(Yicai Global) July 4 -- Inspur, China's biggest server maker, is taking aim at the industrial cloud market for small and medium-sized enterprises in the southern province of Guangdong and will offer discounts worth CNY50 million (USD8 million) over the next three years.

The Shandong-based firm officially released its industrial cloud platform in Guangdong at an event yesterday and aims to set up a local headquarters to accelerate the supply of its services in the province.

The discounts are not only a method to reduce service fees, but more importantly, to attract enterprises to experience the advantages of the platform, Chief Executive Yuan Yisheng told Yicai Global, adding that software developers and information technology service providers will make up a key target segment.

"We need to let these developers learn the value of cloud so they will be willing to upload their applications," he said. "Then, their enterprise customers will naturally adopt cloud as well to reduce their operating costs, which is why are reducing service fees and developing partners."

Guangdong's strong internet infrastructure makes the province a key market for Inspur, Yuan said, adding a strong internet awareness among locals and increasing digital transformation strategies among firms further boost prospects.

The server maker is also buoyed by local government efforts to encourage enterprises to use cloud services. Guangdong provincial government signed cooperative agreements with four public Cloud service providers – Inspur, Alibaba Group, Tencent and Huawei – as well as the country's big three telecoms operators, aimed at jointly promoting the adoption of cloud to reduce costs.

Few Guangdong enterprises use new technologies such as cloud and big data at present, leading to a potential room for market growth, Yuan added.

In the future, Inspur will offer service models such as pay-on-demand as well as service rental and leasing to provide modularized, low-cost and fast-deployment application services to different industries, while building a public and industrial cloud ecosystem.

Editor: William Clegg