March 16, 2010 – [@PR2WEB] - IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced plans to go online with its commercial cloud service for software development and test. IBM, which already delivers a test and development cloud for internal use, is now allowing enterprise and government clients to extend their environments on an IBM Cloud. Following a successful beta program, IBM is working with partners in cloud management, cloud security and software development and testing support to provide businesses with a unique mix of flexibility, scalability, enterprise-grade security and control for development and test on the IBM Cloud. 

The average enterprise devotes up to 50 percent of its entire technology infrastructure to development and test, but typically up to 90 percent of it remains idle. IBM has seen that taking advantage of cloud computing within development and testing environments can help reduce IT labor costs by 50 percent, improve quality and drastically reduce time to market.

IBM’s new Smart Business Development & Test on the IBM Cloud allows enterprise clients to expand on internal development and test efforts with instant access to resources through IBM’s secure, scalable cloud delivery model, IBM software and application lifecycle management capabilities. IBM’s enterprise-friendly approach to cloud complements clients’ current data centers and traditional development efforts, helping clients:
·        Reduce provision cycle times from weeks to minutes
·        Eliminate software defects by up to 30 percent.
·        Reduce time required for test and quality assurance
·        Enable rapid redeployment of environments across multiple IT projects

PayPal, a global payments provider and e-commerce enabler, is extending its e-wallet Adaptive Payment services into the cloud. Paypal is allowing its ecosystem of developers to not only innovate on the IBM cloud, but to quickly monetize upon the new applications developed and made available via smart phones.  “We want to provide a very simple way to make payments available on all platforms including mobile applications,” said Osama Bedier, VP of PayPal's Platform Business Unit and Emerging Technologies.  “The IBM cloud provides a great platform for developers to come together as a community, to create, develop and test new applications. It’s been a great collaboration with the IBM Cloud Labs in our innovation journey.”

The Collaborative Software Initiative is an organization that engages the power of communities to develop and deliver high value enterprise software. A participant in the commercial cloud Beta program, CSI used the IBM Cloud to develop an innovative new education portal for the U.S. Department of Education, which will be used by thousands of experts to submit ideas for how to make our education system more effective. “We used IBM's cloud environment to create this project for the Department of Health because of its focus on open technology,” said Evan Bauer, CTO, The Collaborative Software Initiative.

Partner Ecosystem
IBM is building an ecosystem of partners to deliver the most complete and comprehensive cloud computing solutions to clients. This ecosystem comprises existing and new cloud partners in the IT industry Intend to work with IBM and complement the IBM Cloud in key areas. For example, RightScale and Kaavo can help customers manage and provision cloud resources to facilitate more effective deployment of applications and workloads in the cloud, while Navajo Systems can provide additional security for cloud-based applications and Silanis’ e-signature process management can enables secure e-transactions and e-contracts. Aviarc, Wavemaker and Corent can enable development of applications on the cloud, which can be load and performance tested by SOASTA CloudTest -- or manual, functional, and compatibility testing in VMLogix -- all taking advantage of the IBM Cloud.

IBM Business Partner and IBM software delivery services beta participant, Trinity Software, works with federal government agencies and clients faced with complex IT administration scenarios and mandatory requirements for compliance and security when developing in the cloud. “Our customers often have barriers to scalability and limited resources for deploying quickly,” said Russell Stanley, principle quality management engineer, Trinity Software Solutions, “IBM Rational’s software delivery services for cloud computing can be internal or external and scaled to fit on demand, while streamlining testing with minimal overhead. With the additional reduction of risk IBM enables in the cloud, we can prioritize quality.”

New Developer Tools and Resources
Today, IBM is also introducing new Rational software delivery lifecycle solutions in the cloud. Rational Software Delivery Services for Cloud Computing v1.0, includes a collection of Rational’s marketing leading products and capabilities helping clients harness the agility and flexibility of the cloud. Development and delivery teams can more effectively collaborate and quickly develop, test, and deploy new technology-based business initiatives.

Additionally, IBM is launching a new, online cloud computing resource center on IBM developerWorks, the industry's largest technical resource with 8 million registered developers, IT professionals, and students worldwide.  The new developerWorks Cloud Computing resources provide a single point of entry to beta and production cloud environments, as well as a place for visitors to learn how to make the most of cloud computing initiatives.  The new resource center will include cloud articles, videos, blogs and hands-on virtual workshops for IT professionals new to cloud or interested in developing cloud infrastructures or applications. developerWorks will host cloud-focused forums and online communities and provide no-charge access to IBM software to help developers get started.

In 2010, IBM also will begin a new series of cloud computing workshops at its 40 worldwide IBM Innovation Centers to support ISV business partners seeking cloud skills.

Development & Test for Private Clouds and on the IBM Cloud
IBM understands that not every kind of computing task will move to a cloud environment, so the company is helping clients identify cloud computing opportunities by workload. Some workloads will remain on premise due to security, data or compliance restraints but others are ripe for external cloud environments, including development and test.

IBM has offered a private cloud solution for development and test since June 2009, and now offers development and test services in three flexible delivery models:

·        IBM CloudBurst for Development & Test – a pre-integrated set of hardware, storage, virtualization and networking, with a sophisticated built-in service management system to allow clients to rapidly deploy an internal/private cloud environment.

·        IBM Smart Business Development & Test Cloud – a private cloud service behind the client’s firewall, built and managed by IBM.  The service now includes enhanced capabilities for collaborative cloud development using Rational Software Delivery Services for Cloud Computing.

·        IBM Smart Business Development & Test on the IBM Cloud – application development and test featuring Rational Software Delivery Services for Cloud Computing over IBM’s secure, scalable cloud.
“Workload characteristics continue to drive the rate and degree of standardization of IT and business services,” said Rich Esposito, vice president, IT Strategy & Architecture and Middleware Services, IBM. “Standardization is key to bringing discipline, efficiency and simplicity to the most complex corners of big businesses.”

For clients who need help determining workload and delivery model choices, IBM delivers Cloud Infrastructure Strategy and Design Services. Based on proven methodologies and intellectual property earned through more than 100 client engagements and first-of-a-kind cloud projects, these integrated design services give clients a ready-to-build blueprint for cloud. The services are integrated into IBM’s private workload optimized clouds.

Details and availability
The new open cloud environment includes support for Linux – through Red Hat Enterprise Linux and SUSE Linux Enterprise from Novell -- and Java. Smart Business Development and Test on the IBM Cloud is powered by Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, the Red Hat branded and supported KVM offering.  The enterprise cloud allows clients to work with their own images as well as images from IBM and includes support for a host of technologies including DB2, WebSphere Application Server and WebSphere sMash.
Smart Business Development & Test on the IBM Cloud will be available in the second quarter of 2010 in The United States and Canada, and it will roll out globally throughout 2010.  

For more information on IBM’s cloud computing portfolio, research and labs please visit, ibm.com/cloud.

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