IBM has laid out plans for a rapid expansion of its data centres around the world as it races to make up for lost time and prevent internet companies such as Amazon from cornering the fast-growing cloud computing market
January 17, 2014 Leave a comment
January 17, 2014 2:22 am
IBM plans rapid cloud expansion
By Richard Waters in San Francisco
IBM has laid out plans for a rapid expansion of its data centres around the world as it races to make up for lost time and prevent internet companies such as Amazon from cornering the fast-growing cloud computing market.The US technology group said late on Thursday that it would spend $1.2bn in 2014 to add 13 new data centres, taking the total to 40. The move follows its $2bn purchase last year of SoftLayer, whose software is a building block for running cloud services, and signals the latest step in Big Blue’s rethink of its position in cloud computing.
IBM has focused up to now on selling so-called private cloud services to its big corporate and government customers, which wanted some of the cost advantages of data centre-scale computing without making a full move to the shared computing infrastructure of the public cloud.
However, the fastest-growing part of the market has turned out to be in the public cloud, with web-based companies in particular turning to Amazon Web Services, the leader in the field, to buy computing capacity. Microsoft and Google have also pushed into this market.
The change of heart in cloud computing comes as IBM’s flagging growth has led Ginni Rometty, chief executive, to step up spending on new markets with the most promise. This month she announced a big push to turn Watson, the company’s most advanced computing project, into a significant business by helping companies make better use of vast bodies of data.
The data centre investment planned for this year “is a pretty radical expansion”, said Frank Gens, an analyst at tech research firm IDC. It signals a belated acknowledgment that the market for infrastructure as a service – selling computing or storage capacity – has become the most important part of the cloud market, he said. “If you’re not a top player there, you’re missing most of the growth.”
Lance Crosby, head of the SoftLayer business, said IBM’s deeper move into public cloud services was partly aimed at a “whole new generation of companies that literally appeared out of thin air” – the fast-growing new internet businesses in areas such as games which have seen soaring growth on the back of demand for new mobile services.
About bambooinnovator
Bamboo Innovator 