Microsoft has announced that they are preparing an expansion of the Microsoft Cloud from the existing two datacenters in Ireland and the Netherlands, with an additional regional datacenter in the United Kingdom. Microsoft Azure and Office 365 services is expected to be generally available from the new datacenter in last part of 2016. The Dynamics CRM Online service is expected to follow shortly after.
Around the same timeframe, Microsoft Cloud services is expected to be available in Germany, which will grant Microsoft a significant advantage by making it the first hyper-scale cloud provider to comply with German data protection legislation, effectively shielding the data from access requests from US government agencies. The cloud services will be provided through a partnership with Deutsche Telekom, and based on two new datacenters in Frankfurt am Main and Magdeburg. Both will provide Microsoft Azure, Office 365, and Dynamics CRM Online cloud services for German and European customers, specifically addressing organizations and enterprises operating in data-sensitive areas such as the public, financial or health sector, which must comply with the most stringent privacy regulations, like the German data handling regulations.
Most recently Microsoft have announced that they have completed an expansion of the current datacenter in Ireland and have started delivering services from a datacenter in Middenmeer, the Netherlands. Both datacenters have expanded the capabilities for delivering Microsoft Azure, Office 365 and Dynamics CRM Online for customers across Europe, Middle East and Africa.