Deutsche Telekom and Google Cloud have expanded their partnership, extending the agreement to 2030.
This will see Google Cloud become Deutsche Telekom's preferred partner for migrating "key business areas" to the cloud, including the development of the One Data Ecosystem (ODE), an AI-integrated platform that will consolidate Deutsche Telekom's on-premises data systems.
The company will also use Vertex AI to develop, deploy, and scale AI applications based on Google's Gemini models. Increased access to computing power is hoped to help Deutsche Telekom better meet customer needs.
Stefan Schloter, CIO Europe at Deutsche Telekom, said: “Deutsche Telekom is becoming an AI-first company. By leveraging data and AI, we are improving agility and optimizing digital solutions across all our business entities, software engineering, and customer interfaces to deliver superior experiences for our customers.
"Our collaboration with Google Cloud further strengthens these efforts, driving innovation and efficiency. Examples like Deutsche Telekom’s core SAP systems migrating to GCP or the MyMagenta app using Google’s Gemini Multimodal Live API, highlight the strength of our partnership. We look forward to expanding our collaboration further."
“Communications service providers are increasingly looking to the cloud to further develop service offerings and drive innovation, flexibility, and growth,” added Marianne Janik, VP, EMEA North, Google Cloud. “We look forward to collaborating with Deutsche Telekom to help the company further develop innovative solutions that provide enhanced experiences for end users.”
Deutsche Telekom and Google previously worked together, along with Deutsche's T-Systems, to establish a sovereign cloud offering in Germany in 2021. The sovereign cloud is available as a "Supervised Cloud" offering, which is physically operated by T-Systems and kept separate from other Google Cloud infrastructure.
It's also available as a "Hosted Cloud," which is designed for users with the highest sovereignty requirements and based on the Google Distributed Cloud, which enables it to be air-gapped and can't be operated from a customer data center or T-Systems facility.
The following year, Deutsche announced that it would be hosting its 5G core on Google Cloud, with T-Systems set to manage and operate the Google Cloud services in Germany.
T-Systems' core data centers are located in Magdeburg and Biere, Germany, and the company has 16 total data centers with 130MW of capacity. In October 2024, Deutsche Telekom and T-Systems announced plans to expand its data center footprint with five additional locations.
Google has cloud regions in Frankfurt and Berlin in Germany, launching in 2017 and 2023, respectively. Towards the end of 2024, the cloud giant teamed up with StackIT to use the latter's sovereign storage option for Google customers.
Other telcos known to be customers of Google Cloud include Finland's DNA, part of Telenor Group, and Orange.
