OREANDA-NEWS. CenturyLink, Inc. has received the 2016 Asia Pacific Hybrid IT Strategy Award for the second consecutive year from Frost & Sullivan, a global growth consulting firm. The award, based on Frost & Sullivan's in-depth research and careful evaluation, recognizes CenturyLink's outstanding ability to deliver an integrated and comprehensive hybrid IT portfolio that includes cloud, colocation, managed hosting, network and managed services to meet rising demands for highly automated, efficient, reliable and flexible IT services.

According to Frost & Sullivan, hybrid IT is fast becoming the new normal across organizations in Asia Pacific. The increased utilization of data centers and cloud services in Asia Pacific has led to a gradual update or upgrade of companies' existing IT systems, which is giving rise to the hybrid IT environment. An enhanced customer experience and greater focus on business model innovation is also driving service providers to accelerate their pace of service innovation.

CenturyLink is a leading global hybrid IT solutions provider that powers the needs of 98 per cent of Fortune 500 companies. Frost & Sullivan analysts determined that CenturyLink's leadership in product innovation, coupled with a sound marketing and business development strategy, brought it to the top of the pack.

Sandeep Bazaz, Industry Analyst, Digital Transformation, Asia Pacific at Frost & Sullivan, said that CenturyLink has continued to invest in developing enterprise-class solutions to better serve the changing needs of business and also improve its service portfolio by acquiring companies in service lines of managed services, disaster recovery, cloud application management and database as a service. CenturyLink also provides cost-effective solutions and a strong partner ecosystem that has helped grow its customer base in the Asia Pacific region.

Last year, Frost & Sullivan also presented CenturyLink with the Company of the Year Award for the North American Cloud Industry, in addition to the Asia Pacific Hybrid IT Strategy Award.

"Frost & Sullivan's continued recognition is a clear testimony to CenturyLink's relentless pursuit of excellence and innovative capabilities to meet and exceed the expectations of our customers," said Gery Messer, managing director, Asia Pacific, CenturyLink. "We have a strong team and the right assets in place to help our customers embark and progress on their hybrid IT journey."

CenturyLink's increased commitment to Asia Pacific is reflected in the launch of the CenturyLink Cloud platform in Australia and its exclusive business partnership to provide advanced hosting and managed IT services to enterprises in India (Nxtra Data) earlier this year.