Alibaba and SoftBank have announced a new joint venture targeting Japan’s competitive cloud computing market.

阿里巴巴(Alibaba)和软银(SoftBank)宣布成立一家新的合资公司，瞄准日本竞争激烈的云计算市场。

The new company, SB Cloud Corporation, will open a new data centre in Japan and plans to provide public cloud computing services from the Chinese e-commerce conglomerate’s Alibaba Cloud subsidiary, according to an announcement by the companies.

这两家公司的公告称，名为SB Cloud Corporation的新公司将在日本开设一个新的数据中心，通过这家中国电商企业集团的子公司阿里云(Alibaba Cloud)，提供公共云计算服务。

In 2016 Japan ranked second among top markets for global cloud services according to a case study by the US Department of Commerce’s International Trade Administration. Despite an established market of local competitors, the administration noted that Japan “has no current trade barriers that offer preference to domestic cloud providers.”

美国商务部国际贸易局的一份案例研究显示，2016年，日本是全球第二大云计算服务市场。该局指出，尽管那是一个国内公司相互竞争的成熟市场，但日本“目前并不存在偏向于国内云服务供应商的行业壁垒。”

SoftBank is a major shareholder in Alibaba and will hold a 60 per cent share of the new company.

软银是阿里巴巴的一个大股东，将持有新公司60%的股权。

Sicheng Yu, vice president at Alibaba Cloud, said: We are proud that Alibaba Cloud can leverage its cloud computing expertise in the joint venture with SoftBank. We look forward to helping more Japanese companies grow their business with our secure, scalable and innovative cloud computing services.

阿里云副总裁喻思成说：阿里云将在与软银的这家合资企业中运用自己的云计算专业能力，我们对此感到自豪。我们期待着利用我们安全、可扩展和创新的云计算服务，帮助更多日本企业实现业务增长。