IBM thinks provisioning with ThinkDynamics purchase

IBM acquired privately held ThinkDynamics on Monday, a move IBM executives say will accelerate Big Blue’s aggressive cross-business unit on-demand strategy. IBM says the provisioning muscle is designed to help customers improve responsiveness by properly allocating IT resources to where they are needed most at any given time.

ThinkDynamics’ software will fit snugly into IBM’s recently rolled out “automation blueprint” by provisioning servers, networks, and databases, and then tie correlated information and workflow processes back into how the business is actually performing, said Robert LeBlanc, GM of Austin, Tex.-based Tivoli.

“It’s all about helping customers link IT and their business and align it in an automated way so the IT infrastructure can adapt,” said LeBlanc of the Toronto, Ont.-based ThinkDynamics purchase. “We felt this was very synergistic on what we were trying to do with on demand (and) we saw it working very well with systems management capabilities we already have with the Tivoli portfolio.”

LeBlanc said IBM’s Tivoli software business will assume “custodial” control over the ThinkDynamics technology. However, the technology will be managed and fed to multiple IBM units, including software, hardware, and services, and outsourcing. 

The Tivoli executive noted that ThinkDynamics’ open architecture platform based upon J2EE makes it a natural fit for IBM’s automation designs, as well as its Web services, and grid computing initiatives.

In particular, he said that IBM’s acquired provisioning software could appear in IBM’s eSourcing and eServer product lines, such as IBM’s BladeCenter in eServer X series offering, and may be pushed into IBM’s eHosting and other utility activities.

“We anticipate integration here with rest of IBM portfolio to happen very easily and very quickly,” he added.