Cloud solutions have become a given in companies: Hardly any firm would want forgo spontaneous availability, flexible payment models and sheer endless scalability. Even in Germany, where companies have been relatively cautious for a long time, the cloud has become part of everyday life – but only under one condition: According to a recent study by KPMG and Bitkom, almost all companies (97 percent) describe GDPR compliance as an absolute must-have when choosing their cloud provider.

Jan Baksa Lesjak is also familiar with the particular sensitivity of German companies. He initially used his own IT resources, but for the German market, he is now relying on the Open Telekom Cloud. How did this happen? The owner of 42DBS, a subsidiary of the Slovenian Zejn Group, recently planned to expand the company’s ShakeSpeare software suite to Germany. Its solutions support companies in digitalizing certain work steps, such as digitally signing invoices or powers of attorney or managing documents, such as client files, online – even when on the move; its customers are mainly from the banking, healthcare and legal sectors. "Our software helps companies to minimize risks and errors, increase efficiency and better observe compliance rules," says managing director Baksa Lesjak.

Until July 2017, the company had offered its solutions exclusively in Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia and Austria, using its own servers. In order to also conquer the German market, Baksa Lesjak was looking for a cloud solution that would best meet the demands of German companies. "Data protection is our top priority," says Baksa Lesjak, whose company now has an office in Munich. "Our customers include those from industries that work with extremely sensitive documents.” The ShakeSpeare software processes ten million sensitive documents a day on behalf of its customers, including invoices, powers of attorney, credit and legal files or entire client files. To ensure that the company could also offer this in Germany, the new cloud solution for 42DBS had to prove itself unconditionally when it came to data protection and data security.

Baksa Lesjak, with 42DBS, was the perfect candidate for Telekom's Solution Partner Program. The aim of the program is to help IT service providers such as 42DBS and their customers transfer to the cloud. Telekom helps them make their existing offerings cloud-ready, provides technical and sales support for their partners, trains them and provides individual support for the implementation of their projects.

Since then, as part of the Solution Partner Program, 42DBS has been using computing resources from the Open Telekom Cloud, which is hosted in the multiple-certified and highly secure data centers in Magdeburg and Biere. 42DBS now uses an average of two virtual machines from the Memory Optimized Flavor, each with 32 GB RAM and four vCPUs, to operate its software solution. If required, 42DBS can flexibly add IT resources.

With this highly secure cloud basis, 42DBS is now attracting more and more customers in Germany. For example, the IT system house Digatus: Instead of continuing to stack files, Digatus has digitalized its entire accounting system with 42DBS, all processes now run online – from validation to payment. "The fact that such a solution saves time and money is obvious," says Managing Director Alexander Tobias of Digatus IT-Services. "The most important thing for us was that IT security and data protection were guaranteed at the highest level at all times. With the 42DBS solution based on the Open Telekom Cloud, we have now found exactly such a solution."

42DBS currently offers four software solutions, including ones for quality management and back-office management. But it won’t stay that way for long. Baksa Lesjak wants to continue to extend the digital services for his customers. Even though 42DBS already has a lot on offer for the legal sector, such as the ShakeSpeare Legal solution, Baksa Lesjak sees further potential here: "There is still a lot to digitalize. For example, we would like to offer a solution for courts and insolvency registers. After the positive start, we will continue to rely on the Open Telekom cloud.”