The new model coming next week, to be called the BladeCentre T, will mean the company can aim the products at a new customer niche. But Big Blue is aiming its blade servers at a much larger base of buyers, planning models for IBM's mainframe and Unix server customers.
The expansion to most corners of the product line is smart if IBM can transfer enough high-end features into the blades, Gartner analyst John Enck said. "It makes a lot of sense if you can get to common infrastructure," in which many types of computing hardware modules can be plugged into a common system, "but the devil is in the details."
In IBM's vision, servers are headed in two general directions: hulking machines bigger than refrigerators and packed with dozens of processors, and blade servers with different types of thin systems that slip into a common chassis the way books fit into a bookshelf.
Blades' revenue edge
The large systems have been around for decades, but blades are new territory for most buyers. But it's not hard to see why IBM's so interested.
For one thing, blade-server revenue jumped 548 per cent from 2002 to 2003, according to market researcher IDC, and analysts project more growth. IBM leads the blade market with a 35 per cent share, with Hewlett-Packard in second at 31 per cent, and Dell and Sun Microsystems following.
For another, blade customers more often buy other IBM gear: About 25 per cent buy storage network technology for their blades compared with less than 10 per cent for regular Intel server customers, and twice as many blade customers buy external storage systems than regular Intel server customers, Tim Dougherty, director of IBM's BladeCentre line, said in an interview on Monday.
And there's another sales angle: a customer who buys an IBM blade is likely to have to come back to IBM or its partners to buy upgraded blades or other equipment that can be plugged into an IBM blade chassis.
"There are definitely vendor lock-in issues. That's why the vendors like [blades] so much," said Enck, adding that the lock-in issues have also been a factor that has made some customers leery.
Another roadblock for blades meeting their full potential is the comparatively slow data transfer speed of the "backplane" that interconnects a group of blades, Enck said. A faster backplane could permit bunches of blades to jointly house a single database, he said.
IBM is aware of the limit. "The first thing that causes us to go to a different chassis will be the need to upgrade the backplane," Dougherty said. It's sufficient today for 1-gigabit-per-second Ethernet networks, but not for the upcoming 10Gpbs networking speed, he said.
Expanding beyond Intel servers
IBM has expanded its blade-server line from its beginnings as just a housing for servers using Intel processors. This month, IBM began shipping its JS20 model, which uses two PowerPC 970 processors and runs Linux.
In 2005, the Power blades will begin resembling IBM's Unix server line, with a system comprising four PowerPC 970 processors, Dougherty said. And with a four-processor model, IBM's version of Unix -- called AIX -- becomes a compelling alternative to Linux, he said.
In addition, IBM has blades containing Advanced Micro Devices' Opteron processor working in its labs. Although IBM hasn't committed to sell it, "If I were to bet, I'd say you'll probably see it," Dougherty said.
HP has said it will begin selling an Opteron blade in the third quarter.
For IBM's nearer-term plans, there is the BladeCentre T. That system will meet telecommunication customers' requirements, such as the ability to run off direct current (DC) power and certification to the Network Equipment Building Standard (NEBS) standard, which means a system has been tested to withstand smoke, shaking, and very high or low temperatures, Dougherty said.
While the BladeCentre chassis will change to meet these telecommunications requirements, the blade servers within will be the same as for the conventional BladeCentre, he said.
Mainframe blades
Dougherty also shed some light on IBM's plan to offer a blade spawned from IBM's zSeries mainframe line, in a move that could spread mainframe technology by making it less expensive.
"It will allow us to come into a space below where the zSeries is currently sitting, as opposed to saying 'this is the new zSeries'," Dougherty said. But don't expect it soon: "You're talking maybe two years out. There's lots of engineering issues to be solved there."
The mainframe blade will fit in with IBM's marketing pitch of "infrastructure simplification," in which IBM suggests customers move from their current complicated server arrangement to a combination of mainframes and blades, Dougherty said.
There's still room for lower-priced mainframes, Enck said. "There are a lot of small mainframes being sold. That continues to be an opportunity for IBM," he said.
