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IBM Launches New Grid And Grow Offering

New BladeCenter Solution to Widen Adoption of Grid

SAN FRANCISCO, CA, August 8, 2005—IBM today announced the introduction of Grid and Grow, a packaged set of software, hardware and services that will deliver the benefits of Grid computing to businesses large and small. The offering is built on IBM's experience implementing Grid computing solutions worldwide.

The announcement was made at LinuxWorld in San Francisco.

The IBM® Grid and Grow™ Offering is a simple, but powerful solution designed to help companies in key industries, including industrial, public sector and financial, get started with Grid computing. It is built using the industry leading IBM

® BladeCenter™ platform, running Linux and other operating systems. Grid and Grow will help companies with compute-intensive applications accelerate business results by utilizing an open, robust, and scalable architecture that adjusts to a customer's needs. Grid and Grow, as it name implies, will also allow customers to expand to larger, more robust Grid implementations as their needs grow and is an important enabler of a customer's virtualization strategy.

A key collaborator in IBM's Grid and Grow Offering is Intel Corp, which will work to support Grid and Grow by providing education through their business partner channel, solution blueprints, and joint customer engagements.

"Commercial enterprises are realizing tangible business benefits from Grid technology, so in order to accelerate this adoption and produce business results sooner, we are very pleased to work with IBM to deliver standards-based Grid solutions to help enterprises reduce the risk of adoption, be more competitive, and grow their revenue," said Robert Fogel, director of Grid strategy and business development for Intel Corp.

Adds Fogel, "We see Grid computing becoming a key strategic element in the alignment between business and IT. Grid solutions based on interoperable building blocks, such as IBM

BladeCenter, facilitate IT infrastructure that is easier to manage, lower in TCO and is less complex." The standard Grid and Grow Offering includes:

BladeCenter Grid Hardware – Customers can select from a choice of BladeCenter servers to power their Grid computing offering, including the Intel-based IBM BladeCenter HS20, IBM POWER-based BladeCenter JS20 and the AMD Opteron LS20 blade. The standard Grid and Grow offering will include one BladeCenter chassis featuring seven blades, although customers can easily expand to a full BladeCenter. IBM Director is also available with IBM BladeCenter to help simplify the management of the complete solution.
Grid Scheduler – Depending on the type of workload and the industry, customers can select either Altair PBS Professional™, DataSynapse GridServer™, Platform LSF, or IBM LoadLeveler to manage compute resources as a shared pool, scheduling application work to increase the overall utilization while reducing the time to complete jobs.
Operating System – The Grid and Grow Offering offers a choice of three operating systems, including Linux from Red Hat or Novell SUSE, Windows and AIX 5L.
Services – Grid and Grow customers will also receive services from IBM Global Services with expertise for application assessment, Grid scheduler installation, tuning, testing, and client training.

Optimized software from IBM's Tivoli portfolio is also available as part of Grid and Grow, including dynamic server provisioning, software license tracking, and management of Grid storage.

"Today's announcement expands the benefits of Grid computing to all businesses, not just large enterprises," said Ken King, vice president of Grid computing, IBM. "Grid and Grow is a great way for customers to get started on Grids because it is built on the powerful but affordable BladeCenter infrastructure that brings the advantages of Grid computing to all customers, who can now implement Grid computing solutions within their organizations to dynamically share information and computer resources."

"As one of IBM's leading distributors, Avnet Partner Solutions is already closely aligned with IBM in providing BladeCenter solutions through the channel to the small and medium business market," said Jack Morris, vice president, IBM Software and xSeries, Avnet Partner Solutions. "We are very excited about Grid and Grow and incorporating the technology into our BladeCenter offerings for our channel partners."

The Grid and Grow Offering starts at $49,000 USD for the standard offering, and is available immediately. For more information, visit www.ibm.com/grid.

About IBM
IBM is the world's largest information technology company, with 80 years of leadership in helping businesses innovate. Drawing on resources form across IBM and key Business Partners, IBM offers a wide range of services, solutions and technologies that enable customers, large and small, to take full advantage of the new era of e-business on demand. For more information about IBM's Grid computing business, please visit www.ibm.com/grid.

IBM news releases and fact sheets are available at http://www.ibm.com. The following are either trademarks or registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation in the United States or other countries or both: IBM, eServer and BladeCenter and IBM Grid & Grow Offering. Other company, product, or service names may be trademarks or service marks of others. All statements regarding IBM's future direction and intent are subject to change or withdrawal without notice, and represent g