IBM growing in the cloud

Growth in cloud computing saw IBM beat Wall Street expectations for its fourth quarter earnings.

With full year profits of $16.6 billion for 2012, a 5 per cent increase on 2011, IBM said that cloud computing revenues had jumped 80 per cent year on year.

Ginni Rometty, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer, also identified big data, mobile technology, social business and security as investment areas for 2013.

Cloud computing services combined with developments in mobile computing, are enabling small and midsize companies to access a level of technology that has traditionally not been available to them. Large enterprises continue to invest in cloud computing to make their IT systems more flexible and to reduce their cost base.

Companies of all sizes are seeing a reduced time to market as IT systems can be developed and implemented without many of the restrictions previously associated such as capital funding, support staff training and deployment delays in the underlying infrastructure. Waiting for data centre space sign-off, network integration and project prioritisation is being replaced with a new focus on getting the benefits of the application to the end users as quickly as possible.

With cash still important to many companies this new Opex model for computing services will continue to see growth during 2013.

New Year Resolution? – Secure your business in The Cloud

As the analysts continue to forecast that Cloud computing is going to grow even larger in 2013, traditionalist firms will find it increasingly difficult to ignore the pressures from both staff and customers.

As employees continue to build skills and knowledge through their own personal use on Mobile and Cloud Technologies, company IT resources are forever explaining why they can’t keep up with their demands.

Add to that the increasing pressure on businesses to reduce cost and remain competitive, whilst providing a first class product or service, and the argument for Cloud Computing is made.

However, stories of major outages at global players and perceived issues with security provide reasons enough for some to not start introducing cloud based solutions.

The problem for many is the term Cloud. It suggests something that will float away, something you can’t control; something that brings bad weather. Why would you want to put all your vital business data into something like that?

There is still much explaining for those of us in the Industry to do to help businesses understand what, where and when to put business applications into the Cloud. We need to provide assurances about security, both in terms of the data and in terms of business continuity.

Ironically, the introduction of Cloud Technologies makes it easier than ever for businesses to survive an IT disaster. My advice to businesses for 2013 that haven’t put their Cloud Strategy together is to start there. Once you have a secure Business Continuity plan you’ll feel a lot better about putting applications and data into the Cloud.

IBM Premier Partner award rounds off a great 2012

During 2012 managing change began to replace managing survival for many businesses.

During the year M7 has seen major growth in both it’s established customer base and in new customers, who have started investing into new and innovative uses of technology.

Growth in manufacturing and the telecoms sectors in the second half of 2012 led to significant new wins in both data centre hosting contracts and IBM Infrastructure roll outs.

This success has been recognised by IBM through their Business Partner Organisation with M7 attaining Premier Partner Status in Q4 2012, the only Independent Partner headquartered in Wales to do so.

We wish a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year to all our Customers and Partners and look forward to working with you in 2013.

IBM SmartCloud Enterprise achieves ISO 27001:2005

As at June 7th 2012 IBM SmartCloud Enterprise (SCE) has been recognised as achieving ISO 27001:2005

What is ISO 27001:2005? ISO/IEC 27001 is an auditable international standard which defines the requirements for an Information Security Management System (ISMS). The standard is designed to ensure the selection of adequate and proportionate security controls.

What does this certification cover? The planning, design, implementation and operation of IBM Smart Cloud Services, including SmartCloud Enterprise (SCE), encompassing local and global capabilities. The certification covers all SCE data centres in Canada, Germany, Japan, Singapore and the United States.

As an IBM SCE Partner this enables M7 Managed Services to offer both locally managed and hosted services provided under the AccredIT UK Certification or as part of a global cloud solution using IBM SmartCloud Enterprise.

For more information on our range of managed cloud services please contact us: 01443 657100

IBM Launches Cloud Club

Yesterday IBM UK launched a new initiative to bring together Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) with the aim of building eco-systems in the cloud.

With the IT industry experiencing a major change in traditional business models, moving from large capital projects to monthly charging, ISVs and Vendors need new routes to market and a delivery model that they can afford.

The large outsourcers have built businesses on a model that often requires significant up-front investment from their customers, a model that many mid-market businesses cannot afford.

The conference, held at Vinopolis on the Southbank, heard how IT systems were considered by businesses within a Cost, Agility and Risk matrix. While many larger, listed businesses were still being wary of cloud based solutions because of their risk adverse nature, mid-market customers were recognising the opportunity to become more agile whilst reducing cost at the same time.

This new delivery model, using highly available, secure, shared environments that can be personalised to a business, would provide huge growth opportunity over the next 4 years. There was a big emphasis on localisation, services being delivered in country or within local geography rather than internationally. The conference was told that customers wanted to know their service provider and have a solution that was tailored for them, not an off the peg, one size fits all, which invariably it doesn’t.

For more information on IBM’s Cloud Club and participation as an ISV or for customers looking for a UK based MSP to help them put together their IT delivery strategy, please contact M7 on 01443 657100.

