Five Minute Briefing - Data Center
April 23, 2018

Five Minute Briefing - Data Center: April 23, 2018. Published in conjunction with SHARE Inc., a bi-weekly report geared to the needs of data center professionals.

News Flashes

Bringing Blockchain into Insurance Operations

Marsh, a provider of insurance broking and risk management solutions, in collaboration with IBM, ACORD, and ISN, has introduced blockchain capabilities to an important part of the insurance value chain. The blockchain technology is being applied to the certificate of insurance process, intended to enable clients to speed up necessary business functions such as hiring contractors and transferring risk while increasing coverage certainty.

Compuware Adds Mainframe Web Interface, Machine-Learning Tool

Compuware released a new web interface and mainframe machine-learning tool intended to boost mainframe productivity. Compuware's latest release of ThruPut Manager, a web interface, helps provide mainframe staff with visually intuitive insight into how batch jobs are being initiated and executed, as well as the impact of those jobs on mainframe software licensing costs.

IBM Reports Revenue Growth Across the Board for Q1, Including Mainframes

IBM saw growth in just about all of its business sectors, including mainframe and midrange-class sales in the first quarter of 2018. Overall systems revenues—including systems hardware and operating systems software—were $1.5 billion, up 8%, driven by growth in IBM Z and Power, the company reported.

New “Skinny Mainframe” Announced by IBM

With cloud, the mainframe just keeps getting smaller and more portable. IBM has announced it will be shipping a new, 19-inch, single-frame mainframe built on IBM z14 technology, capable of processing more than 850 million fully encrypted transactions per day on a single system. These "skinny mainframes" are designed for easy placement in both public cloud data centers and private cloud deployments. It's the result of IBM working closely with more than 80 clients to create a mainframe that meets their needs.