Asustek enters race on Cloud services

Taiwan’s Asustek Computer Inc, known foremost for making laptops, says it is branching out into Cloud computing services as it seeks to keep up in a highly competitive technology market.

The world’s fifth-largest personal-computer maker said it focused on security as it unveiled its Asus Private Cloud package of motherboards, servers and software…

Company officials said it would let institutions share confidential information among staff members without the risk of security breaches that might occur in public clouds.

"We found that a lot of businesses were afraid of the security problem," vice president Jonathan Tseng said, adding that the private Cloud system could be accessed on devices ranging from desktop computers to mobile phones.

Taipei-based Asustek’s private Cloud is now available in Taiwan only but the company plans a push into China and Hong Kong from next year.

The term private Cloud generally refers to computing and data storage united on the internet for a limited number of people, such as a group of employees, who use the services from behind a firewall.