IBM Beefs Up Public Cloud Services for Enterprises

IBM has expanded its public cloud services for enterprise IT customers, announcing new SmartCloud offerings, including its entry into the Platform as a Service market, tools to run enterprise applications from SAP and the integration of cloud storage technology from Nirvanix.

The new services are part of a continuing push into cloud services that IBM says will result in more than 200 million users on its SmartCloud technology by the end of 2012.

"Enterprise clients are much more conservative because their revenue, reputation and supply chain are closely related to the performance and security of their infrastructure,” said Erich Clementi, Senior Vice President, IBM. “Our focus with SmartCloud is to bring the benefits of this model in a way that supports enterprise level service, leverages existing investments and opens new doors to productivity and innovation.”

SmartCloud Application Serviced Unveiled

IBM's new platform as a service (PaaS) offering, IBM SmartCloud Application Services (SCAS), will be available in beta this year, and offer enterprise–grade security, open Java and cross-platform support, and managed services to enable development and deployment of applications to the cloud.

The SCAS will run on IBM’s SmartCloud Enterprise and Enterprise+ - the industry’s first enterprise class infrastructure-as-a-platform - and offer "business centric" service level agremeents (SLAs).

IBM says it has also added services for automating the most common tasks associated with managing SAP environments in the cloud. The SmartCloud for SAP Applications leverages IBM’s experience in managing over 1.5 million users of SAP to significantly reduce the cost and labor associated with SAP cloning, refreshes and patching.

Nirvanix Storage Now Part of SmartCloud

IBM is unveiling new storage-as-a-service offerings from Nirvanix as part of the IBM SmartCloud portfolio. With the integration of Nirvanix cloud storage technology, IBM’s SmartCloud storage services will provide customers with a solution capable of supporting millions of users, billions of objects and exabytes of data to complement IBM’s existing secure, virtual server environments in the cloud.

“Nirvanix’s cloud storage services offer the advanced, production-grade cloud storage capabilities that are built on experience with hundreds of enterprises,” said Jan Jackman, Vice President, Global Cloud Services, IBM. “The company’s presence and strong adoption in leading Fortune 500 corporations makes its cloud storage technology ideally suited to IBM’s global customer base.”

“We look forward to teaming with IBM in the enterprise cloud storage space and cooperatively enhancing our leading cloud storage service for the most demanding IBM global customers,” said Scott Genereux, President and CEO of Nirvanix. “Today’s announcement marks an important step in accomplishing Nirvanix’s strategic goals of capturing cloud storage market share and accelerating revenue growth.”

While expanding its public cloud offerings, IBM is announcing SmartCloud Foundation private cloud solutions to help companies design and deploy private cloud environments. Big Blue will also offer a Cloud Migration Service for hosting and application on demand clients in the U.S., and is announcing a commitment to the business partner community to help them quickly ramp up and participate in the industry shift to cloud computing by making it easier for them to deliver enterprise-grade public and private cloud solutions to clients.