Volantis's Ubik.com service for building mobile Internet sites will use Azure storage Credit: StockStudio / Shutterstock Scoring a customer win for Microsoft’s Windows Azure cloud platform, Volantis Systems on Tuesday is announcing that its Ubik.com online service for building mobile Internet sites will use Azure for storage. Ubik is a free service enabling small businesses and consumers to build mobile sites without having to write code. Azure storage will be provided for thousands of mobile Web sites, Volantis said. [ Find out what developers and enterprises need to know about Microsoft Azure | Earlier this year, Microsoft opened up Azure to PHP development. ] “Essentially, we’re taking our application and moving our data storage system to use Azure,” said Jeff Yee, senior director of worldwide business development at Volantis. The company previously used its own technology for storage but believes it is time to move to a scalable platform, he said. Volantis with Ubik offers a mobile Web presence on handheld devices, covering more than 6,300 handsets. Revenues are generated for Volantis via ads and integration with third-party services such as PayPal. Azure will help Volantis meet growing demands for storage of user data. Flexibility also is enabled, with Ubik being based on Ruby on Rails Web technology but still able to use Azure, Yee said. “When carriers roll out user-generated content solutions, they’re seeing growth beyond what they’ve seen with other types of systems,” Yee said. “Data requirements are enormous for user-generated content sites.” Volantis considered Amazon’s S3 platform as a storage venue but opted for Microsoft because of the Microsoft name and other opportunities presented through such a partnership, said Yee. He would not disclose how much Volantis will pay for Azure storage. As far as how easy it might be to move to another storage platform should Volantis ever see the need, Yee said he had not scoped out this issue out assumes switching would be easy. Volantis Site Builder technology is leveraged by Ubik. Site Builder enables service providers to deliver a branded portal where users can build mobile Web sites. Cloud Computing