Dimension Data's acquisition of cloud and managed hosting provider OpSource Thursday is a major step forward in the global systems integrator's "services journey," a journey in which cloud services play a key role.
Dimension Data CEO Jere Brown said in an interview that adding 9-year-old OpSource to its portfolio "accelerates our cloud services journey" and gives Dimension Data the ability to take a step back from traditional product sales and focus heavily on bringing customers up to speed with services.
Johannesburg, South Africa-based Dimension Data, which was acquired by Tokyo-based NTT last year, has wrapped OpSource's cloud and managed hosting offerings into a new business group, a centralized Cloud Solutions Business Unit.
While the financial terms of the OpSource, Santa Clara, Calif., weren't divulged, Brown said Dimension Data is making significant investments in bulking up its cloud offerings, which he predicts will be a huge growth engine and a major component of Dimension Data's offerings in coming years. The company examined a number of cloud providers, Brown said, but OpSource, which has an existing relationship with Dimension Data parent NTT, was the best fit.
"OpSource will be the key asset that's part of the cloud business unit we're launching," Brown said, adding OpSource's cloud stack coupled with Dimension Data's global reach were a perfect fit.
The OpSource acquisition comes as Dimension Data customers are looking for affordable and scalable methods to consume IT. It gives Dimension Data the ability to go into existing customers and bring them into a cloud computing ecosystem.
"This allows us to expand our current client relationships, retain clients and grow them while adding new services and capabilities," he said.
OpSource, which will be a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dimension Data, sees the buy as a "phenomenal opportunity" that gives OpSource access to Dimension Data's vast global reach and massive client base.
"This is straight up a growth services buy for Dimension Data," OpSource CTO John Rowell said. "They want to be in the cloud services business. They want to accelerate their cloud strategy and get the cloud out to end customers."
Rowell said Dimension Data's resources coupled with OpSource's cloud heritage will combine into a services led cloud powerhouse that will leverage Dimension Data's global reach and its ability to build relationships to get a leg up on the competition.
"Amazon doesn't come close to having the relationships Dimension Data has," he said.
And Rowell reassured OpSource's growing channel that nothing will change as a result of the Dimension Data buy.
"We look at this as an enabler of the channel to get out and get in front of more people," Rowell said.
