Business success increasingly depends on the ability to apply new and innovative business models and supporting IT solutions more quickly than one's competitors can. In short, it requires an agile enterprise. Recent advancements in cloud computing can provide an enterprise with the essential capabilities it needs to become an agile enterprise

1. © Copyright IBM Corp. 2013. 1
Redbooks
Thriving in this fast paced and
connected world
Technology advancements in cloud computing are creating
exceptional opportunities for enterprises to transform business
models, supply chains, and the ways in which they interact with
customers and partners. New technologies and tools are
transforming traditional software development lifecycles.
Innovation around an open cloud architecture is dramatically
changing the entire digital fabric inside and outside of the data
center with profound impact on how enterprises should think
about their business:
Unlock innovation: Cloud computing is enabling changes in
how business and society operate and is unlocking huge
avenues for innovation that are leveraging new ecosystems.
Scale through open architectures: Evolution of an open cloud
architecture based on open source software (such as
OpenStack and Cloud Foundry) and open standards is
enabling a new approach to delivering capabilities, with new
innovations in workloads and services. Applying this open
cloud architecture results in dramatic improvements in data
center operations, application development, and lifecycles, for
highly scalable solutions both on-premise and in the cloud.
Develop rapid business outcomes: Developers are taking a
more central role in delivering value to the business. Rapid
technology innovations in tools, frameworks, open interfaces,
and languages are enabling them to create or synthesize
highly interactive and dynamic applications that accelerate
business outcomes. DevOps innovations coupled with
composable cloud services are allowing new cloud-centric
applications to be ready in days, rather than months.
Engage social business for competitive advantage: Social
applications and mobile devices are transforming customer
and partner interactions. Advanced analytics processing
applied against the mobile and social interactions provides
insights to transform marketing and product innovation,
resulting in competitive advantage for those willing to
engage.
Economics of consumption: Emergence of a cloud services
consumption model (often called the API economy) and the
availability of composite cloud services based on open
standards are creating the opportunity for cost effective
sophisticated solutions for enterprises large and small.
Open source ecosystems: Leveraging open source projects,
tools, and technologies can greatly enhance the enterprise's
ability to adapt and leap-frog its competition. Open source
projects supported, maintained, and enhanced by global
partners can dramatically improve innovations. This
Highlights
Business success increasingly depends on
the ability to apply new and innovative
business models and supporting IT solutions
more quickly than one's competitors can. In
short, it requires an agile enterprise. Recent
advancements in cloud computing can provide
an enterprise with the essential capabilities it
needs to become an agile enterprise:
The open cloud architecture establishes the
foundation for the agile enterprise, enabling
innovative solutions and avoiding vendor
lock-in.
New applications that increase customer and
employee loyalty and interactions are
enabling the agile enterprise in a mobile and
socially connected world.
Open source technologies and standards are
transforming existing business and IT
processes, making them more flexible and
agile.
Supercharging the Cloud
for an Agile Enterprise
An IBM Redbooks®
Point-of-View publication
by IBM Corporate
Headquarters Strategy
By Mac Devine, IBM
Distinguished Engineer,
Walter Falk, IBM Program
Director, Christopher
Ferris, IBM Distinguished Engineer, and Rob
Sauerwalt, IBM Director of Strategy, Cloud
Initiative

2. 2
approach is becoming the norm rather than the
exception for IT going forward.
To be an agile enterprise in this fast paced and
connected world, each enterprise must continuously
transform itself in order to adapt to the ever changing
business landscape. To enable this continuous
transformation, an agile enterprise (Figure 1) needs a
flexible digital fabric and application platform.
Figure 1 Agile enterprise in today’s environment
The IBM® vision for the agile enterprise is based on
the open cloud architecture. The IBM strategic direction
for IT services is based on this architecture. IBM is
ready to accompany your enterprise on this journey to
take advantage of these technology innovations and
market forces in order to become agile and to prosper.
However, creating the agile enterprise is riddled with
challenges and questions.
Building the foundation of an
agile enterprise
The heart of an agile enterprise is based on the rapidly
maturing open cloud architecture. This architecture has
evolved as a result of steady technology
advancements, improved integration, and
standardization in virtualization and management
automation. Lately, this architecture has evolved more
rapidly as a result of business requirements for radical
improvements in data center operations, developer
productivity, and application lifecycle agility.
