IBM launches server provisioning bundle

IBM has launched the first bundled hardware and software offering from its Project Symphony initiative to automate IT infrastructure provisioning.

Targeting the web server market, Web Infrastructure Orchestration is a package containing IBM's Intel-based BladeCenter servers and pre-integrated versions of software.

Included are WebSphere application server, DB2 database software, Tivoli Storage Manager and, underpinning the whole offering, Tivoli's Intelligent ThinkDynamic Orchestrator server provisioning technology.

The bundle also contains disk and tape hardware from the TotalStorage portfolio as required.

US prices come in at $20,000 for the Orchestrator alone, with the overall bundle averaging $300,000 depending on the configuration.

Since IBM also unveiled a capacity-on-demand version of BladeCenter, comprising a 14-blade chassis with seven up and running and seven on standby, the spare half of the box can be paid for as used over a six-month activation period.

Orchestrator was the technology for which IBM bought ThinkDynamic in May this year and debuted with a Big Blue badge last month at the US Open, where it load-balanced between tournament web serving and gene protein-folding cancer research.

Angus Jamieson, Tivoli ambassador for the EMEA Northern Region, said that IBM will launch further bundles of this sort for other applications besides web serving.

The bundle need not ship with the server hardware, so customers can use other Intel boxes running Windows which they may already have in house.

The current offering is Windows-specific, but Jamieson highlighted the fact that Orchestrator supports "all the major Unixes".

James Governor, principal analyst at Redmonk, suggested that this first bundling out of the gate puts IBM ahead of its main competitor in the field - Hewlett Packard with its UDC initiative.

"The Windows focus in this early implementation is perhaps surprising. Linux is a very important market for this kind of offering so IBM is going to have to move there in double-quick time."