Amdahl creates new division to bring RAS to the dot coms

Amdahl has created a new technology division in an attempt to move what the mainframe world calls RAS (reliability, availability and scalability) into the dot com space.

The unit will employ about 1000 staff who will undertake research and development, business development and worldwide sales and marketing. It will be headed by Ali Jenab, who will also oversee the management of www.trustedanswer.com, a Web based customer support site that is currently under construction.

Jenab said one of the division's main tasks would be to take Amdahl's knowledge of OS/390 mainframes, Unix and Windows NT servers and storage, and apply it to ecommerce and Internet companies as they continue to increase the amount of transaction processing they undertake on the Web.

"Our value is to take the characteristics of the mainframe world and extend them and integrate them to Unix and NT. There are others who provide individual markets, but not all three at once. This is the best of breed," he claimed.

Amdahl also now supports Linux and will make those skills available to ecommerce sites.

The company, which has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Japan's Fujitsu since September 1998 and made its name in the mainframe world, now consists of three divisions - the new technology group, a software group and a solutions group.

But Rob Enderle, an analyst at Giga Information Group, said that Amdahl had not grown much over recent years and a new division did not achieve anything in and of itself.

"It has to create something for a benefit. The hope is it will come up with a product to use in the future. Hopefully by putting a bunch of people together, it can carry it off and keep the doors open," he attested.