- Offers managed hybrid IT services to regional and multinational corporations across five Australia locations

MONROE, Louisiana, April 28, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- CenturyLink, Inc. (NYSE: CTL) today announced it now offers access to its full suite of managed hybrid IT services to regional and multinational corporations in Australia with the extension of its data center footprint into the country through an agreement with independent Data-Center-as-a-Service provider NEXTDC Limited.

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CenturyLink's comprehensive portfolio of managed hybrid IT services comprises network, managed hosting services, colocation and cloud. The company has offered network services to more than 50 regional and multinational corporations in Australia since 2002, and plans to deploy its public cloud service within the country later this year. Starting today, managed hosting and colocation services can be accessed through NEXTDC's network of five next-generation data centers in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra and Perth.

Through the agreement, CenturyLink and NEXTDC can sell into each other's data centers. This innovative approach to outsourcing will be invaluable for Australian businesses wanting to enhance their international reach with CenturyLink's managed hybrid IT services, and for existing global CenturyLink customers to quickly and easily gain a physical presence in Australia.

"We are eager to offer our managed hybrid IT services and consistent IT experience to multinational corporations in Australia, one of the most connected countries in the world," said Gery Messer, managing director, Asia Pacific, at CenturyLink. "The extension of CenturyLink's data center footprint into Australia signifies our commitment to serve growing customer demand for IT services in the Asia-Pacific region."

Craig Scroggie, chief executive officer of NEXTDC, commented, "NEXTDC's agreement with CenturyLink continues the trend of the world's top IT providers utilizing NEXTDC's national data center network to provide services. CenturyLink is an important new member of our ecosystem of carriers, cloud and IT service providers, and its presence will essentially open up a world of new possibilities for Australian organizations on their journey to a hybrid cloud model."

The availability of CenturyLink's global managed hosting services in Australia continues the company's recent momentum in Asia Pacific, including the recent launch of its public cloud platform in Singapore, the expansion of its managed hosting services into China and the availability of its Private Cloud service in all 58 of its global data centers. The company also earned industry analyst recognition for its Asia-Pacific cloud-enabled managed hosting capabilities, and received a Brill Award from the Uptime Institute for Asia-Pacific data centers facilities management.

Rated by Deloitte in its APAC Tech Fast500 as Asia Pacific's fastest-growing telecommunications company, NEXTDC's quality-first design philosophy saw the company win a 2015 Uptime Institute Brill Award for Efficient IT in the Product Solutions category for the APAC region, and NEXTDC's Sydney data center achieve the inaugural 2014 DatacenterDynamics APAC Award for Innovation in the Mega-Data Center.

"Our recent surveys have shown that many enterprises would like to reduce the number of IT services providers they work with, so we believe there will be strong demand by enterprise customers to be connected globally in Australia under a single contract," said Stefanie Williams, analyst at 451 Research. 

"CenturyLink continues to invest in expanding the reach of our global data center footprint into key markets like Australia," said David Meredith, senior vice president, CenturyLink. "CenturyLink makes it easy for multinational corporations to host with us in key markets all over the world, adhering to high standards for operational excellence across all of our services and locations."

About CenturyLink
CenturyLink is the third largest telecommunications company in the United States and is recognized as a leader in the network services market by technology industry analyst firms. The company is a global leader in cloud infrastructure and hosted IT solutions for enterprise customers. CenturyLink provides data, voice and managed services in local, national and select international markets through its high-quality advanced fiber optic network and multiple data centers for businesses and consumers. The company also offers advanced entertainment services under the CenturyLink® Prism™ TV and DIRECTV brands. Headquartered in Monroe, La., CenturyLink is an S&P 500 company and is included among the Fortune 500 list of America's largest corporations. For more information, visit www.centurylink.com.

About NEXTDC
NEXTDC is an ASX300-listed technology company enabling business transformation though innovative data center outsourcing solutions, connectivity services and infrastructure management software. NEXTDC is a leading provider of enterprise-class colocation services across Australia, facilitating hybrid cloud deployments by offering direct connections to their partner community: Australia's largest independent network of carriers, cloud and IT service providers.

NEXTDC is where the cloud lives™. To learn more, visit www.nextdc.com.

Related Links

http://www.centurylink.com

SOURCE CenturyLink, Inc.