"Digital Launch Pad", the OVH Program to Accelerate Innovative Ideas

MONTREAL, QUEBEC--(Marketwired - Nov. 4, 2015) -

During the OVH annual Summit, Laurent Allard, CEO of the OVH Group, announced the launch of a comprehensive program supporting innovation. Entitled "Digital Launch Pad", this program differs from conventional incubators in its commitment to supporting selected projects all the way to their final stage, which is to say until they reach the market. The North American head office - located in Montreal - will be at the forefront when it comes to selecting and promoting the best local projects, with the intent of forging new partnerships.

The "Digital Launch Pad" program was launched last September during OVH's annual Summit. With a design based on the various stages of a rocket launch, the program consists of three steps: Ideation/Ignition, Build/Launch and Market/Launch into orbit.

3 levels of support

"IDEATION" - The first stage provides selected projects with support in prototyping and infrastructure capacity for several months. Candidates can create their own 'Public Cloud Project' space directly on the www.ovh.com site. This first level of assistance will also integrate access to knowledge bases, reference materials, training ... everything that can help quickly materialize ideas.

"BUILD" - The second stage not only provides the means of infrastructure, but also support provided by architects, assistance in the planning of a funding structure, and finally logistics to quickly bring the selected projects to fruition. Entry into the BUILD phase is based upon selection by some of the staff at the Montreal OVH office who have a direct contact with the candidates. For those participating in this program, it will also be possible to be physically hosted in OVH offices and/or those of OVH partners.

"MARKET" - The third stage aims to set new solutions in orbit to accelerate their business development. Selected projects will have the OVH Marketplace doors opened to them, providing visibility to the group's 900,000 customers worldwide. Expertise in digital marketing, as well as structure and support may be integrated. OVH wants to give full access to its entire ecosystem.

Montreal at the forefront

In North America, the new OVH office in Montreal will be largely used as a place to select and support the most ambitious projects. In addition to bringing some technical, logistical and financial expertise, OHV will be able to provide start-up companies with a dedicated space where they can get the full support they need all the way to the marketing phase of their project. "The goal is to share our knowledge and work with people whose areas of expertise are complementary to our own, to eventually build new partnerships.", says Laurent Allard, CEO of OVH.

"Innovation spans all economic spheres. All technological sectors are eligible for the Digital Launch Pad program". Any and all ideas will be considered without any limits or restrictions. A strong focus will be put on projects linked to IoT, which will benefit from special funding through the project "1 Million Euros (1.5 M$) for 100 Projects". Before the end of the year, the 3 winners of the "Big Data Challenge", a joint initiative of OVH and Intel to support the emergence of Big Data solutions, will be announced.

More about the "Digital Launch Pad": www.ovh.com/en/dlp/

About OVH.com

Providing 930,000 customers with a better, safer cloud, OVH.com operates over 220,000 physical servers in 17 datacenters world-wide, powered by a private fiber optic network (4,000Gbps). In 2013, the company opened its first North-American datacenter in Montreal, Canada, with a capacity of 360,000 servers. OVH.com owes its success to its disruptive pricing made possible by adopting an industrial approach to a high-tech industry, and maintaining complete control of the supply chain, through total vertical integration (from datacenter construction to server production). OVH.com is committed to finding innovative solutions to push the boundaries of cloud security.