Alibaba Cloud to Launch Data Center in South Korea

Global cloud leader’s first local data center for more stable and secure cloud services from 2022

Seoul, South Korea, October 21, 2021 – Alibaba Cloud, the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group, today announced it will launch its first local data center in South Korea in the first half of 2022 to offer South Korean customers more secure, reliable and scalable cloud services, underlining its commitment to empower South Korean businesses with their digital transformation.

Leveraging Alibaba Cloud’s self-developed supercomputational engine, Apsara, the new data center will extend the reach of Alibaba Cloud’s offerings in South Korea, ranging from elastic compute, database, security, storage and network services to machine learning and data analytics capabilities. Local businesses of all sizes will be able to deploy mission-critical workloads while enjoying more reliable cloud services with lower latency.

"South Korea is a strategic market for Alibaba Cloud and we are building the new data center to address increasing demand for cloud infrastructure services from local clients. Together with our global data network, we will continue to help our South Korean customers heighten their pace of digital transformation and global expansion through the latest cloud computing technologies and ecosystem support,” said Unique Song, Regional General Manager of Japan & South Korea, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence.

Serving 25 regions and with 80 availability zones globally, Alibaba Cloud is the leading public cloud service provider in Asia Pacific and the number three globally, according to Gartner. Since it entered the South Korea market in 2016, it has introduced proven technologies from the Alibaba ecosystem to serve a wide array of South Korean customers in various industries including retail, finance, manufacturing, logistics, media & entertainment, and internet companies.

In fact, Alibaba Cloud supports Amorepacific China, South Korea’s leading cosmetics company, in digitalization to bring personalized shopping experience to Chinese customers. By leveraging Alibaba Cloud’s digital intelligence platform - underpinned by its robust computing technology and AI capability – Amorepacific China can utilize business intelligence tools such as sales and inventory insights as well as launch precisely targeted and effective digital marketing campaigns.

“Alibaba Cloud’s upcoming data center shows our commitment in this country. It will allow clients to access our reliable infrastructure as a service (laaS) and platform as a service (PaaS) products without the need to worry about the issue of compliance and data sovereignty,” said Stone Ni, Head of South Korea, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence.

To ensure the highest cyber protection and compliance standards, the global trusted cloud leader has more than 80 security and compliance accreditations worldwide.

“The launch of the local data center will bring more leading technologies that have been proven successful in Alibaba’s ecosystem, including e-commerce, finance and logistics, to our South Korea customers. We are committed to continuing our mission on helping more South Korean companies to expand their businesses locally and globally with innovative technologies,” said Hyung-Kwon Danny Chung, General Manager of Alibaba Group South Korea.

Alibaba Cloud’s partners in South Korea also welcome the launch of the new data center as they believe it will bring new offerings and opportunities to local businesses.

“Alibaba Cloud is an important partner for Megazone and the new data center will enable us to provide more tailored services for our customers in a cost-effective, resilient and secure way. We look forward to continuing partnering with Alibaba Cloud on local initiatives to support the digitalization of local businesses,” said Lee Joo-wan, CEO of Megazone, a local cloud service provider who has partnered with Alibaba Cloud since 2016.

In South Korea, Alibaba Cloud works with a number of local partners and organizations, including Lascom, Bankware Global, Gyeonggi Global Game Center, and Incheon Creative Economy Innovation Center to extend its ecosystem support for local businesses. For example, Alibaba Cloud partnered with Megazone’s subsidiary Cloud Class and Global Knowledge to provide workshops for personal and enterprise users, focused on increasing access to knowledge about how to use the cloud effectively.

The launch of the new data center is the latest move taken by Alibaba Cloud to support the digitalization of South Korean businesses. In September, it announced a series of measures to further support South Korean SMEs, startups and developers on their digital transformation journeys. The measures included a new startup support program to provide entrepreneurs with resources to onboard with Alibaba Cloud more efficiently.

Last month, it also launched a support program for South Korean SMEs in the gaming sector. The benefits include six months of free Alibaba Cloud services, tailored support to address pain points, regular meetings with Alibaba Cloud technical experts, and access to the company’s Asia business expansion services.

About Alibaba Cloud

Established in 2009, Alibaba Cloud (www.alibabacloud.com) is the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group. It offers a complete suite of cloud services to customers worldwide, including elastic computing, database, storage, network virtualization services, large-scale computing, security, management and application services, big data analytics, a machine learning platform and IoT services. Alibaba Cloud is China’s leading provider of public cloud services by revenue in 2019, including PaaS and IaaS services, according to IDC. Alibaba Group is the world’s third leading and Asia Pacific’s leading IaaS provider by revenue in 2020 in U.S. dollars, according to Gartner’s April 2021 report.