IBM has entered into a multiyear cloud computing deal with AT&T. Under the agreement, AT&T Business Solutions, the division of the carrier that provides network services to corporate customers, will move its operational applications to IBM Cloud. IBM will also make AT&T Business its primary provider of software-defined networking.
“We are proud to collaborate with AT&T Business, provide the scale and performance of our global footprint of cloud data centers, and deliver a common environment on which they can build once and deploy in any one of the appropriate footprints to be faster and more agile,” said Arvind Krishna, Senior Vice President, Cloud and Cognitive Software, IBM.
As part of enabling cloud migrations, IBM will help modernize AT&T Business Solutions’ internal software applications. IBM will be the primary developer and cloud provider for AT&T Business’s operational applications. IBM will also provide infrastructure to support AT&T Business’s applications. The company will help manage the AT&T Communications IT infrastructure, on and off-premises and across different clouds –private and public.
AT&T Business will utilize Red Hat’s open-source platform to manage workloads and applications. The telecommunications company is an existing Red Hat customer. The deal comes a week after IBM closed its $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat. The companies informed that AT&T Business would help transform IBM’s networking solutions with their latest technologies including 5G, Edge Compute, and IOT as well as multi-cloud capabilities using Red Hat.
“In AT&T Business, we’re constantly evolving to better serve business customers around the globe by securely connecting them to the digital capabilities they need,” said Thaddeus Arroyo, CEO of AT&T Business. “This includes optimizing our core operations and modernizing our internal business applications to accelerate innovation. Through our collaboration with IBM, we’re adopting open, flexible, cloud technologies, that will ultimately help accelerate our business leadership.”
The two companies will also collaborate on edge computing platforms. It will help enterprise clients capitalize on the power of 5G network speeds and the internet-connected devices and sensors at the edge of the network.