IBM Strengthens AMD Partnership, Extends Opteron-Based Server Line

This IDC Flash focuses on IBM's announcement of five x86 servers based on the AMD Opteron processor. These servers extend IBM's System x server line, adding models that address customer demand for servers aimed at a new workload target IBM has dubbed "Business Performance Computing" (BPC), a set of enterprise workloads that are both memory intensive and processing intensive, like high-performance computing (HPC) workloads, yet support general business needs through support of line-of-business (LOB) applications and preservation of corporate data in scalable databases. At the same time, these models will compete with Opteron-based models from other vendors leveraging the same AMD Opteron processor technology in rack-optimized and bladed servers - increasing competition within the x86 server segment for new customer workloads.