Columbus, OH – January 6, 2020 – Horizon, a regional fiber broadband company and Official Communications Provider for the Columbus Blue Jackets, has announced the launch of a new product called Horizon Cloud Express. Cloud Express will run over Horizon’s fiber Ethernet and allow businesses to directly connect to over 300 cloud service providers.
Through their partnership with Megaport, a cloud aggregator and network provider, Horizon now offers a direct fiber Ethernet connection from a business to their cloud service providers of choice without running the service through the public internet. The product allows for a faster and more secure connection. Horizon will provision and setup the services through Megaport, in turn saving their customers time, money and reducing the risks involved when carrying cloud services over a DIA connection.
“Cloud Express will be the first of many products in our 2020 roadmap,” says Craig Drinkhall, Director of Products and Sales Engineering for Horizon. “We are seeing a huge industry shift in the migration towards Cloud Service Providers and we think now is the perfect time to offer our customers a secure direct connection that most of our competitors don’t have.”
The benefits of the Cloud Express product are significant. Greater security and low latency are achieved by moving off of the public Internet. It is far more cost and time efficient than a customer attempting to directly connect to cloud service providers on their own. Horizon customers will be able to connect to any of Megaport’s 300+ cloud service providers, such as AWS, Microsoft Azure, Salesforce, Oracle and Google, within minutes of placing an order once the port connection has been established.
“A significant focus for Horizon in 2020 is to be more innovative by developing products and services that are both synergistic to our core fiber products, and offer a high value-add to our customers and prospects,” stated Glenn Lytle, CRO for Horizon. “Our 2020 product roadmap includes a newly launched product each quarter, with Cloud Express being the first. Our stated goal is to provide best-in-class products and services backed by a customer experience that is beyond what consumers are used to receiving in our industry today.”
The launch of Cloud Express also offers one month of free service to anyone who contracts by February 28, 2020 which includes not only Cloud Express itself, but also one free month of the fiber optic Ethernet connection.
Businesses wanting to inquire about Horizon Cloud Express are asked to contact Horizon directly by phone (866) 418-8126 or request a quote online https://www.horizonconnects.com/enterprise-fiber/services/cloud-express/.
ABOUT HORIZON
Based in Columbus, Ohio, Horizon is a leading fiber-optic broadband carrier operating in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana and Michigan. The extensive network offers high speed Point-to-Point, Point-to-Multipoint, dark fiber, wavelength and data center services primarily to business customers. Horizon’s entrepreneurial heritage, dating back 125 years, and long-standing commitment to remarkable customer care, ensures its devotion to connecting customers to their worlds through the delivery of cutting-edge fiber-optic technology.
ABOUT NOVACAP
Founded in 1981, Novacap, Horizon’s owner, is a leading Canadian private equity firm with $2.6 billion of assets under management. The firm’s unique investment approach, based on deep operational expertise and an active partnership with entrepreneurs, has helped accelerate growth and create long-term value for its numerous investee companies. With an experienced management team and substantial financial resources, Novacap is well positioned to continue building world-class companies. For more information, please visit www.novacap.ca