Wasabi Techologies has partnered with VSTECS Singapore to distribute Wasabi’s predictable, high-performance cloud storage solutions in the market.
“As Asia’s appetite for emerging technologies like generative artificial intelligence grows, this will inevitably drive data storage needs and thus, demand for low cost, high-performance object storage services,” Wasabi Technologies APJ vice president and general manager Michael King said.
This partnership comes after the launch of Wasabi’s first Singapore data centre and marks a pivotal moment for Wasabi in bringing its hot cloud storage solutions to the country. It paves the way for Wasabi’s expanded presence in the APAC region by tapping on VSTEC’s expansive reach of 50,000 channel partners across Asia and emerging SEA data centre hubs like Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia.
In an interview with King, he said Wasabi’s focus is increasingly shifting away from well-established markets towards the burgeoning digital landscapes of Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia, where promising opportunities are on the rise.
“This escalating interest has spurred hyperscale cloud providers to direct their attention to these countries, eager to stake their claim in the burgeoning cloud market. Singapore’s stringent regulations on new data centres, notably enforced by its 2019 moratorium, have only added fuel to the fire, amplifying interest in these emerging markets and significantly influencing the trajectory of the channel ecosystem for cloud services,” King added.
VSTECS Singapore president Sebastian Chong told Channel Asia the exponential growth in AI adoption has resulted in explosive growth in data and the need for robust, scalable IT infrastructure that is scalable, secure, cost-effective, and powerful.
“Complementary services, such as data analytics, IoT, and big data processing, that can be seamlessly integrated with AI solutions are also in demand,” Chong said.
“Our collaboration with Wasabi, complemented by their local data centre, positions us to meet these demands head-on, providing customers with faster, reliable, and locally optimised hot storage solutions that can also cater to neighbouring Southeast Asia markets that are similarly witnessing a spike in storage needs.”
In a recent survey conducted by Wasabi, one in two APAC businesses are overspending for cloud services. Thus, faster and more price-performant solutions will be critical for Singapore with an increasing proportion of small and medium enterprises pursuing digital transformation.
According to King, channel partners are poised to become pivotal in acquiring and retaining customers with their extensive reach into small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs).
“The significance of SMBs in the APAC market cannot be overstated, as they contribute significantly to economic growth, with their share of gross domestic product ranging from 40 – 60 per cent in most countries,” he highlighted.
However, King found that many SMBs still lag behind due to a lack of IT leadership and skills. Unlike enterprise customers with mature best-of-breed strategies, SMBs often make IT buying decisions reactively rather than strategically or proactively.
He explained that SMBs rely heavily on channel partners to serve as trusted advisors for their IT decisions with limited internal IT knowledge and capabilities.
“Therefore, channel partners not only play a crucial role in facilitating cloud adoption but also act as key advisors guiding SMBs through their digital transformation journey in the complex and dynamic APAC cloud market,” he said.
Besides partnering with VSTECS Singapore to meet increased data storage requirements driven by Gen AI, King also shared that Wasabi is heavily investing in improving AI capabilities in the cloud to its customers. It has recently acquired Curio AI, which combines Wasabi’s low-cost, high-performance object storage with Curio’s AI to create intelligent storage.
“This innovation is poised to revolutionise data storage, with AI-powered indexing expected to become a standard feature in object storage,” King said.
Apart from Gen AI, Chong said that there is also a trend towards sustainable IT solutions that focus on reducing environmental impact of IT operations and infrastructure to counter climate change.
“Growth areas are in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, cloud computing, data analytics and big data, IoT, remote work and collaboration, and sustainability and Green IT,” Chong added.