October 7, 2008 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- Technology giant IBM (www.ibm.com), which further expanded its cloud computing initiative a couple of weeks ago by opening four new cloud centers in emerging markets, announced on Monday it has launched new cloud-enabled services to help companies more easily adopt cloud computing models for the purposes of better managing data, lowering operational costs and simplifying collaboration across the enterprise.
According to the company's most recent announcement, this is a company-wide initiative IBM is pushing to further expand enterprise computing from the traditional software delivery model towards a mix of on-premise and cloud computing applications.
"Everybody is trying to define cloud computing," says Willy Chiu, VP of high performance on demand solutions at IBM. "Ultimately, cloud computing will take off when companies can utilize data, applications and services from any device and from any location. We are moving our clients, the industry and even IBM itself to have a mixture of data and applications that live on the data center and on the cloud."
IBM says it is launching its cloud-enabled services portfolio with new Lotus, Rational and Telelogic software, and offering independent software vendors new technical and marketing resources to enable them to build and sell their applications in a cloud-enabled service model.
Specifically, the new offerings include Bluehouse (http://bluehouse.lotus.com), the "industry's first online social networking and collaboration service designed for business;" Lotus Sametime Unyte, IBM's first software product designed for delivery as a service via cloud computing, which quickly and easily arranges Web conferences including the sharing of documents, presentations or applications, regardless of location or Web connection; IBM Rational Policy Tester On Demand, which helps reduce online risks by automating Web content scanning to isolate issues; IBM Rational AppScan On Demand, which efficiently scans Web apps for security bugs; and Telelogic Focal Point, which is described as "visualization, prioritization, planning, and analysis software' that helps product managers and business analysts set the scope of product and IT delivery based on objective requirements.
IBM has also released a technical roadmap, based on open standards and services oriented architecture, to help application developers build interoperable, cloud-based applications and services within a company?s existing IT infrastructure.
The technology giant says it is also on track to double its Software as a Service Speciality partner ecosystem in 2008, bringing the total number of partners offering SaaS solutions using IBM technology to over 200.
Some recent changes to the program include a new series of white papers, online demos and downloadable code, new marketing resources and a new SaaS Enablement Network of infrastructure providers who use IBM server technology.
Considering the tremendous growth we've seen thus far in IBM's cloud computing initiative, the company says throughout 2008 and 2009, the industry can expect to see even more focus put into helping companies adopt cloud computing models. Throughout the year, IBM says it will add cloud-enabled services specialists to its 13 cloud computing centers and 40 IBM Innovation Centers around the world to help with this initiative.
Qualified clients and partners also can take advantage of special financing on all cloud-enabled services with no payments until 2009 through IBM Global Financing
To date, IBM says it has dedicated more than 200 full-time researchers and over $100 million over three years in cloud computing.
IBM launched its version of cloud computing "Blue Cloud" in November 2007 and describes it as "a collection of enabling technologies that is used to create cloud computing experiences for customers in data center, hosting service and other cloud environments."
