China-US partnerships important steps in cloud strategy

United States tech multinationals rushed to grab Chinese partners during President Xi Jinping's US trip on Thursday, hopping to get more government procurement deals in China.

Microsoft Corp and its Chinese cloud computing partner 21Vianet will partner with State-owned information technology company Unisplendour, targeting government and SOE customers.

In a separate partnership deal, the world's largest software provider agreed to let Baidu Inc provide Internet search services on its latest operating system Windows 10 in China, replacing its own Bing.

Harry Shum, Microsoft's executive vice-president directing technology and research, told China Daily the team-ups were an important step to execute cloud strategy in China. He added a deeper cooperation on technology development will also kick off.

Cisco Systems Inc also tied up with Jinan-based technology firm Inspur Group to build a joint venture on IT infrastructure. After losing a number of critical customers to Chinese vendors such as Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, Cisco is betting on local partnerships to secure more customers in the government procurement sector.

Kitty Fok, director at research firm IDC China, said overseas tech giants are actively finding new ways to maintain their presence in the world's third-largest IT market amid robust growth of local competitors and regulatory barriers on data security.

"Joining hands with a local company could help (the US companies) access the lucrative government procurement market," said Fok