The Champions League trophy. Photo credit: Felipe Loyola/Flickr.

UEFA, the administrative and controlling body for European football, has signed a three year cloud computing deal with service provider Interoute.

The Switzerland-headquartered governing body will be using cloud solutions from Interoute, a UK-based enterprise platform provider, to host its website and business applications. Together they will create Europe’s largest private cloud.

The cloud services will be deployed in order to help with the online running of all UEFA’s tournaments over the next three years, including the annual Champions League competition and the European Championships in 2012.

UEFA’s existing Football Administration and Management Environment (FAME), which will now be moved to the cloud, is its core IT platform. The FAME platform hosts the sites which deliver the latest news and information on all of UEFA’s tournaments as well as its commercial partnerships and media booking opportunities.

UEFA expects its website to receive 400 million hits during next summer’s European Championship and will also have to cope with people visiting the site to book tickets when they go on sale prior to the competition.

By using Interoute’s multiple servers, UEFA will be able to handle the dramatic increase in traffic it experiences on its website UEFA.com during its larger competitions. This includes hosting video highlights, match reviews and tournament information – all of which are in very high demand while the competitions are being played.

Gareth Williams, CEO at Interoute, said: “It is a huge endorsement of the quality of Interoute’s organisation, infrastructure and technical expertise that UEFA will rely on it to bring all the latest competition results and information to fans around the world, as well as underpinning online ticket sales and organisational applications.

“With the public-facing IT behind Europe’s most prestigious football being hosted in Europe’s largest private cloud, fans can expect a great experience from every click as well as every match.”

Daniel Marion, UEFA information and communications technology head, shared Williams’ optimism about the deal. “In Interoute,” Marion said, “we have found a partner who can match the high levels of performance and quality that UEFA and its competitions stand for.”