News From Japan: Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, IIJ

There's been a number of data center news items this week from Japan. Here's a roundup:

Mitsubishi invests in property fund.  Mitsubishi Corp. announced that it has started a real estate fund that invests in data centers, seeking to benefit from a 1.36 trillion yen ($17 Billion) market amid rising demand after the March earthquake. The 25.8 billion yen ($336 million) fund was started by Mitsubishi unit Diamond Realty Management and includes investments from domestic institutional investors and pension funds.  The market for data centers is likely to expand 8 percent this fiscal year and may reach 1.9 trillion yen by March 2016, according to a report by Tokyo-based MIC Research Institute Ltd. Last month Japan's Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) was evaluating a plan to sell its data center holdings, including the @Tokyo 1.4 million square foot data center.

Fujitsu launches analytical simulations cloud service.  Fujitsu announced the launch of a new cloud service for analytical simulations in the area of technical computing called TC Cloud. TC Cloud is comprised of an Analytical Platform Service for conducting analytical simulations, an Analytical Applications service, and an Analytical Help Desk for assistance in setting up and running analytical simulations. Geared towards the manufacturing sector, the new service enables customers to optimize their computational resources by allowing them to quickly scale their resources up or down in accordance with fluctuations in their need to run analyses. Features of the Analytical Platform Service include the ability to create hybrid environments that combine the computational resources of the customer with those of the TC Cloud, navigation of large-volume analytic results, and it delivers the reliability and operational continuity of Fujitsu's data centers.

IIJ sees strong growth and plans further investments.  Internet Initiative Japan (IIJ) announced first quarter 2011 financial results, with a 47.7 percent year-on-year revenue growth. Operating income was 915 million Yen ($11 million), up 244.2 percent due to consolidated subsidiary IIJ-Global and revenues were 23,362 million Yen ($290 million). “In addition to the contributions for IJJ-Global, we have seen continuous growth in our overall business, including systems integration, despite the weakened Japanese economic momentum after the 11 March earthquake," said Koichi Suzuki, President and CEO of IIJ. IIJ will continue to invest in cloud computing-related facilities such as the Matsue Data Center and others due to the strong demand for cloud that they have seen. "For the coming quarters, we expect our outsourcing services and cloud computing-related services to grow steadily. We will continue to be best positioned as one of the leading total network solutions provider in Japan for those in need for network service, outsourcing service and systems integration," Suzuki said.