Articles tagged with media

LA and Toronto data center openings add to existing locations to provide continent wide IaaS

Los Angeles, US — January 16th, 2012: ElasticHosts, the cloud server provider, has today announced its launch into North America. The company will open two new data center locations in Los Angeles, USA and Toronto, Canada, adding to its existing locations in London, UK and San Antonio, Texas. With a central, east and west coast presence sitting alongside London, ElasticHosts will now be able to provide its elastic, easy-to-use, pay-as-you-go cloud hosting to customers across North America.

The ElasticHosts offering enables businesses to take advantage of on-demand, scalable cloud servers. Capacity is billed by the hour ensuring customers only pay for what they use. The user interface has been designed to suit all levels of IT expertise so is simple and easy-to-navigate, allowing organizations to instantly create, increase or decrease computing capacity. Customers can also scale their CPU, RAM and disk space independently to whatever sizes they need, rather than trying to match these needs to a set of pre-defined hosting packages. As a result, customers only pay for what they need, when they need it.

Richard Davies, CEO at ElasticHosts, explained: “In the current economic climate, businesses are under pressure to reduce costs. As such, IT spend is under increasing scrutiny and businesses need to justify any outgoings. For too long they have been overpaying for unnecessary server capacity because they were tied to fixed term, pay monthly contracts. The cloud hosting we provide lets businesses bypass this issue by letting them scale up and down, with costs instantly reflecting any changes. In addition, our goal is to offer scalable cloud computing but without the complexity often seen with this kind of solution. The benefits of cloud — costs savings and improved efficiency — are attractive to people of all levels of IT expertise, and cloud hosting should therefore be designed to suit this wide range of IT skill sets.”

With multiple data centers across North America, customers have the choice of where to locate their websites or applications to ensure their users get the best possible experience. Where there is a geographically diverse set of users, organizations can mirror and load balance their websites and application across multiple ElasticHosts data centers while still benefiting from the on demand model. Additionally, in offering a data center in Canada, ElasticHosts can provide North American cloud hosting that does not fall under the US Patriot Act, Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) or the forthcoming Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). This means that Canadian and European businesses which do not want to operate in US jurisdiction can still enjoy the benefits of North American cloud servers with fast network connectivity to US and Canadian markets.

To mark its US launch, ElasticHosts is currently offering a 5-day free trial to businesses. Prices then start from 6c per hour, or $44 per month.

For more information, please contact:

Spark Communications elastic@sparkcomms.co.uk +1 415 358 5219 +44 (0)20 7436 0420

ElasticHosts sales@elastichosts.com +1 415 358 5210 +44 (0)20 7183 8250

Cloud platform provider launches range of new features to build cost-effective public and private clouds

London, UK — July 28th, 2011: ElasticStack, the cloud platform provider, has today announced a range of new features enabling businesses to build and quickly deploy a scalable, resilient, pay-as-you-go cloud infrastructure from low cost commodity hardware. New features include improved storage clustering, which reduces hardware costs by eliminating the need for a SAN (Storage Area Network) whilst still offering the same resilience. Another key update is the new Ajax user interface which makes deploying and managing cloud servers easier and faster.

Following its launch in 2010, ElasticStack has been adopted across the world by service providers and businesses who have built public and private clouds within weeks. The platform has always enabled significant cost savings by allowing businesses to run compute and storage on the same commodity hardware — eliminating the need for expensive SANs or dedicated storage clusters. However, the new release uses distributed block storage (network RAID) technology to offer improved storage redundancy and performance. This means that for the first time businesses can make their clouds as resilient as they would be with a SAN without the associated costs.

“Organisations traditionally used SANs to provide resilient shared storage for their clouds. They wanted to be able to move VMs between compute nodes and also to know that their storage was resilient to hardware failure. However, implementing a SAN or any dedicated storage cluster comes at an expense that ultimately increases the cost of your cloud,” explained Richard Davies, CEO at ElasticStack. “With ElasticStack you’ve always been able to run both your compute and storage infrastructure on a single set of commodity hardware, with VMs still free to move between nodes. Now, you’ll also be secure that if any node goes down then all of your storage is already replicated elsewhere and your cloud will continue running. Essentially we are bringing all the resiliency benefits of a SAN to your cloud, without the need to invest in separate expensive storage hardware.”

In addition to this, ElasticStack has also developed a new control panel which makes creating and managing cloud servers easier and faster. Built using Ajax, the new control panel is still simple for any user to understand and use, and is now also more responsive. Businesses building ElasticStack-based clouds can also now make use of an increased range of payment, CRM and SMS options — meaning they can customise currency and pricing based on their region whilst also integrating ElasticStack into CRM systems such as Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics.