Today's business environment is demanding greater
flexibility in order to introduce new products to market
faster. This requirement demands that new tools be
available that promote such products to an ever
increasingly interconnected, mobile, and social world.
As a result, the digital fabric supporting the business
must be designed for utmost flexibility in order to
support modern business processes, and customer
and partner interactions.
The open cloud architecture (Figure 2) encompasses
at its most basic level three distinct layers.
Figure 2 Open cloud architecture for an agile enterprise
The Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) layer (Figure 2,
layer 1) resides above the physical hardware and
supports virtualization and management of the
hardware components. Virtualization has evolved to a
point where it is used by most enterprises today.
However, virtualizing physical hardware and creating
this abstraction layer does not deliver on the full
promise of the cloud. Although virtualization is a key
component of the cloud infrastructure architecture, all
basic infrastructure resources should be provided as
true services. As defined by National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST)1
, the full set of
characteristics for IaaS includes managing all the
infrastructure resources in a resource pool, with
self-service provisioning, rapid elasticity, and as
measured services. Virtualization alone does not
accomplish this vision and set of characteristics. Once
all infrastructure resources are provided and managed
as services, the data center can be treated as a true
software-defined environment (Figure 2, layer 1).
Software-defined environments encompass three
major infrastructure components (networks, storage,
and compute) and have to be considered holistically as
an environment:
Software-defined networks move the network control
away from the physical switch to server-based
control software. This approach improves
programmability and extensibility for the developer,
Application
Developers
Cloud
Services
Agile Enterprise
IT Team
Business Users
Customers
and
Partners
IT Environment
1 NIST, http://www.nist.gov/index.html
Hardware
IaaS
Software-defined
Environments
PaaS
Composable Environments
SaaS
API Economy
1
2
3

3. 3
and at the same time scale and efficiency for the
business.
Software-defined storage enables developers to
build their own control software to access data. By
using this approach, developers can customize,
optimize, and integrate storage components that
are ready for immediate use.
Software-defined compute decouples the software
image from a physical compute resource.
Application workload mobility is bolstered by
providing the ability to automatically select the best
system on which to run the application. The
selection is based on the attributes and capabilities
requested by the workload.
The value in a software-defined environment stems
from two aspects. First, by expressing physical
infrastructure as software services that can be
manipulated and automated, programmatically.
Second, by considering the infrastructure as a
composite whole, not the network, storage, and
compute as individual parts. Building the
software-defined environment requires a disciplined
approach. Standards (both formal and informal) are
rapidly evolving to ensure portability, interoperability,
and manageability of the software-defined
environment. The OpenStack Foundation2 has
emerged as the most important consortium for the
implementation of the software-defined environment by
adopting many of the cross industry standards
initiatives. The OpenStack Foundation was founded by
IBM and several other leading IT vendors.
OpenStack is an open source IaaS cloud platform that
has broad industry support across a wide variety of
virtualization platforms such as, Kernel-based Virtual
Machine (KVM), XEN, VMware, Microsoft Hyper-V,
IBM PowerVM®, and IBM z/VM®, as well as the base
hardware (also referred to as bare metal). OpenStack
itself runs on most Linux distributions. The OpenStack
Foundation has an open governance model and a very
vibrant and growing ecosystem of vendors, providers,
and other open source projects delivering base
capabilities and services, and supports a wide variety
of plug-ins and add-ons.
A number of other important standards initiatives help
ensure portability and integration across the
software-defined environments. To support networking
capabilities, the Open Networking Foundation (ONF)3
is defining rapidly emerging networking virtualization
and software-defined networking standards. A new
open source initiative called Open DayLight is pursuing
the delivery of an open source framework for
software-defined networking. The Organization for the
Advancement of Structured Information Standards
(OASIS)4
is defining a standard for defining portable
workload template definitions called Topology and
Orchestration Specification for Cloud Applications
(TOSCA)5
. TOSCA also takes advantage of various
open source deployment automation tools such as
Chef, Puppet, and Juju. TOSCA is itself being
implemented as one of the supported template
languages in the OpenStack Heat project.
The agile enterprise takes advantage of the capabilities
of a software-defined environment to make sure that its
applications receive the resources and performance
available when demanded by the business, customers,
and partners. This new design approach and
architecture establishes a new mind-set in the value of
IT to the business. This design and architecture
ensures that enterprises do not have to let key
resources (financial assets) sit idle ever. The success
of IaaS in public and private cloud deployments and the
associated cost savings have already transformed the
operations of many data centers.
