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IBM to open Dublin cloud computing centre
19-03-2008
by Ciara O'Brien

IBM is setting up Europe's first cloud computing centre in Dublin, supported by IDA Ireland, at its Innovation Campus in Mulhuddart.

Up to 21 people are expected to be employed at the centre, with nine of these employees focusing on research into cloud computing.

Cloud computing is a way that users can tap into increased computing power, by creating networks from large groups of servers and using specialised connections to carry out data processing tasks. It essentially refers to an IT infrastructure of shared computing resources, which are virtualised and accessed as a service, perhaps through the internet. Cloud computing eliminates the need to have stand-alone hardware and local servers to deal with applications and tasks.

The technology model is also considered "green", reducing energy consumption by improving the utilisation of IT resources and requiring fewer servers to handle equivalent workloads. The demand for the technology has grown as business collaboration, connected devices, real-time data streams, and Web 2.0 applications such as streaming media and entertainment, social networking and mobile commerce increase in popularity.

The Dublin-based centre will function as a European hub, providing research and services to facilities planned for construction in Europe, Middle East and Africa. It will also help train lecturers at the Dublin Institute of Technology's School of Computing in cloud computing training.

The company's High Performance on Demand Solutions Lab will use IBM's "Blue Cloud" technologies -- which is a series of cloud computing offerings based on industry open standards and open source software -- to build the centre, in partnership with IDA Ireland.

"Responding to demand in the market, we are moving fast to build an integrated cloud computing operation. We are adding Europe's first Cloud Computing Centre at Dublin and more facilities into a network of existing centres in China, Vietnam and the US. The centres can bring skills and expertise to serve our clients in building their own new enterprise data centres," said Dr Willy Chiu, Vice President of High Performance On Demand Solutions, IBM Software Group, in a statement.

The announcement was made by the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Micheal Martin, who said the decision to locate the centre in Ireland highlighted Ireland's role as an important contributor to IBM's global research, development and innovation strategy.

One of the centre's first offerings is IBM Idea factory, which uses Web 2.0 technology to facilitate the creation of social networks from communities of business professionals. This will allow them to collaborate and develop new business ideas, encouraging brainstorming among employees, partners, software developers and other third parties.

IBM has certainly been upping the ante lately. Not only has it announced the new cloud computing centre, but it also signed a new licensing deal with Lenovo that enables the Chinese PC maker to manufacture and sell a range of x86 servers, and bought up privately-held security software firm Encentuate for an undisclosed sum. In January, it kicked off the year with a three-year EUR45 million agreement with Allied Irish Bank to transform its core banking systems.