ARMONK, NY -- (Marketwire) -- 10/06/08 -- IBM (NYSE: IBM) today launched a company-wide initiative that extends its traditional software delivery model toward a mix of on-premise and cloud computing applications with new software, services and technical resources for clients and Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). IBM's new cloud services can help businesses of all sizes more easily adopt cloud computing models to better manage data, lower operational costs and make collaboration easier.

Businesses face a unique set of challenges as they look to grow in a globally integrated economy. A perfect storm of data deluge, a fluid regulatory environment and widening information technology (IT) skills gaps is placing additional cost pressures on top of already resource-strapped organizations. As a result, businesses are looking for new ways to drive more value out of their IT infrastructures and free up resources for strategic growth investments.

"We are moving our clients, the industry and even IBM itself to have a mixture of data and applications that live in the data center and in the cloud," said Willy Chiu, vice president, high performance on demand solutions, IBM. "IBM's cloud computing strategy was inspired by feedback from the business world's broadest IT customer base indicating a growing desire to utilize data, applications and services from any device and from any location based on open standards."

IBM has a four-pronged strategy to capture the cloud computing opportunity by: 1) delivering its own cloud services portfolio; 2) helping ISVs design, build, deliver and market cloud services; 3) helping clients integrate cloud services into their business; and 4) providing cloud computing environments to businesses.

IBM's clients and partners will have access to a growing number of cloud services specialists through its worldwide network of 13 Cloud Computing Centers and 40 IBM Innovation Centers to help test applications via cloud computing models.

IBM has extensive experience in building cloud computing solutions used for both public and private cloud-delivered services. IBM's cloud-building services include: server, storage and network virtualization, service management solutions to automate workload management, usage tracking and billing and a portfolio of security and resiliency offerings to enable end-user confidence. IBM offers consulting and implementation skills for organizations to leverage cloud computing as a key component of their overall business and IT strategy.

New IBM cloud services

IBM's ability to deliver cloud services is made possible by technologies that include Request-Driven Provisioning (RDP), Dynamic Workload Management (DWM), Usage and Accounting and Security. Offered as part of IBM's Tivoli portfolio, these technologies give clients and ISVs the assurance of delivering quality services from a cloud computing environment with the ability to monitor and log activity, chargeback and secure identity and access management protections. New IBM cloud services areas that utilize these technologies include:

1.