IBM announces PowerLinux server and IBM PowerVM®.

For user organisations or ISVs looking for more performance per server in a Linux environment, the PowerLinux 7R2 offers a new, cost effective solution.

The IBM PowerLinux 7R2 server delivers the outstanding performance and workload-optimizing capabilities of the IBM POWER7® processor in a Linux only, dense, 2U rack form factor. The two-socket, high-performance, energy-efficient server supports sixteen POWER7 cores and a choice of Linux operating systems, Red Hat and SUSE.

PowerVM Micro-Partitioning® supports multiple VMs per processor core and, depending upon the IBM PowerLinux server model, can run up to 160 VMs on a single server—each with its own processor, memory, and I/O resources. Processor resources can be assigned at a granularity of 1/100th of a core.

For more information:
http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/power/software/linux/powerlinux/

Moving to the Cloud?

Ultimately the goals for businesses moving to the cloud are either to reduce the costs of business operations or to improve their performance, or for most organisations the business case incorporates both of these.

When considering cloud what is often missed is the ultimate users’ experience. Organisations should focus on the level of service the system is providing from the perspective of the users it is serving.

Understanding this, along with the resources an organisation has at its disposal, will enable it to make a decision on a cloud deployment model. This may be an Infrastructure as a Service model or a Software as a Service Model.

It is important to understand the distinctions between IaaS and SaaS.

IaaS is a provisioning model used to support IT infrastructure operations, including storage, hardware, servers and networking components. The service provider will own the equipment and will typically charge a monthly fee.

SaaS is a software subscription model in which applications are hosted by a provider who makes the service available over a network.

IaaS is often provided through a virtualisation layer interface and the customer has no control over this or the infrastructure (servers, networking and storage). But everything above that interface the customer has control of. This model adds flexibility and scalability, enabling customers to consume fractions of hardware to host their own application configurations whilst benefiting from the economies of scale of their provider.

In a SaaS model applications are run directly from a web browser with the service provider taking care of all the infrastructure and application management, including security and systems back up.

For many SMEs the hard line between one service and another can often lead to a company continuing with their in-house approach.

Recognising this M7 offer a range of hybrid cloud solutions taking the best of SaaS and IaaS to meet an organisations individual cloud requirements.

For more information please contact us at http://www.m7ms.co.uk/

IBM announces PureFlex Systems

April 11th – IBM announced IBM PureFlex Systems, an infrastructure system that provides an integrated computing system—combining servers, storage, networking, virtualization and management into a single structure.

“IBM PureSystems combine the flexibility of a general purpose system, the elasticity of cloud and the simplicity of an appliance tuned to the workload-fundamentally changing the experience and economics of IT.”

The announcement also included new Application Platform supporting a wide range of Industry Leading applications from the likes of Infor and SAP.

“The IBM PureApplication System is specifically designed and tuned for transactional web and database applications. Solutions enabled on the PureApplication System are packaged into patterns of expertise built for a cloud environment and easy deployment.”

For more information please contact M7, see resources on the M7 website:
http://www.m7ms.co.uk/
or follow the link to the IBM PureSystems website.

New IBM Announcement – Expert Integrated Systems

On 11 April 2012, IBM is introducing a new category of systems which will deliver integrated expertise and an overall simplified experience, shorter time to value with improved integration and installation times.

This new category, called expert integrated systems, is already generating tremendous excitement in the market as it addresses head-on the economics and complexity of deploying a new infrastructure, and the need to deliver IT at the speed of doing business.

IBM believes that their Expert Integrated Systems will have three truly unique attributes:
• Built-in expertise: captures and automates what experts do, from the infrastructure to the application
• Integration by design: deeply integrates and tunes hardware and software in a single, ready-to-go system
• Simplified experience: makes every part of the IT lifecycle easier

While the details of the announcement are confidential until 11 April, M7 have arranged for a number of briefings for customers including the UK SyteLine User Group Conference at Blythe Valley on May 3rd.

Cloud Computing driving SME jobs growth

An IDC study commissioned by Microsoft has been published, showing how many jobs will be created in the area of cloud Computing by 2015. The results suggest that globally, cloud technology is expected to generate nearly 14 million new jobs.

Many have thought that as Cloud Computing makes companies more efficient and brings down their costs, this will result in staff reductions. According to IDC, this is not the case. The companies that make investment in cloud infrastructure early will reap the rewards first in greater expansion and job growth.

Cloud Computing can make a real difference for businesses by increasing productivity, reducing costs and enabling IT staff to focus on line of business activities rather than supporting hardware and operating systems.

Chief Research Officer and Senior Vice President John F. Gantz of IDC stated “A common misconception is Cloud Computing is a job eliminator, but in truth it will be a job creator, a major one.”

In 2011 1.5 million new jobs were created worldwide. In its study projections IDC believes more than 50 per cent of the 14 million jobs worldwide would be generated in small and medium sized businesses.