IBM releases new set of hybrid cloud solutions, services

Armonk, N.Y. - IBM is betting big on the cloud. The enterprise technology giant is releasing new hybrid cloud technology and services designed to extend clients' control, visibility, security and governance in a hybrid cloud environment similar to what they have in their private cloud and traditional IT systems.



In doing so, IBM aims to increase data portability across environments and make it easier for developers to work across cloud and non-cloud environments.



IBM is dedicating more than half its cloud development team to hybrid cloud innovations, including hundreds of developers working on open cloud standards.



IBM is offering the following services via composable API-based services on its Bluemix cloud development platform:



IBM Enterprise Containers: Help developers rapidly build and deliver applications by extending native Linux containers with Docker APIs to provide enterprise-class visibility, control and security as well as an added level of automation. Solutions developed in a cloud environment could be brought to on-premises systems for execution,



IBM DataWorks: New, intuitive tooling and experience to find, refine, enrich and deliver trusted data. This allows developers to subdivide and manipulate data sets from the treasure trove of public and private data.



Collaborative Operations: Enhanced visibility and control of clients' hybrid environments with a single, end-to-end view.



Orchestration: Available as a service enabling management across hybrid environments that is the largest federated orchestration library in the industry.



Security: New features that protect the most vital data and applications using analytics across the enterprise, public and private clouds and mobile devices.



In addition, IBM is releasing new services for developers, including a secure Passport gateway to Bluemix and an extension of Bluemix to the company data center



IBM has also unveiled the Watson Zone, a new resource center on Bluemix that brings together Watson APIs, sample code, training resources and use cases. IBM also announced the general availability of the Watson Personality Insights service, which allows developers to integrate new capabilities to analyze trends and patterns in diverse, high-volume social media and other public data streams. The commercial launch follows the addition of five new betas Watson services to Bluemix including Speech to Text, Text to Speech, Visual Recognition, Concept Insights and Tradeoff Analytics. These services are available free of charge.