“All of these new features are designed to help businesses become more economically and operationally efficient,” added Davies. “The new user interface makes self service much easier, while the improved cluster redundancy means organisations not only benefit from reduced hardware costs but now also have the resilience of an expensive SAN. Cloud computing should be on-demand, easy-to-use, truly scalable, cost-efficient, resilient and flexible. This new release delivers on all of these points and will enable both service providers and enterprises to build low cost, highly resilient clouds.”

The ElasticStack cloud platform has supported ElasticHosts’ own cloud servers in the UK and US since 2008. In 2010, the platform was made available to service providers and businesses looking to deploy private clouds. ElasticStack now powers production clouds on four continents, including US-based Open Hosting; Malaysia’s first public cloud service SKALI Cloud, and UK-based Serverlove.

For more information, please contact:

Spark Communications elastic@sparkcomms.co.uk +44 (0)207 436 0420

ElasticStack sales@elasticstack.com www.elasticstack.com +44 (0)845 686 8642

Thanks to ElasticHosts customer and blogger Sam Jack for this very positive and comprehensive review of our cloud hosting service!

Like many of our customers, Sam is impressed with our customer service:

ElasticHosts Customer Service is amazing. Fronted by Elastigirl herself (aka Anna Griffiths, her cover as Helen Parr now being thoroughly blown) they’ve been quick to respond whether I’ve called or emailed.

Sam is also pleased with our pricing, flexible service, and API, and recommends signing up for our free trial.

You can read Sam’s full review here.

First two providers already signed up; many further discussions ongoing

June 28, 2010, London: ElasticHosts, the international cloud provider, today announced the launch of the ElasticStack cloud platform (www.elasticstack.com), a powerful platform that enables hosting providers and data centres to offer own-brand cloud servers to their customers swiftly.

Built on the proven platform that underpins ElasticHosts’ own cloud services in the UK and US, ElasticStack is a complete turn-key solution for organisations looking to maximise revenues from cloud hosting services quickly. ElasticStack helps service providers offer their customers ultra-flexible and easy-to-use cloud server capacity, without any upfront investment or development work, and runs entirely on low-cost commodity server hardware.

Commenting on the launch of ElasticStack, Richard Davies, CEO at ElasticHosts, said, “As the use of cloud-based services continues to gain momentum, growing numbers of hosting providers are looking to offer own-brand cloud servers to their customers. Hosting providers and data centre businesses that sense customer demand for cloud can now simply license and deploy our proven technology. This dramatically improves the speed with which they can offer cutting-edge cloud server products to their customers, which is crucial in this fast-expanding market where time to launch is pivotal to success.”

Davies continues, “As we offer a complete turn-key solution, hosting providers and data centre businesses can focus on selling cloud servers to their customers under their own brands; we license our complete software solution and optionally also provide fully managed technical operations. We can run on pre-existing commodity server hardware or provide complete hardware and software solutions with our cloud-in-a-box hardware partners VeryPC.”

A number of service providers have already licensed ElasticStack with further discussions ongoing in North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Existing licensees include Dave Cummings at OpenHosting who commented, “Building our cloud services on an existing platform helps us bring cutting-edge products to market swiftly, giving us a significant competitive advantage in our markets.”

Davies concludes, “The introduction of the ElasticStack cloud platform is a significant step in the development of ElasticHosts. We are proud to have recently expanded our own hosting business into the US, but we also understand that there are many service providers across the world that already receive enquiries about cloud every day and would be delighted to have cutting-edge products to offer their loyal customers. By helping these partners to launch own-brand cloud services swiftly, we instantly give them cutting-edge products to sell and leave them free to focus on what they do best and drive their revenues.”

About ElasticHosts

ElasticHosts produces the ElasticStack cloud platform, which enables service provides to swiftly offer ultra-flexible and easy-to-use cloud server capacity for scalable web hosting and on-demand burst computing such as batch processing, development & test, backup & disaster recovery and cloud bursting. ElasticStack is build on the proven platform that underpins ElasticHosts’ own cloud services in Europe and North America. For more information, visit www.elasticstack.com or e-mail sales@elasticstack.com.

Contact:

Champion Communications E: elastichosts@championcomms.com Tel: +44 (0) 207 268 3076

ElasticHosts are delighted to announce that they are sponsoring the 2010 Mind Sports Olympiad (MSO), which will be held at the Soho Theatre during the last week of August. Anybody can enter — please take a look at the MSO website for more details.

The MSO, now into its 14th year, is an annual event that brings people together from around the world to compete for medals in mental-skill games, such as Chess, Poker, Draughts, Scrabble, Go, Settlers of Catan, Backgammon, Mental Calculations and many more. The original vision was to create an Olympic Games for the mind.

Our Sales and Support Manager, Anna Griffiths, has been a keen Go player for a number of years, and we are keen to support such pursuits.

US businesses can now use cloud servers which have taken Europe by storm

June 1, 2010, London: ElasticHosts, the UK-based cloud provider, today announced the launch of its cloud server solutions in the US. The offering, which will be available from San Antonio Texas from June 1, provides ultra-flexible and easy-to-use server capacity for scalable web hosting and on-demand burst computing. Customers will benefit from a user-friendly interface that can be managed from any desktop and allows them to create virtual servers instantly and resize their capacity immediately.

