IBM has announced partnering with Canonical in order to build two mainframe server models running Ubuntu Linux operating systems.
According to the TechCrunch, the first of the new mainframes is called Emperor and runs on the IBM z13, while the other is a smaller entry-level server called the Rockhopper. The new marketing approach of IBM includes deeper involvement with other open source projects, a monthly subscription pricing model, participating in the newly launched Open Mainframe Project, and contributing a huge cache of mainframe code to open source.
As part of IBM's broader strategy to promote security, analytics and the cloud, the company is hoping to expand the potential market for mainframes by running open source Ubuntu Linux operating systems on its servers and supporting a range of popular open source enterprise software including Chef, Node.js, PostgreSQL, Apache Spark, MariaDB and MongoDB.
The general manager for IBM Systems, Ross Mauri, said that the company has quarterly between 10 and 20 mainframe customers. By offering cloud-like and more elastic pricing model, IBM is hoping to land more customers who were hesitant previously because of the high up-front cost involving with investing in an IBM mainframe.
According to Mauri, billing will be based on how much the customer actually used the server, same as in the cloud model, even if the metered mainframe will still sit inside the customer's on-premises data center. With the Linux-only mainframe servers called LinuxONE, IBM hopes to increase its profits on the server market niche.
According to the company, its LinuxONE Emperor mainframe server can scale up to thousands of containers or 8,000 virtual machines. This performance is higher than most of any other single Linux systems. The Linux One Emperor system based on IBM's z13 mainframe computer had been designed for mobile transactions at high-volume.
IBM also announced that it partnered with UK-based Canonical Ltd for the distribution of its Ubuntu open source software on z systems and LinuxONE mainframe servers.