IBM is investing heavily to build and acquire
world-leading IaaS capabilities. The recent IBM
acquisition of SoftLayer Technologies Inc. provides the
industry's only seamlessly unified global cloud
computing infrastructure. It combines virtual public
cloud instances, powerful bare metal servers, turnkey
private clouds, and a broad range of storage, network
and security devices, and services. All these services
are connected via a global private network across 13
data centers, with a single control-and-command portal.
Quickly, SoftLayer customers can deploy globally
distributed hybrid architectures. These architectures
are provisioned in real-time and billed hour-to-hour or
month-to-month. Options that are available include
GPU-powered servers, high-speed storage, and
multi-processor bare metal. These options give
customers access to higher levels of performance than
available in commodity public clouds. The performance
mandate extends to SoftLayer’s innovative
triple-network architecture with these capabilities:
High-speed public connectivity
A global private network for security
Point-to-point intra-application and inter-data center
connectivity
Out-of-band management network for systems
administration
2
OpenStack Foundation, http://www.openstack.org/foundation
3 ONF, https://www.opennetworking.org
4
OASIS, https://www.oasis-open.org/standards
5
TOSCA, https://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?
wg_abbrev=tosca

4. 4
Cloud-enabling an existing application environment or
data center has resulted in increased flexibility for the
enterprise, but this is often not sufficient to be a true
agile enterprise.
A new style of cloud-centric applications, often
designed for a mobile and socially interconnected
world, is rapidly emerging. In some applications areas
(such as, commerce and customer relationship
management (CRM)), these cloud-centric applications
are already having a dramatic impact. These
cloud-centric applications take full advantage of
software-defined environments and are also leveraging
rapid evolutions in platform services. The open cloud
architecture empowers developers with increased
flexibility, which is further enhanced in the
Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) (Figure 2 on page 2,
layer 2) layer. Bridging the software-defined
environment layer with the compositional PaaS layer
above it is an emerging open standard, which is based
on the Wide Web Consortium (W3C)6
linked data,
referred to as Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration
(OSLC).
The concept of composable environments, which
consists of finer grained elements that can be
recombined to create new capabilities, are a key
element of the open cloud architecture. Composable
environments (Figure 2 on page 2, layer 2) can contain
cloud services, which bring together operational,
development, application, database, and third-party
services. All of these cloud services include embedded
monitoring and manageability capabilities. Developers
can take advantage of these cloud services to build
new composable applications. These new applications
are built as cloud-centric (designed for and deployed to
the cloud) and in a mobile-first (user interface that is
designed for mobile devices) fashion. New
cloud-centric applications can digitize the enterprise's
business and allow the enterprise to reach and interact
with its customers regardless of where customers are
located or what devices customers are using.
IBM and Pivotal have announced their intent to
collaborate on development of the Cloud Foundry open
source Platform-as-a-Service framework and to work
towards defining an open governance model for the
emerging Cloud Foundry community. Cloud Foundry is
an interoperable PaaS framework that enables rapid
application development, deployment, and scaling of
new cloud-centric applications. It runs on a broad
range of cloud infrastructure platforms, including
OpenStack, Amazon Web Services (AWS), VMware,
IBM SmartCloud® Enterprise with IBM SoftLayer. It
also supports a wide range of application programming
language runtimes and frameworks through the use of
portable buildpacks. Buildpacks is a concept that was
first introduced by Heroku. As with OpenStack at the
IaaS layer, Cloud Foundry is emerging as the open
standard at the PaaS layer, by virtue of its growing
community and broad ecosystem of partners, vendors,
and users. An agile enterprise can take advantage of
this open and vibrant cloud development platform
without fear of vendor lock-in.
Software-as-a-Service is the top layer of the open
cloud architecture (Figure 2 on page 2, layer 3). This
layer is where end-users gain access to and leverage
business applications to support the enterprise's
business processes.
Modern applications are increasingly composed from a
wide variety of composite services and leverage many
application programming interfaces (APIs) to access
information and integrate with other applications. The
rapid evolution of social applications, coupled together
with the desire to have multi-modal applications that
can be accessed from any type of device with
consistency of data and user experience, is fueling an
increase in APIs. Composite applications leverage
APIs from internal and external providers to build even
more powerful application environments with a focus
on employee productivity and efficient customer
interactions. While APIs have been around for
decades, these APIs are representational state transfer
(REST)-based APIs that enable web-scale interactions
between the application and services that it consumes.
