Getting Your Tech Start-up Ahead of the Curve with Equinix and HPE

From Shenzhen to Seoul, from Tokyo to Singapore, a tech boom is in full swing across Asia-Pacific. According to the Global Startup Ecosystem Report 2020, published by San Francisco-based research and policy advisory Startup Genome, the region now accounts for 30% of the world’s top start-up ecosystems, compared with just 20% in 2012. What’s more, of the 11 start-up ecosystems that made it onto Startup Genome’s top ecosystems list, six are in Asia-Pacific, confirming the region’s growing web-tech clout.[i]

To navigate a highly competitive environment, Asian start-ups, just like their successful counterparts elsewhere across the globe, increasingly recognize that they need to compete not only by delivering innovative products and services, but must also equip themselves with a scalable technology platform to stay ahead of the game.

It is critical for start-ups to react promptly to market requirements. As such, the frictionless ability to adapt quickly and efficiently to changing business demands will be key to its growth. Consequently, cloud has enabled early-stage Asian start-ups to enjoy the benefits that flexibility can offer.

Emerging challenges of public cloud adoption

While offering many new opportunities for start-ups, cloud adoption also comes with challenges. This is especially true for start-ups that utilize public cloud exclusively. According to Gartner, “Proponents of multicloud cite better disaster recovery and easier migration for data and services as the prime benefits though the decisions are generally based on three major drivers:

1. Sourcing: The desire to increase agility and avoid or minimize vendor lock-in. Multiple factors could drive this decision – availability, performance, data sovereignty, regulatory requirements, labor costs.
2. Architecture: Modern applications are designed in a more modular style and can support multiple cloud providers.
3. Governance: To ensure operational control, enterprises want to unify the administration and monitoring of their IT systems.”

These three drivers are crucial to start-ups which need to be agile when opportunity knocks, ensuring that their technology capabilities will not hold the business back. Instead of being constrained by the capabilities of a single cloud service provider, a hybrid and multicloud architecture enables start-ups to cherry pick the solutions based on each service provider’s strengths, build a resilient and optimized environment to maximize these benefits to facilitate their business development. Increasingly, there are more enterprises adopting hybrid multicloud infrastructures at the very early stage of their development to eliminate the IT bottleneck. More importantly, this enables them to integrate the best of private and public clouds — the private fulfills regulatory requirements and addresses latency issues, while the public supports the scalability of IT resources and access to innovation accelerator services.

This trend is reflected in a latest Gartner survey of public cloud users, which “finds 81% of respondents using two or more providers.”[ii]  More and more start-ups will be following the successful example set by industry unicorns including Dropbox, Netflix and Zoom — currently deploying hybrid multicloud or hybrid cloud approaches to both safeguarding and expanding their fast-growing businesses.

Unlocking the potential of hybrid multicloud with Equinix

Without a doubt, the hybrid multicloud route gives start-ups a clear competitive edge, and that’s why Equinix has teamed up with HPE to launch the Webtech Accelerator Program — to support web-tech start-ups with secure, resilient and cost-efficient IT infrastructure, thereby helping their businesses to grow.

One of the program’s key offerings is the HPE-Equinix Rapid Ideation Center, where start-ups have direct access to Equinix’s cloud, network and financial ecosystems, along with HPE’s technology solutions, for a 30-day period to validate how a hybrid cloud environment streamlines their operations and enables new functionality – for free.  The ‘as-a-service’ consumption model offered by public cloud service providers has been extended so start-ups can experience the flexibility and scalability inherent in a hybrid multicloud solution, and overcome data governance, security, and egress concerns. They can rest assured that as new business opportunities come their way, their infrastructure will always be primed and fit for the task.

Start-ups participating in the program can also leverage Equinix’s extensive global footprint and proven expertise in high-performance multicloud solutions, securely linking their public platforms to private clouds and a myriad of other service providers and business partners. With more than 220 data centers scattered across the planet, Equinix enables start-ups to place infrastructure wherever they need it, to locate close to clouds and networks, and to build on the industry’s most consistent and sustainable platform. Additionally, storage and compute are decoupled for running to move workload, not data, so regulatory compliance becomes easier to fulfill.

Through the partnership between Equinix and HPE, start-ups can now simply and easily integrate discrete services from service providers, based on their differentiated capabilities, cost and performance. This enables a best-of-breed paradigm and also makes regional specialists and innovative new entrants to the market more accessible.

With Equinix’s robust, interconnected ecosystem, start-ups can directly and securely connect with more than 1,800 network providers and over 2,900 cloud and IT service vendors, giving them more control over their engagement with service providers and better control of their technology spend. More than half of the Fortune 500 and over one-third of the Forbes Global 2000 use Equinix, so start-ups also can seamlessly and easily connect with their business partners and customers, gaining the edge to succeed in today’s competitive environment.

Furthermore, Webtech Accelerator Program participants can benefit from other Equinix solutions, including popular network interconnection services Equinix Fabric and Network Edge. This enables start-ups to shorten timeframes to provision new digital infrastructure, whilst improving communications and connectivity, and delivers higher performance at a lower cost.

Getting with the Webtech Accelerator Program — maximize your digital advantage

Start off on the right foot. Plan ahead to avoid unnecessary complexity and cost of when migrating from public clouds to a hybrid multicloud architecture. We believe the flexibility, speed and confidence start-ups derive from a hybrid multicloud-ready digital infrastructure should be their greatest competitive advantage. Get to know more about the Webtech Accelerator Program and sign up now to fast-track your digital advantage with Equinix.

[i] https://e27.co/6-of-the-worlds-top-11-startup-ecosystems-are-now-in-asia-pacific-startup-genome-report-2020-20200626/