Microsoft has been making headway in the cloud services industry lately, and in the same series of developments, the Redmond giant has announced major investment for Greece. As a part of its “GR for GRowth” initiative, the cloud giant will build new datacenters in the country and establish a Microsoft Cloud region in Greece.
The establishment of new datacenters in Greece is a continuation of Microsoft’s European expansion. The extension of a Cloud region in Greece will also witness Microsoft training 100,000 people in the country in digital technologies by 2025. The blog post regarding the announcement stated, “Microsoft aims to boost the digital competencies of an estimated 100,000 public sector, business and IT professionals, educators, and students to support the digital transformation of public and private organizations. This ambitious goal will be achieved over the next five years, through a three-pronged skilling program that includes online and physical courses and workshops.”
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The announcement is followed by Microsoft’s digital and cloud transformation plan for Poland worth $1 billion that was revealed back in May 2020. Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the Prime Minister of Greece, spoke about the move, “today’s commitment to the people and businesses of Greece will position the country among the digital leaders of Europe. A Microsoft datacenter region provides a competitive advantage to our digital economy. At the same time, it is a long-term investment and a vote of confidence in our country’s potential. The cloud is transforming every industry and sector. The investment in skilling 100,000 citizens will empower today and tomorrow’s Greek workforce.”
Brad Smith, the President of Microsoft, also spoke about the move and stated, “by a substantial margin, this is the largest investment Microsoft has made in Greece in the 28 years we have been operating here. In part, this reflects confidence that our world-leading datacenter technology can help enable innovation and growth across Greece’s economy. In addition, this large investment reflects our optimism about Greece’s future, its forward-leaning government, and the country’s ongoing economic recovery.”
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The establishment of new datacenters will bring local access for Microsoft’s services such as Microsoft Azure, Microsoft 365, and Dynamics 365. The addition of a datacenter in Greece also brings the total tally of Microsoft’s datacenters around the world to 63 spread across 140 countries. Lastly, the Redmond giant also reiterated its intention of shifting its datacenters to 100 percent renewable energy by 2025.
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