Alibaba is getting ready to battle with Amazon Cloud with the launch of Alibaba Cloud. The company announced that the global partner ecosystem investment is worth $1 billion.
According to the company, the money will come in both financial and non-financial incentives, including funding, rebates, and go-to-market initiatives. The move makes Chinese tech giant a third’s largest public cloud service provider.
The $1 billion initiative is meant to “support partners’ technology innovation and their market expansion with Alibaba Cloud in the coming three fiscal years,” said the company.
Alibaba Cloud at the moment has around 11,000 partners worldwide, including Salesforce, VMware, Fortinet, IBM, Neo4j and BCX, South Africa.
“Africa is recognised as the next frontier in the adoption of emerging technologies. We are proud to partner with a reputable global player, such as Alibaba Cloud. The partnership gives BCX the opportunity to expand our reach and services and create additional revenue streams, which is part of our broader strategy to grow our business and expand our partner eco-system,” says BCX CEO Jonas Bogoshi.
“As the exclusive South African distributor of Alibaba Cloud, BCX will be the primary contact for all resellers in South Africa and intends on providing Alibaba Cloud services across the continent through distribution and channel partners,” adds Bogoshi.
Alibaba Cloud enjoyed a 9.5% market share in 2021, trailing Microsoft (21%) and Amazon (39%), according to market research firm Gartner.
