailor their infrastructure and truly make headway in the world of AI. Similarly, we’ve long been committed to executing new ways of


making green computing a reality in our data centres. Consequently, we are able to share expertise and help clients utilise innovative new ways to monitor, measure and reduce energy consumption in their environments. For example, AI tools are now enabling incremental improvements in areas like data management as well as supporting more efficient and sustainable business operations.


How does Leaseweb address security concerns and compliance requirements? In our role as a cloud service provider, we provide uniform and compliant standards for personal data and privacy. In Europe, this includes all applicable data protection acts and principles including GDPR and we are able to provide customers with the DPAs (data processing agreements) they need. Meanwhile, our state-of-the-art defence systems feature agile


and efficient network-wide protection against the full spectrum of cybersecurity attacks, including challenging multi-vector attacks. We also operate a 24/7 Security Operations Centre manned by cybersecurity experts and registered ethical hackers with over 200 years of battle tested experience who are on hand to help customers protect their business. Finally, we offer best-in-class cloud based and dedicated cybersecurity solutions with customisable and configurable rule sets that can be adjusted to the security posture of individual customers. Dedicated to educating and supporting the clients we work with


adopt a defence in depth position, we offer 24/7 security related support services, standard security training for all employees, and a robust disaster recovery solution.


What can we expect in the future? Leaseweb will continue to listen to its customers and develop products and services to complement their demands. We are continuously developing our automation tools and working with AI to allow our customers the freedom and flexibility to run their own environments and connect everything in a secure cloud. Continuous improvement of our support services is allowing us to move to the levels that hybrid cloud demands as well as making our billing and SLAs seamless and transparent. We are a truly global company and we continue to look at acquisitions that are geographically beneficial, but more importantly, we look for skills and innovations that are beneficial and add new services and solutions to our portfolio. Our latest releases of Object Storage, Managed Kubernetes, Public Cloud and CDN have already been released across many entities and will shortly be available globally to offer significant price/performance benefits over some of our competition. Our roadmap of development has always been strategically aligned to what our market needs and this will continue to be our key investment moving forward.


March/April 2024 | 21


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