Cork, Ireland, 14th November 2011: Cork Internet eXchange (CIX), an Irish, energy efficient data centre, today announced the official launch of CloudCIX, one of the world’s first Public Clouds based on the OpenStack cloud computing platform. The solution enables Cork Internet Exchange to offer flexible and scalable Compute Resources and Data Storage, on demand, to their customers.  Cloud computing is now recognised as the most important breakthrough in the global information technology (IT) industry since the Internet.

This new initiative will initially lead to the creation of eight high skilled post graduate jobs in oftware, networking and technical support with the potential for future employment growth. The next twelve months will see CloudCIX mature into a world class, cost effective, customer friendly offering with capability to compete effectively with Amazon and Microsoft Azure.

Cork Internet eXchange delivers vital communications infrastructure for the Munster region. It is currently the Internet connectivity hub for 20,000 homes and businesses in the region. It has been responsible for cost reduction and service level improvements in Broadband delivery in Munster. The Government has identified Broadband connectivity as a key jobs enabler.

Cork Internet eXchange, being the only truly resilient data centre in Ireland outside of the Dublin region ensures that Munster is able to attract foreign direct investment and to support indigenous software services companies. CIX currently serves more than 50 such companies supporting over 1,800 employees.

CloudCIX has been running for a few months with selected customers such as Supply.ie and SharpView. Supply.ie (www.supply.ie) operates an online marketplace for Irish businesses within CloudCIX. SharpView (www.sharpview.ie) have built a SaaS CRM solution on the platform for resale to their customer base using CloudCIX.

CloudCIX Business Development Manager, Bob Grantham, “Existing customers are delighted with the service and it is expected that demand for the service will ramp up significantly throughout 2012. Both Dell and MPSTOR are vital partners in the development of CloudCIX. Dell is a major employer in Ireland and MPSTOR are a Cork based designer and supplier of cloud services platforms based on OpenStack.”

MPSTOR’s Co-founder and CTO, William Opperman, "CIX has made an excellent partner with whom to develop and test Orkestra™ - MPSTOR's cloud service provider platform.  CIX's attention to detail and customer centric culture has focused our development on a platform that can deliver what's important for our customer's customer - a reliable, flexible and cost effective cloud computing service."

For further information please contact Bob Grantham on 021 4854300, email, bg@cix.ie or visit the website www.cloudcix.com.

Located in Cork, Ireland, privately held MPSTOR is a designer and supplier of cloud services platforms and data storage management software. MPSTOR’s flagship open-platform storage management software, MPStackwareTM scales from entry level to enterprise performance at cost effective prices and runs on standard Intel platforms. For more information please visit http://www.mpstor.com/.

The MPSTOR logo and MPStackware are trademarks or registered trademarks of MPSTOR. All other trademarks are the property of their respective holders.

Linda Capcara, Global Connect Communications (480) 229-7090, lcapcara@globalconnectpr.com.