In a raft of announcements underscoring the importance of the cloud to its future, Microsoft has unveiled partnerships with Fujitsu and Dell and an expanded alliance with HP.

 

Microsoft said at its Worldwide Partner Conference that its partnership with Fujitsu will enable the Japanese IT firm to deploy Microsoft’s Windows Azure platform in its data centers.

 

Fujitsu will deliver system integration, cloud migration and managed services to customers and independent software vendors, Microsoft announced. 

 

The new Fujitsu cloud services and solutions, based on the Windows Azure platform, will be available in Fujitsu’s Japan data centers by the end of 2010.

 

“As a result of the expanded partnership between Fujitsu and Microsoft, customers will be able to easily address new business scenarios that require rapid scaling of applications and obtain services that are predictable and immediately consumable,” Microsoft said.