HP squares up to mainframe rivals

By Alex Kayle for HP

Johannesburg, 20 Nov 2008

HP outlined a strategy to aggressively implement mainframe migrations, at a recent conference, in Madrid, held at the HP Centre of Excellence for Mainframe Migrations.

Ruud Vrolijk, VP and GM of HP Business Critical Systems in Europe, Middle East and Africa, also highlighted the plan during a recent visit to HP's local headquarters. Vrolijk also stressed HP's vision to drive the Mainframe Alternative Programme into the emerging market.

According to him, businesses are unable to implement projects fast enough as they lack agility to respond to changing business needs.

Vrolijk says the Mainframe Alternative Programme aims to assist customers' transition to the next state of technology. "Businesses need to change, rethink and redesign their IT strategy and mainframes in line with their business strategy.”

He claims that, as part of the programme, HP assists companies to replace high-cost mainframes with HP server alternatives and service support. He says HP assists businesses by delivering flexibility, bringing down costs, and creating business agility to quickly adapt to new technologies.

He further points out that data centres tend to have too many under-utilised servers, too many unmanaged applications, and high power and cooling costs. Vrolijk says businesses need to ensure business continuity, protect critical resource and data assets, and meet compliance requirements.

Competing against IBM

The new plan will mean HP is taking on mainframe giant IBM. “HP is positioning itself as a mainframe alternative to major brands, such as IBM, as mainframes generate approximately 50% of IBM's profits,” notes Vrolijk.

Spain is HP's leading market in terms of mainframe migrations, followed by the Nordic countries and Italy.

IBM says it is not in a position to comment directly on the new HP mainframe strategy. However, IBM points out it had noticed growth within its own mainframe business. The company says 600 new applications were introduced this year for IBM's mainframes. More than 1 400 independent software vendors are developing applications for IBM System Z mainframes. The company also says mainframes currently power the top 50 banks worldwide.

Linux speciality engines for IBM's mainframe grew 26% in the first half of this year, while Java specialty engines grew 45% and database speciality engines grew 133%, IBM adds.

Economic slowdown

While the economic recession is expected to worsen in months to come, HP believes the timing is perfect to roll-out the strategy in emerging markets, such as SA, where companies are feeling the credit crunch and are turning to cost-effective solutions.

Andrew Fletcher, SA business unit manager for HP Business Critical Servers Enterprise Storage and Servers Group, says: "This is not the first time that countries have gone into economic recession and it's not the first time that we've experienced an economic slowdown.

“This is a time where big enterprises need to rethink their business models and by doing that it will influence how they manage their IT. It fits with HP's overall strategy and we will gain business opportunities out of it as well."