ALSO Expands Its Cloud Services Portfolio With Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Ormuco OpenStack Technology, Joins Cloud28+ Community

EMMEN, SWITZERLAND--(Marketwired - Oct. 4, 2016) - ALSO expands its cloud services portfolio with The Connected Cloud, a cloud delivery platform built by Ormuco in collaboration with Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) technology, which allows managed cloud deployments on and off premise. The new offering will enable customers to consume local IaaS, PaaS and SaaS services while addressing security and data sovereignty requirements. The solution is managed through a state-of-the-art portal to ensure optimal customer experience. ALSO is the first B2B marketplace to offer HPE and Ormuco OpenStack services in Europe. The offering has been tailored for ALSO by Ormuco.

"The Private and Hybrid Cloud ecosystems are growing fast, bringing great opportunities to our customers. Our goal is to ensure our services portfolio empowers our customers to address their verticals with easy to use, scalable services and an accelerated time to market. With the Ormuco offering we continue our commitment to support our customers by bringing great value-add to their customers. At the same time, we are delighted to join and contribute to the development of Cloud28+ to accelerate the digitization roadmap of our customers through a wide catalogue of Cloud services," said Prof. Dr. Gustavo Möller-Hergt, CEO of ALSO Holding AG (SIX:ALSN).

With the HPE and Ormuco OpenStack services, ALSO customers can configure Private or Hybrid Cloud platforms for their clients with a pay-per-use or a term commitment model. The solution will be delivered from Tier 3 TUV Certified datacenters operated in Europe and will enable customers to seamlessly migrate and transition between cloud environments with the flexibility required for streamlined IT operations.

The service enables the creation and delivery of a wide variety of different vertical solutions. The platform is fully managed and updated by Ormuco, engineered around APIs and end-to-end automation, ensuring scalability, efficiency and cost optimization. All the services proposed by ALSO will be included in the Cloud28+ Service Hub.

"We see a great opportunity in our partnership with ALSO to expand our offering through their reach. With our multi-Cloud technology, customers across Europe can consume services with the same SLA, security and performance, using a feature-rich and intuitive web-based interface. The solution will allow businesses to regain control of their IT resources, transition to an IT-as-a-service model and focus on their core competencies. With ALSO joining the Cloud28+ community with us, we will have another strong partner to accelerate the adoption of cloud services in Europe," said Orlando Bayter, CEO, Ormuco.

Through Cloud28+, customers and partners can easily find trusted, enterprise-grade services and then connect directly with a local Service Provider for deployment or install the apps on-premises. Cloud28+ enables customers to choose the right mix of private cloud, public cloud, and professional services for their business to help them transition to a hybrid IT environment, while complying with local regulations.

The HPE and Ormuco solution will be available in the ALSO Cloud Marketplace by the end of 2016. For further information and access to the ALSO Cloud Marketplace, please visit: www.also.cloud.

ALSO Holding AG (Emmen/Switzerland) brings providers and buyers of the ICT industry together. The company offers services at all levels of the ICT value chain from a single source. In the European B2B marketplace, ALSO bundles logistics services, financial services, supply services, solution services, digital services, and IT services together into individual service packages. ALSO's portfolio contains more than 160 000 articles from some 350 vendors. The Group has around
3 750 employees throughout Europe. In fiscal year 2015 (closing on December 31), the company generated net sales of
7.8 billion euros. The majority shareholder of ALSO Holding AG is the Droege Group, Düsseldorf, Germany. Further information is available at www.also.com.

Droege Group (Major shareholder)

Droege Group (founded in 1988) is an independent consultancy and investment company under full family ownership. The company acts as a specialist for tailor-made restructuring programs with the aim of enhancing corporate value. Droege Group combines its corporate family-run structure and capital strength into a family-equity model. The group carries out direct investments in corporate subsidiaries and medium-sized companies in "special situations" with the use of equity. The motto of "The Art of Implementation" has made the group into a pioneer among hands-on implementation-oriented consultancies. Droege Group demonstrates its implementation excellence daily within its own portfolio. The seven corporate platforms which exist at present are aligned to the current megatrends (mobility, prevention, digitalization, demography, etc.). Enthusiasm for quality, innovation and speed determines our actions. In this way Droege Group has successfully gained a position in the domestic and international markets and operates with over 120 companies in 30 countries. In 2015 the sales volume of Droege Group was 9.2 billion euros.

More information: http://www.droege-group.com.

Ormuco

Founded in 2008 and with ongoing projects in 5 continents, Ormuco is a leading cloud technology provider with a focus on innovative solutions. Its main offering, The Connected Cloud, is a hybrid, public and private cloud services platform based on open source technology with a robust catalogue of services for organizations, service providers and ISVs. Built with the end-user in mind, Ormuco's platform is available through a global partner ecosystem to facilitate both local data requirements as well as global, multinational companies.

More information: www.ormuco.com.

Cloud28+

Cloud28+ is a federated community of service providers, resellers, ISVs, developers, government entities and end users dedicated to accelerating enterprise cloud adoption across Europe. It offers an online, aggregated catalogue of cloud services, matching detailed workload requirements with trusted cloud services at different prices. Cloud28+ currently features over 1,000 Infrastructure-as-a-Service, Platform-as-a-Service and Software-as-a-Service offerings.

The Cloud28+ service catalogue is available at http://www.cloud28plus.eu/.

Disclaimer

This press release contains forward-looking statements which are based on current assumptions and forecasts of the ALSO management. Known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors could lead to material differences between the forward-looking statements made here and the actual development, in particular the results, financial situation, and performance of our Group. The Group accepts no responsibility for updating these forward-looking statements or adapting them to future events or developments.