IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM) has announced global availability on five continents – including in Canada – of IBM Smart Cloud Enterprise+, its new cloud service designed to host SAP applications and other core business operations.
According to IBM, organizations are eager to leverage the economic advantages of cloud computing to run their critical applications, but require a level of service not found in typical public clouds, such as deep technical expertise, around-the-clock customer service, tight security and ongoing maintenance.
To meet this demand, IBM developed an Infrastructure-as-a-Service cloud combining the best features of sourcing – high service level agreements, security and reliability – with the best features of cloud – elasticity and subscription-based pricing.
While many companies have already moved non-core applications in the cloud, IBM said this service is designed for core applications such ERP, CRM, analytics, social business and mobile computing. IBM will help manage patch updates and identity management, improving security.
“This is a logical evolution of IBM’s sourcing business that gives us an advantage both in our services relationships and the cloud market as we define a new enterprise-grade cloud today,” said Jim Comfort, general manager of IBM SmartCloud Services, in a statement. “Our clients want sophisticated, economical cloud-based services that provide the same quality and service level as a private, hosted IT environment. With that assurance, they can focus more on driving business value from their data and operations, and less on managing their IT.”