The launch into the US follows ElasticHost’s huge success in Europe, which has seen growth of more than one percent every day since August 2009. With the launch, ElasticHosts becomes the second cloud hosting provider in the world to offer cloud servers from data centers in two continents to serve the needs of its customers. With the exception of Amazon, every other provider operates cloud servers in either Europe or North America, but not both.

Commenting on the company’s entry into the US, Richard Davies, CEO of ElasticHosts, said, “Having facilities in both the US and the UK means we can now serve both markets with local cloud servers, offering fast direct network links and data storage within local jurisdiction and data protection regimes to both European and North American customers. We are really excited to be moving into the US and look forward both to helping our European customers expand and to reaching new US customers.”

ElasticHosts’ cloud servers allow customers the cost-efficiency of buying exactly the capacity they need today, with the peace of mind that they can immediately scale up or down as required. Capacity is billed on-demand by the hour, unlike traditional hosting contracts which tie customers to fixed capacity for up to two years. The servers run any PC operating system, are fully configurable and designed to accommodate all forms of web hosting. ElasticHosts offers a 100 percent SLA with 100x credits for downtime, supporting mission critical hosting needs where business continuity is vital.

Davies, continues: “To date, businesses looking for the cost savings and scalability of cloud hosting have had to tackle complex user interfaces and have been limited to a handful of server sizes offered by different vendors. We have designed ElasticHosts so that it can be used by almost anyone – it allows users to configure their servers specifically to suit their requirements. With our expansion into the US we are aiming to capitalize on this ease of use and offer customers on two continents a competitively priced, familiar experience when they move to the cloud. This reduces the need for training and dramatically speeds up deployment, leaving our customers free to focus on what they do best and drive their revenues.”

To mark its launch into the US, ElasticHosts is offering a free five-day trial to allow businesses to experience the power and simplicity of cloud hosting for themselves. Full details are available at www.elastichosts.com.

About ElasticHosts

ElasticHosts provides ultra-flexible and easy-to-use cloud server capacity for scalable web hosting and on-demand burst computing such as batch processing, development & test, backup & disaster recovery and cloud bursting. ElasticHosts offers competitive pricing for both subscription and burst use, outstanding performance for any PC operating system, fully flexible sizing, three independent data centers covering both Europe and North America, and a 100% SLA with 100x credits for downtime. For more information, visit www.elastichosts.com or e-mail sales@elastichosts.com.

Contact:

Champion Communications E: elastichosts@championcomms.com Tel: +44 (0) 20 7268 3076

“How cloud computing should be done” — that’s how Steve O’Donnell describes ElasticHosts on his popular blog, The Hot Aisle.

Writing on his blog, Kurt Van Meerbeeck explains how he started with a dedicated server, considered and rejected Amazon EC2 and found ElasticHosts.

As he says, ElasticHosts cloud servers “have made sure that all interfaces are very simple — a disk is a disk — an static ip really is a static ip. No fuzzy acronyms … it’s just a simple server that is ‘out there’ — it needs cpu, memory, network and electricity — and for me affordable flexible pricing — that’s it!”

As Kurt says “have a look at elastichosts.com — it rocks!” — and sign up for our free trial to test it for yourself!

ElasticHosts has been covered in depth by Liam Eagle of Web Host Industry Review, in follow up to David Hamilton’s article there last month.

As the article says, ElasticHosts is based out of two UK data centres, so will “appeal to European customers with concerns about latency and EU data legislation” when compared to US providers.

The ElasticHosts interface is designed to be easier to use than other cloud hosting: “It is a system that is closer to what a customer that is used to having with a physical server in his office – an IT manager or IT worker at an SMB, who doesn’t spend his time thinking about infrastructure – would be used to knowing how to handle”.

The commercial launch of our cloud hosting last week has been widely covered in the media.

“A new scalable cloud-based service designed to offer highly flexible and easy-to-use web hosting and on-demand burst computing capabilities … offering small to medium sized businesses an interface which even non-IT professionals will be able to use.” wrote Phil Muncaster of V3.co.uk and Computing.

Kevin White of Computer Business Review wrote a detailed article, mentioning our “nice, easy to use interface” which targets “organizations wanting to use cloud services that are simple to use”.

We were also covered in depth by David Hamilton for Web Host Industry Review, Jennifer Scott for IT Pro, Antonio Piraino for Tier1Research and Dan Ilett for Greenbang.

Finally, The Frugal Tech Show on 6 August featured a 30 minute interview with Richard Davies, ElasticHosts CEO, interviewed Ken Hess of DaniWeb and ServerWatch and Jason Perlow of ZDNet. Follow this link to hear a recording of that interview.