IBM Builds Up its Cloud Offering

Abstract

In June 2009, IBM announced yet another string of Cloud computing-related offerings. More will follow. They are key deliverables in IBM' s cautious, pragmatic progression into the cloud.

Table of Contents

• EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
• In a Nutshell
• SWOT analysis
• Strengths
• Weaknesses
• Opportunities
• Threats
• A workload-centric approach to cloud computing
• Three new offerings
• One platform and two (private and public) clouds
• Moving to the cloud one workload at a time
• Showcasing as well as structuring IBM' s cloud portfolio
• A work in progress
• A cloud offering centred on development or test workloads, or both
• Based on IBM software delivery services for the cloud
• Staggered delivery across all Smart Business systems and services
• It will take some time to mature
• Expansion beyond development and test
• Low-risk workload, impressive rewards
• Virtualised desktop workloads
• Only on public and private clouds
• Desktop-as-a-service (DaaS)
• An offering with an agenda
• A service management-centric approach to cloud computing
• Service management is key
• Becoming an efficient service provider
• The ‘secret sauce'
• The sauce, not the main dish
• Across all three new offerings
• Overall offering: Service Management Centre for Cloud Computing
• ‘Smart Business' offering gets a specific software bundle
• Self-service online catalogue
• Key element for the integrated service management offering
• SME and large enterprise catalogues to converge
• How the offerings will evolve
• Each cloud offering has its own set of challenges
• IBM CloudBurst: in line with IBM' s overall approach to systems
• Dynamic infrastructure for clouds
• Approached from a variety of perspectives
• From data centres to private clouds
• IBM builds on its service capabilities
• Signposting the way to private clouds
• From private to public clouds
• Public cloud offering: high profile but not yet beta
• A hybrid approach to the cloud
• An IaaS offering focused on workloads
• Potential to challenge other IaaS offerings
• May become PaaS in the future

List of Figures

• Figure 1: Cloud computing foundations versus workloads