Many analysts have been extremely critical of IBM (News - Alert)'s lack of foresight regarding cloud technology. The company's reliance on its hardware is partly responsible for its late entrance in the cloud marketplace, which is currently being dominated by Amazon Web Services (News - Alert) (AWS) followed by others. Although IBM is playing catch-up, its knowledge base, strategic partnerships and available capital is allowing it to acquire key assets that are rapidly increasing its presence in cloud technology. The latest partnership is with Actifio, a copy data virtualization platform provider, and Completel, a French operator in the FTTO (Fiber to the Office) network, to launch a SmartCloud data virtualization (SCDV) service.
The SCDV service is part of IBM's portfolio of cloud enterprise solutions that will enable customers to decouple their application data from their physical infrastructure. With this solution, business applications can be supported by virtualizing data management with a single physical copy to create multiple virtual copies. The partnership allows SCDV to leverage the Virtual Data Pipeline technology from Actifio to manage critical data without the complication and expense associated with managing excess copies.
Unlike traditional systems, SCDV customers will be able to improve data center utilization, reclaim production storage capacity and quickly recover critical servers, which lower the cost of ownership. Using cloud-based recovery services provides higher degrees of resiliency with faster response, translating into recovery times measured in minutes instead of hours.
"IBM’s SmartCloud Data Virtualization combines the power of Actifio’s data virtualization platform with IBM’s Resiliency technology and operational reliability,” said Laurence Guihard-Joly (News - Alert), General Manager for IBM’s Business Continuity and Resiliency Services. “As part of our growing portfolio of cloud software, services and expertise that help clients tackle any IT or business challenge with confidence, security and trust, SCDV will not only offer many customers faster recovery times at better price points, it will enable them to leverage their protected data as a business asset rather than simply an insurance policy."
The collaboration with Completel also includes the signing of Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) to deploy a high-speed cloud by tying Completel's network infrastructure and IBM’s SoftLayer (News - Alert) Cloud Computing. The partnership between the two companies will take advantage of their combined assets to provide public and private companies, including small and medium enterprises and industries (SME/SMI) and partners (Independent Software Vendors, Systems Integrators) in France with the tools they need to stay competitive in today's digital environment.
With 16 acquisitions of cloud-related assets totaling more than $7 billion since 2007, as well as the $6 billion it spends annually in R&D, IBM is a force to be reckoned with as it continues to grab market shares in cloud-related products and services. The company has 1,560 cloud patents and 40 data centers around the world to provide its customers with cloud solutions.
Edited by Rory J. Thompson