Verizon Communications has served notice to its customers that it is to pull the plug on its public cloud offering.

The news emerged as security researcher Kenn White used Twitter to publish a copy of a customer communication sent from Verizon Communications, which warned client that Verizon will ‘discontinue its Public Cloud, Reserve Performance and Marketplace services on April the 12th. As an alternative, Verizon said it will offer Virtual Private Cloud which, it says, provides the cost effectiveness of a multi tenant public cloud but includes added levels of configuration, control and support. It claims this will improve isolation and control for more advanced businesses.

When Verizon shuts down the virtual servers currently running Public Cloud and Reserved Performance, no data or content will be retained, it told customers, warning that without prior transfer to the discontinuation their data would be permanently deleted.

Virtual Private Cloud is the service that Verizon intends to carry on offering to the enterprise market and Verizon said it is making significant investments in the enterprise cloud platform in 2016.

In January BCN reported that Verizon was examining its options for selling its global estate of 48 data centres. Verizon would reportedly expect to raise over $2.5 billion and streamline its business. Currently its colocation portfolio generates $275 million a year. Other telcos such as AT&T, CenturyLink and Windstream have also divested themselves of their data centres businesses in recent years.

According to channel publication CRN Verizon could work with Google to cater for the increasing demand for hybrid cloud systems among enterprise customers, with a Verizon-branded hybrid service running on Google’s public cloud a possibility. This would obviate the need for Verizon having its own public cloud offering. Neither party has confirmed or denied the speculation about their alleged partnership.