Increasingly, these APIs may participate in an
economic model, where the consumption of the API is
tied to a fee or on-going subscription model. As a
result, this approach is often referred to as the
API economy.
Many business models across various industries are
being transformed as a result of the rapidly evolving
API economy. Enterprises are making existing and new
business applications and data available through APIs
in order to expand their reach and drive new business
opportunities for growth. The explosion in APIs is
fueling a dramatic shift in the business landscape
where customers, business partners, vendors, and
clients can directly participate in an enterprise's
business processes and gain access to enterprise
data, from both inside and outside of the enterprise.
APIs offer a cost-effective way to provide access to
large amounts of data and the enterprise can leverage
sophisticated analytics that are available to increase
the value of such data.
6 W3C, http://www.w3.org

5. 5
It is important to carefully design and manage APIs
because they are often published and made available
in internal and external marketplaces or application
stores. Many new business models are evolving around
the availability of APIs. For example, APIs could be
used to hail a taxi from a smart phone application, to
process a mortgage application on a tablet, or to
purchase health insurance from health exchanges via
the web. Monetization of APIs and governance of the
API lifecycle are rapidly evolving. Developing and
implementing applications that take advantage of the
API economy requires enhanced tools, frameworks,
and programming models that are part of the PaaS
layer of the open cloud architecture. Cloud Foundry is
the open source framework that pulls all these pieces
together.
As enterprises become more agile and take advantage
of the open cloud architecture, they often must
leverage existing IT systems inside, as well as outside
of the enterprise. Adopting Cloud Foundry is not
sufficient to bridge all these requirements because the
agile enterprise often needs to link new applications
with existing business applications and data in a secure
and scalable way. IBM has worked on these challenges
with its clients as their IT systems have evolved, and
IBM is focused on helping enterprises bridge the gap.
The cloud-centric application environments that
incorporate mobile and social business support are
often referred to as systems of engagement, due to their
highly interactive nature. In contrast, traditional
application environments are often referred to as
systems of record because of their transaction-oriented
and database-oriented nature.
Figure 3 shows the combined environment of systems
of engagement and systems of record, together with
the Internet of Things, referred to as systems of
interaction.
Figure 3 Systems of Interaction
IBM is leveraging its middleware platforms, IBM
PureSystems™, IBM Worklight, OpenStack, and Cloud
Foundry to ensure that enterprises can build systems of
interaction. Next generation applications will be built in
such an environment within most enterprises. These
applications could take advantage of existing investments
in packaged line of business applications including CRM,
human resources (HR), and enterprise resource planning
(ERP) as well as new cloud-centric applications. Through
workload-optimized deployment, IBM can ensure that the
agile enterprise receives optimal benefits out of existing
line of business applications as they are deployed in
system of interaction environments.
With this new type of infrastructure, an agile enterprise
can rapidly and incrementally create and evolve
applications including mobile applications. These new
and enhanced applications consist of cloud services
and may use different programming models or run
times. The IT infrastructure can respond to business
requirements as they occur, increasing customer
loyalty and providing an immediate impact on the
bottom line of the business.
Empowering developers to create
applications for the agile enterprise
In order to take full advantage of cloud computing and
the open cloud architecture, with its composable cloud
services, applications must be designed to an
emerging set of cloud-centric architectural principles.
Developers must continually balance the need for
application performance, security, deployment, and
management. The development environment should
make it easy for the developer to write applications,
deploy the applications at the required scale, and use
cloud services seamlessly in a secure manner.
Systems of Interaction
Systems of Engagement Systems of Record
Internet of Things
Continuous
client experience
Cloud-based
Services Partner
value chain
CRM HR
DB ERP

6. 6
Developers require the tools and the infrastructure
necessary to publish and manage APIs. These
capabilities allow the developer to expose services (as
appropriate) to the ecosystem of customer and partner
applications so they can leverage these services.
These items are critical to developing cloud-centric
applications:
Open source tools and technologies and the ability
to use multiple programming languages (known as
polyglot programming) in order to deliver the most
optimal and efficient solution for the given task at
hand.
Creation of composable services and publishing
such services as APIs in application stores or
market places.
