Disclosure: I previously worked for IBM.
Back in October, IBM made an announcement about its Cloud Computing initiatives that was particularly interesting, because it illustrated efforts across different IBM divisions, and plans to respond to opportunities in the marketplace.
So far, the primary adopters of Cloud Computing have been Web 2.0 startups and some SMBs, but it seems larger enterprises are slowly moving to a more blended model of computing:
- Customers are looking for more capabilities beyond server consolidation and virtualization. They are looking to transform their data centers across different sites to “private clouds” with autonomic capabilities to leverage internal resources and capabilities more efficiently.
- Customers are starting to show demand for solutions to help bridge these “private clouds” with “public clouds” to consume services securely and reliably.
As part of its Blue Cloud, IBM has been investing a lot on new global delivery centers and technologies. In addition, IBM research cooperates on a number of projects with universities and vendors on open-source, and standards around portability and interoperability (i.e. Reservoir, OpenNebula, and Eucalyptus).
I have been a big believer in internet-based Web services since Amazon introduced S3 & Elastic Compute Cloud in 2005 (I also worked for Amazon). They deserve a lot of respect and credit for leading the industry and continued innovation. But, I think big vendors like IBM and Microsoft are needed to change the mindset of executives and influencers at the enterprise level.
So, could this be the beginning of the end of the initial euphoria - typical of early stage technologies – and maturity of Cloud Computing towards an accepted approach?
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