IBM executives Ray Jones and Paul DiMarzio told Computerworld Philippines in a roundtable discussion Thursday that mainframes, which process much of the world's most strategic information and applications, could serve as a 'hub' for SOA or for Internet-based computing.
Jones is IBM vice president for worldwide zSeries software sales, while DiMarzio is an IBM consulting software product design professional. SOA, they explained, refers to a framework that allows companies to reuse existing technologies, resulting in greater efficiencies, cost savings and better productivity.
Jones said part of IBM's plan include the creation of next-generation mainframe developers, as well as making the mainframe easier to run.
'We are evolving the mainframe to make it more open and consistent with open standards so that customers can modernize and port their workloads around in a matter of weeks, as opposed to years, or never,' he said.
The IBM officials reported there has been a growth in mainframe usage in the past three years brought about by an explosion of interconnected business processes such as cross-checking inventory and shipping across retailers, wholesalers and suppliers that flow through interconnected applications.
They explained that more IT infrastructures are relying on modular code, or 'services,' to string together the ever-increasing number of applications between different types of computers in an automated way, based on open standards.
And in its attempt to produce a new breed of mainframe developers, Jones said IBM has worked with 300 universities worldwide to teach IBM's mainframe system.
He disclosed that IBM aims to train 20,000 new mainframe professionals by the year 2010. Yet, he said only last July, IBM had 16,000 students in training. 'So in about three years to go, we will exceed the 20,000.'
Jones said IBM recently recruited universities in Asia, one each in Singapore, Thailand, India, and five in China. He added they might also apply the program in the Philippines as they receive positive responses from local customers.
'If the customers would give us information, we're going to talk to schools ourselves. But I hope within a few months, we can get an agreement with, at least, one university here (in the Philippines) to proceed,' he said.
Jones and DiMarzio also said IBM aims to expand the base of independent software developers using the System z platform. IBM will also encourage new independent software vendors (ISVs) to develop their applications for the System z through technical, sales and marketing support, no-cost access to IBM IT architects, advertising discounts and customer lead generation tools.
The executives added that part of the company's mainframe strategy is the new IBM middleware to secure and integrate the hundreds of applications and petabytes of data running through IBM System z and other computers in an IT infrastructure.
Jones said 41 percent of all mainframe customers are now seriously evaluating SOA implementations on IBM mainframes compared to last year's 31 percent. 'Two years ago, it was a very small number,' he said, noting the improvement is a validation that SOA is real.
DiMazario said there are real tangible benefits to be gained in SOA, referring particularly to the ability of developing applications much faster, while Jones said the longer term is more on the business gains.
Both executives also announced that IBM has made software tools that make the creation of 'services-ready' mainframe applications by Java, Visual Basic, COBOL and PL/1 developers to be as easy as mastering an advanced video game after only a short time. They claim more companies are turning to IBM System z as the nexus for SOA, noting that services are placing new demands on network performance and security.
IBM, in a statement, said its System z mainframe already supports the world's largest banks, retailers and manufacturers -- each day handling more than 80 billion transactions and US$4 trillion worth of credit card purchases, bank deposits and other financial exchanges.
Mainframes, IBM said, already host more than 80 percent of the world's information, which can be exchanged and analyzed to enable banks to seamlessly serve customers via ATMs, call centers, and the Internet.
DiMarzio said IBM's System z mainframe series provide the highest levels of ability of any server in terms of security. 'To the best of our knowledge that mainframe has never been hacked.'