IBM is getting in the cloud. After a string of announcements over the past few weeks from Citrix, Red Hat, VMware, Cisco and Hewlett-Packard, Big Blue is launching an initiative to extend its traditional software delivery model toward a mix of on-premise and cloud-computing applications with new software, services and technical resources for clients and independent software vendors (ISVs).
As IBM sees it, businesses face a unique set of challenges as they look to grow in a globally integrated economy. The company described a perfect storm of data deluge, a fluid regulatory environment, and widening gaps in IT skills that add more cost pressures to resource-strapped organizations. Part of the answer, IBM says, is cloud computing.
“We are moving our clients, the industry, and even IBM itself to have a mixture of data and applications that live in the data center and in the cloud,” said Willy Chiu, vice president of high-performance on-demand solutions at IBM.
A Four-Pronged Approach
Chiu said feedback from the business world inspired IBM’s four-pronged cloud strategy, which includes delivering its own cloud-services portfolio; helping ISVs design, build, deliver and market cloud services; helping clients integrate cloud services into their business; and providing cloud-computing environments to businesses.
As part of its initiative, IBM is launching a free, open beta for Bluehouse, its Web-based social-networking and collaboration cloud service that aims to help professionals work together securely. Lotus Sametime Unyte is also on IBM’s cloud to let businesses communicate in real time with a worldwide network of employees, partners and consumers.
IBM is also offering Rational Policy Tester OnDemand. Big Blue said the software helps reduce online risks by automating Web-content scanning to isolate privacy, quality and accessibility compliance issues.
Meanwhile, Rational AppScan OnDemand scans Web applications for security bugs, and Telelogic Focal Point helps product-management teams collect, analyze and…