The implementation of development and operations
(DevOps) leverages automation, tool integration,
and process optimization in order to accelerate the
application lifecycle from requirements through
development, test, and into production.
Cloud-centric applications may consist of composable
components that are created using a combination of
languages and frameworks such as, Java, Node.js,
PHP, Python, Ruby on Rails, and Ruby. An enterprise
would likely choose just one or two languages for their
internal projects. Polyglot programming optimizes both
system performance and programmer productivity.
Traditional programming languages (such as, C, C++,
and Java) are compiled and optimize system
performance where it matters, but often at the expense
of decreased programmer productivity. Newer dynamic
languages (such as, Ruby, PHP, and Python) are
interpreted, which results in lower performance, but
allows for higher programmer productivity and greater
agility. By combining traditional and dynamic languages
(that is, polyglot programming), the developer can
optimize the elements of an application and the
development process for that application. The Cloud
Foundry framework supports such polyglot
programming. Cloud Foundry can also be run on
various IaaS implementations, including the
OpenStack implementation as a cornerstone of the
IBM open cloud architecture. Cloud Foundry supports
polyglot programming, by allowing providers to create
“buildpacks” in support of their unique environments.
This approach is enhancing the enterprises' flexibility
and their ability to choose the right environment for a
given development job, allowing developers to focus on
their skills and productivity.
Enhancements to existing integrated development
environments (IDEs) to support polyglot development
greatly improve developer productivity and retention
during this transition towards cloud-centric application
development. Developers should have the freedom to
choose the languages and development environments
that best serve their needs. Many of the popular
languages and tools are already used in numerous
cloud-related open source projects. The languages and
tools include OpenStack (based on Python) and Cloud
Foundry (based on Ruby and Go), and other popular
open source tools such as, Chef, and Puppet (both
based on Ruby).
The emergence of cloud services (which can be used
as composable services) is transforming the way
developers work. Cloud services provide a means to
create and use complex capabilities without the need
to install, configure, and tune the service in the
traditional manner. For example, a commonly used
cloud service is Database as a Service (DBaaS). This
service allows developers to quickly provision a new
instance of a MySQL, IBM DB2®, Redis, or MongoDB
database automatically and start using it in mere
seconds.
The developer should be able to simultaneously write,
test, and deploy their new mobile and cloud-centric
applications and the cloud services that they use
without leaving their favorite development environment.
As new applications move through test and quality
assurance cycles, various tools are often used to stress
test the applications. Ensuring interoperability between
the tools and their shared metadata is important for
efficient deployment and maintenance of new
applications in a cloud environment. OSLC is an
emerging open standard to make software lifecycle
tools interoperable by enabling them to bind data into
each other’s namespace, thereby sharing data. The
open cloud architecture ensures that developers at the
PaaS layer can pick the tools that they are most
comfortable with from various open source projects.
DevOps covers the application lifecycle from
conception and business planning, through the
development and test phases, to release, deployment,
and maintenance of the application. DevOps (in this
case the testing, management, and deployment of
applications) is a very important focus area because it
increases developer productivity, quality, and facilitates
an end-to-end application development and
deployment lifecycle. DevOps is undergoing rapid
evolution and innovation to optimize its effectiveness in
a PaaS environment by leveraging new tools,
frameworks, and programming languages. DevOps
tooling is being enhanced to work with Cloud Foundry
and OpenStack to facilitate the agile enterprise and the
API economy. IBM has recently acquired UrbanCode,
Inc. to help with deployment and orchestration of

7. 7
application releases. These products complement an
existing and very extensive DevOps tools portfolio from
IBM.
Application security and federated identity are
undergoing enhancements to support the API
economy and the cloud. A number of existing and
evolving standards, such as the OASIS Security
Assertion Markup Language (SAML), the OpenID
Foundation (OIDF) OpenID, and the Internet
Engineering Task Force (IETF) OAuth 2.0 are in the
works. These security standards play an important role
in enabling and securing the API economy as the
standards govern the application APIs and their access
controls. Other standards, such as OpenSocial, could
further define the component model for cloud-centric
social applications and help with integration of existing
applications. Standards could also enable the ability to
add third-party applications, thereby providing a single
integrated solution. Business event and messaging, as
well as security enhancements could also be improved
to deal with the new requirements of cloud deployment
and scalability. The Active Streams middleware
approach is an emerging standard that provides
developers with a common vocabulary to describe
business events, enabling apps that are able to
socialize data and knowledge with people in real time.
