Microsoft has applied for permission from the New Zealand government's Overseas Investment Office to acquire sites to build its first Azure region in the country, the company announced.
Storing customer data at rest in New Zealand along with meeting users' security and compliance needs are cited by Microsoft as the drivers for establishing the new region.
Cloud services to be provided from the New Zealand region include the full Azure offering with compute, storage, artificial intelligence and databases, the Microsoft 365 productivity suite, and the Dynamics 365 and Power Platform.
As part of the OIO application, Microsoft said it will add support for educational and training programs for New Zealanders.
Details such as the number and size of data centres to be built and their locations were not revealed by Microsoft. iTnews will update the story if and when the information becomes available.
Microsoft operates four Azure regions in Australia, which serve New Zealand customers including the Fonterra milk cooperative, telco incumbent Spark NZ and the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research.
Worldwide, Microsoft has 58 Azure regions in 140 countries.
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