ANA aircraft at Sapporo international airport. Photo by Masgatotkaca via Wikimedia Commons

Provider of data center services Savvis has secured a large new client for its IT infrastructure offerings. All Nippon Airways, operator of one of Japan's largest airlines, will use Savvis for managed hosting services supporting its 70 corporate Web sites.

The provider will use its Tokyo data center to deliver the services to the airline whose headquarters is located in the de-facto Japanese capital. The facility was recently expanded by 3,700 square feet of raised floor.

"Japanese enterprises are increasingly turning to hosted IT infrastructure solutions that provide immediate business benefits, and we look forward to serving them from our newly expanded data center in Tokyo," Savvis Managing Director for North Asia Mark Smith said in a statement.

Prior to making the three-year agreement with Savvis, ANA's Web sites relied on the airline's in-house infrastructure the company managed itself. The company decided to outsource this task because it needed better scalability, availability and security, according to a Savvis news release.

Hosting infrastructure of the company's many Web sites within one data center is a significant departure from the group's traditional approach. Until now, each of the many companies the group owns has built its own Web site, resulting in high development and maintenance costs, which ANA is expecting to lower by centralizing and outsourcing the infrastructure that supports these Web sites.

"There was an urgent need to enhance Web site governance, reduce costs and increase flexibility," ANA's Assistant Manager of Technology and Architecture, Information Technology Services, Masahiro Tsukiji said in a statement. "Choosing Savvis has enabled our IT team to move away from the day-to-day operation and management of IT infrastructure and enable our IT team to focus on other core business initiatives."

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