By leveraging big data analytics applications
developers now have the tools necessary to really
make the enterprise agile.
Ultimately, the infrastructure and platform must make it
as easy as possible for developers to rapidly deploy
applications to the cloud. These mechanisms must also
manage the complete application lifecycle. Developers
must have an ecosystem of easily consumable cloud
services that are based on proven cloud technologies.
The IBM SmartCloud Application Services (SCAS)
platform today provides many of the DevOps
capabilities outlined in this paper in a public cloud
consumption model, including services from IBM and
many business partners. Recently, IBM introduced
Project BlueMix (Figure 4) a technology incubator
platform that leverages Cloud Foundry and includes the
core capabilities necessary to build cloud-centric
applications. Project BlueMix is intended to further take
advantage of the rapid technology innovation
happening in the broad ecosystems around
OpenStack, Cloud Foundry, and various other open
cloud architecture components and technologies. IBM
plans to make Project BlueMix available for private and
public cloud consumption, as well as merge in the core
capabilities with IBM SmartCloud Application Services.
Figure 4 Project BlueMix
Project BlueMix leverages the IBM DevOps tools and
capabilities from across the IBM Rational® portfolio.
Project BlueMix also leverages a number of open
source capabilities, including GitLab, Jenkins, and
Gerrit. These open source tools make it possible for
Project BlueMix to take advantage of inherent features
of Cloud Foundry and OpenStack. Project BlueMix
makes critical application services available from the
extensive IBM middleware portfolio, which includes
IBM WebSphere® software solutions, IBM
InfoSphere® BigInsights™, and IBM Rational software,
as well as additional services from across the industry,
such as: PostgreSQL, MySQL, Redis, blob storage,
elastic caching, RabbitMQ, and MongoDB.
Because the Project BlueMix environment is built on
and is an implementation of the open cloud
architecture, it also offers the opportunity for business
partner and Independent Software Vendor (ISV)
content. In addition, IBM Systems Integrators could
leverage the environment for their own client projects
and solutions.
When developers gain access to the tools, services,
and technologies they need, they can write new
cloud-centric applications more easily. The agile
enterprise saves money by reducing bottom-line IT
infrastructure costs. More importantly, the agile
enterprises’ top-line revenue can be increased by
enabling new business models and applications to be
delivered with a quicker time-to-market. As an example,
agile enterprises can take advantage of the
composable application methodology to create
mobile-first applications. This methodology allows the
developer to select from available cloud services to
compose applications for mobile devices that access
Development
Services
Operation
Services
Infrastructure
Services Application
Services
IBM BlueMix

8. 8
enterprise applications and data. Mobile-first
applications are customer-centric in that they are
designed for the mobile device rather than trying to
perpetuate existing business processes on mobile
devices. Also, mobile-first applications support the
mobile user interaction paradigm as the preferred
interaction style. This paradigm is redefining the nature
of transactions between consumers and
service/product providers, enhancing the value served.
Geographic location and context information provided
by mobile devices greatly streamline interactions and
require significantly less manual user input. Mobile-first
applications enable the agile enterprise to quickly
respond to customer needs, increasing customer
satisfaction and retention. The IBM initial focus is on
providing first-class support for the complete DevOps
life-cycle for cloud-centric applications in a mobile-first
environment with Project BlueMix.
A knowledgeable partner is key
to becoming an agile enterprise
IBM is in a unique position to help transform its clients’
IT infrastructure and development environments into
the base for an agile enterprise. IBM has led the way in
embracing new technologies to provide business
solutions that benefit enterprises. Now, IBM is helping
to define this new era of cloud computing via the open
cloud architecture, which is based on software-defined
environments and composable cloud services. IBM is
using continuous delivery methods for the design,
construction, deployment, and maintenance of
applications.
These new technologies and tools bring both
challenges and great opportunities to enterprises. The
open cloud architecture is built on a number of open
source projects with impressive ecosystem
momentum. However, most enterprises should not
embark down this road without a knowledgeable
partner who is investing in the core technologies, as
well as providing service and maintenance. Open
source projects have their challenges and only an
experienced and trusted partner is able to provide
world-class support, service, and the long-term
maintenance capabilities that are needed to make
these projects successful.
