Cogeco Data Services Launches Canada's First Geo Redundant Multi-Hypervisor-Public Cloud and Self Service Management Portal

TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - March 4, 2015) - Cogeco Data Services, a Canadian provider of fully managed ICT
solutions, today announced the availability of its enhanced Public Cloud Virtual Data Centre (VDC) service and self-service customer portal. First to market in Canada, the new geo-redundant Public Cloud IaaS platform provides customers with the choice between flexible enterprise-class virtual environments, including Microsoft's Hyper-V and VMWare's vSphere platforms.

"At Cogeco Data Services we are focused on helping our customers embrace cloud solutions that align with their business strategy and vision," said Susan Verma, Director, Product Development, Cogeco Data Services. "Our new Public Cloud provides customers with the flexibility to design a cloud solution that fits their application requirements and combines the security, control, and performance characteristics of an enterprise private cloud with the cost, elasticity and scalability of the public cloud."

With four data centres in Canada and connected by Cogeco Data Services' extensive wholly-owned, all-optical network, the Public Cloud Virtual Data Centre service is hosted on a high-availability multi-tenant platform within data centres that are owned and operated by Cogeco Data Services and designed to tier 3 standards.

"Data residency matters. Our customers tell us that knowing where their data is hosted and ensuring that it meets regulatory compliance requirements is of critical importance to them. With our geo-redundant Virtual Data Centre, enterprises can trust that even in the event of a disaster their data will remain in Canada," added Verma.

As part of its suite of cloud services, Cogeco Data Services provides customers with a comprehensive, single point ICT solution that reduces complexity and creates transformational value for businesses that is backed by industry-leading service level agreements and the company's wholly-owned all optical network.

Career Edge, a not-for-profit social enterprise that connects well-qualified interns with leading organizations, chose Cogeco Data Services because the new VDC service improves its IT performance and helps address the challenge of rising IT costs.

"Improved IT performance is critical to our ability to meet the accelerating technology change in the marketplace," said Naguib Gouda, President, Career Edge. "Our constituents-clients who are launching their career through paid internships-and our employer partners who hire them expect 24/7 access to our services."

"With the on-demand compute model, we get more resources for less cost, giving us rapid scalability and a simple self-service deployment model" added Dewey Mai, IT Manager, Career Edge.

All customers subscribing to the new platform will also have access to the Cogeco Data Services' new self-serve portal capabilities through which they can manage, configure and automate their cloud environment in a customized manner suited to their unique ICT requirements. This includes access to real-time visibility, the ability to take advantage of many self-service functions including a comprehensive dashboard view of all services and a menu of all tools necessary to manage subscriptions.

Key Benefits of the new Public Cloud IaaS Platform:

• Enterprise-ready, secure cloud with multiple hypervisor environments - Microsoft (Hyper-V) and VMWare (vSphere)
• Simplified single-pane-of-glass self-service portal for managing and administrating multiple cloud environments
• Geo-redundant VDC options with automated failover and defined service level agreements for recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO)
• Cloud infrastructure hosted in Cogeco Data's tier 3 data centres within Canada with 100% Canadian data residency
• Built on next generation Flexpod infrastructure, a reference cloud architecture developed in partnership with Cisco, NetApp, VMware and Microsoft
• Storage IOPS based QoS policy management with guaranteed service level metrics
• Advanced DDOS, virtual firewall, IDS and anti-virus security options
• Supported by dedicated account teams and complimented with a suite of private, hybrid cloud, managed IT, security, backup and connectivity services

About Cogeco Data Services

With its suite of ICT solutions (Data Centre, Managed IT, Private and Public Cloud IaaS, Connectivity, Voice and Professional Services), Cogeco Data Services supplies its customers with the fast, reliable and secure ability to access, manage, move and store large amounts of data worldwide. The Company's 'always on', tier 3 quality data centres and reliable, redundant network provide some of Canada's largest companies and public sector organizations with near limitless bandwidth and secure facilities for hosting, storing and managing mission critical data.

For more information about Cogeco Data Services, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cogeco Cable Inc. (TSX:CCA), visit cogecodata.com, or connect with us on LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube.

About Career Edge

A self-sustaining social enterprise, Career Edge has remained passionate about connecting highly motivated, well-qualified interns with leading organizations since 1996. Our innovative internship programs provide cost-effective and virtually risk free workforce solutions to help multisector enterprises meet or exceed evolving business needs, while giving new graduates- including those with disabilities-and internationally qualified professions the edge they need to successfully launch their careers. Career Edge works. Half of our interns are hired by the employer at the end of the internship and most of the rest launch their career. For more information about Career Edge, please visit www.careeredge.ca