The statement to work on the cloud may previously mean to daydream or to fantasize over something. This may have worked for creative jobs like writing and designing, but today to work on the cloud has a whole new meaning. In fact, a latest survey released by IBM stated that more and more companies find migration to the cloud as very timely and useful. This same study projected that cloud migration may increase by more than double in the coming years.

The same study entitled, The Power of the Cloud affirmed that social media and the demand for big and rapid data availability as the primary influencing factors for companies to migrate to the cloud. The 572 IT expert respondents said that development of new cloud business models are on top of their priority list of areas to explore that will maximize the advantages of the new cloud platform.

More than 50% of the respondents cited that improvement of a company’s organizational efficiency as the number one challenge for businesses. An interesting result, however, showed that the focus of the cloud trend will shift from company motivation for cloud migration to that of IT competitive growth and initiatives. The reasons indicated that support this shift includes the following:

• External collaboration and partnership will be the focus of cloud migration according to 62% of the respondents.
• Competitive cost will remain to be a major influencing factor for cloud migration as cited by 57% of the respondents.
• Opening and improving service and delivery channels would be an important goal to meet according to 56% of the respondents.

Considering the abilities of the cloud such as computing tools, analytical power, cost or data analysis it is just as important to look at the complexity of the cloud computing solutions and user experiences. Judging from these circumstances, the cost effectiveness, responsiveness, flexibility, scalability and the overall economics of IT must be seriously pondered.

This is where IBM’s Smart Cloud Foundation and IBMi Solutions come in the picture. These products feature SaaS services that can be used to allow companies to install, control, manage, automate and configure in all cloud environments. The previous results of the IBM study were used to develop and design the new software products that will answer the overall economics of IT on a cloud environment.

The new IBM’s Smart Cloud Foundation and IBMi Solutions will enable companies to thrive in the business market through lowered risks, speedy delivery of services and better control over their cloud environment and various partnerships.

IBM Software Products

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk – Allows companies to maintain configuration integrity during planned instances and unplanned incidences.

IBM Endpoint Manager for Mobile Devices – Allows companies to control, to manage and to secure mobile environments in delivering their services. With IBM Endpoint Manager Services and software are installed in minutes and provides companies to set policies, monitor usage and identify potential compromise.

IBM SmartCloud Monitoring – Allows IT administrators to maximize cloud utilization through an effective virtual monitoring infrastructure.

IBM SmartCloud Virtual Storage Center – Allows Improves the flexibility, cost, utilization and performance of storage with automated administration, management and provisioning controls.

IBMi Solution Edition Program – Allow businesses in taking advantage of maximizing the experience of combining IBM’s expertise with various independent software vendors (ISVs) with flexibility and scalability. The objective is to build up IT investment and business value. Of all the recent product releases, the IBMi Solutions proved to be the most promising than all other products as seen from last year’s 4Q sales. Major sales were accounted to the reasonable cost of the four-core Model 720 server in the Solution Edition.  In addition, IBM also sold another larger server, the Model 740 as part of the program.

IBM takes pride of the various successful partnerships they were able to gather worldwide that greatly contributed to the steady growth of the company. Among the ISV partners include Oracle, SAP, Lawson, Infor, Reatlix USA, Service Information Access, Syntax, Vision Solutions and many others. Businesses that benefited from the IBMi Solutions include International Business Systems, Health Management Systems and VAI.

Worldwide marketing manager, Guy Paradise said, “We had a really nice fourth quarter with the Solution Editions. The six- or eight-core solution sold real well for us.”

“Price is not solely the driver. If all we did was create a box and put a discount on it, perhaps we’d sell some more. It’s more than just a box and a discount. It’s more about a partnership and a pretty deep relationship between IBM and ISV that signifies investment on both sides, innovation on both, and optimization for Power 7 and IBM i 7.1. In many cases, our two labs have worked together and partnered with a participating ISV to deliver rapid installation packages and implementation.” Paradise added.