IBM has successfully introduced and integrated new
technologies into the enterprise in the past with its
leadership in Linux, Apache, and now with OpenStack
and Cloud Foundry. To build an agile enterprise,
enterprises need to develop and acquire new skills and
embrace different approaches. In return, the enterprise
has the opportunity to deepen its relationships with
customers, find new ways to deliver value, and grow its
business. IBM is ready to embark on this strategy with
your enterprise.
Through the SmartCloud initiative and the acquisition
of SoftLayer, IBM has introduced the initial capabilities
necessary to enable the agile enterprise. IBM plans to
continue this journey to build out the open cloud
architecture and the Project BlueMix environment for
its clients. IBM also plans to continue enhancing its
platform and application services that are necessary
for the agile enterprise. The IBM acquisition of
SoftLayer greatly enhances the IBM capability to
provide a world class and scalable cloud platform.
Significant additional investments are going into the
open source OpenStack community for the further
creation of IaaS technologies. IBM plans to base PaaS
capabilities on Cloud Foundry with significant new
investments into that open source project and the
ecosystem supporting and enhancing it. IBM has
launched the SmartCloud brand and family of
foundation, platform, and cloud solution products to
help clients take full advantage of these capabilities
and services.
Open standards are important and IBM intends to help
solidify their definition and usage. IBM is a founding
member of The OpenStack Foundation. IBM is also a
founding member of the Object Management Group
(OMG) Cloud Standards Customer Council (CSCC)
where customers, vendors, and consultants collaborate
to influence the evolution of the open cloud. As the
Cloud Foundry community continues to grow, IBM
plans to work with Pivotal and other members of the
community to help steer it towards an open governance
model. These initiatives and investments, combined
with other standards activities, help to advance broad
industry adoption of an open cloud architecture,
reducing the concerns of vendor lock-in and fostering
an open API economy. The standards also improve the
ability of developers to interchange component
services when they need to modify or enhance their
applications.
Enterprises can choose to use these technologies on
their own premises or from a provider. They can
choose to use capital to procure and own these
solutions or they can pay only for their usage,
converting some or all of this expense to their
operational budgets. All of these choices result in the
flexibility to construct business models that scale from
small startup situations to large globally integrated
endeavors. IBM has the skills to customize
technologies and assist clients with their

9. 9
decision-making process to become an agile
enterprise.
What’s next: How IBM can help
IBM is investing to help enterprises realize the vision of
the agile enterprise. IBM is working with thousands of
enterprises worldwide to make them agile by helping
them adopt the next generation of cloud computing.
IBM partners and clients are providing feedback and
identifying best practices based on real world projects.
IBM continues to share this collective knowledge and
expertise with its clients so they too can become an
agile enterprise.
You can start your journey to becoming an agile
enterprise by learning more about the IBM SmartCloud
offerings and Project BlueMix. IBM SmartCloud and
IBM SoftLayer provide a full range of offerings that
span the continuum from designing cloud-based
solutions to deploying and maintaining these solutions.
The offerings include infrastructure, platform, software,
and business process as a service. Information about
the IBM SmartCloud offerings is available at this web
address:
http://www.ibm.com/cloud
Information about the IBM SoftLayer offering is
available at this web address:
http://www.softlayer.com
Information about Project BlueMix is available at this
web address:
http://www.ibm.com/software/ebusiness/jstart/blu
emix
Resources for more information
For more information about the concepts that are
highlighted in the paper, see the following resources:
eBook: Cloud Services for Dummies
http://www.ibm.com/cloud-computing/files/clou
d-for-dummies.pdf
All Clouds are Not Created Equal: A Logical
Approach to Cloud Adoption in Your Company
http://www.ibm.com/services/be/en/attachments
/pdf/SmartCloud_Enterprise_-_IBM_-_Frost_and_
Sullivan_Whitepaper.pdf
IBM is a leader in cloud open standards
http://www.ibm.com/cloud-computing/us/en/open
-standards.html
The Twelve-Factor App
http://www.12factor.net
The Citizen Developer
http://thecitizendeveloper.com
Systems of Engagement and the Future of
Enterprise IT: A Sea Change in Enterprise IT
http://www.aiim.org/futurehistory
IBM's open cloud architecture blog
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/cloud/libra
ry/cl-open-architecture/index.html

10. © Copyright IBM Corp. 2013. 10
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