On May 16, IBM announced a new strategic direction for the IBM Tivoli portfolio, shifting from product and technology resource management to a solution and services focus that helps clients automate and integrate their IT processes. The goal is to create a more efficient, effective and agile IT organization that is better able to deliver a portfolio of IT services to meet the requirements of the On Demand business.

IBM is delivering an integrated set of products, services and education designed to support IT Service Management. This is a cross IBM initiative that offers clients a better way to manage the business of IT, increasing the efficiency of IT management and improving the effectiveness of IT services in support of business goals. This approach allows IT leaders to more fully participate in creating strategic business value by harnessing key technologies.

The evolution of IBM's IT Service Management strategy includes enhancements to existing products, delivery of a new set of products targeted at IT process automation, and services to support the implementation and customization of IT processes. It also includes a defined and documented IT process model that demonstrates prescriptive approaches to IT process automation. IBM has harnessed decades of experience in designing, building, and delivering IT services for clients into developing these product and services enhancements.

The IBM IT Service Management launch complements IBM's rich set of products and services with offerings available now or being rolled out over the next several months:

• IBM Tivoli Unified Process (ITUP) - The industry's first online tool to provide the "how-to" for implementing best practice for mapping, modifying and improving IT processes. It provides "tool mentors" to help clients apply technology to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of IT processes and workflows. ITUP also is the first-ever solution to prescribe specific actions aligned with the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), a widely used industry guide of best practices for IT processes. It is available now at: www.ibm.com/software/tivoli/itservices
• IBM Tivoli Change and Configuration Management Database (CCMDB) - A "virtualized" database that federates IT information that is spread across multiple databases. The CCMDB can provide a single view of an application running on a dozen servers, so IT staffers can make more informed decisions that affect the business - such as administering passwords so the right people have access to the right systems. This is particularly important for organizations grappling with compliance and governance issues in increasingly complex environments
• IBM Tivoli Process Managers - First-of- kind, pre-packaged software that can automate IT processes, such as coordinating application deployment across software, hardware, storage and network technologies. These turnkey products also can be customized to a particular industry, such as healthcare or retail. IBM Process Managers will support change and release management, availability management, and managing and storing information on demand
• Customized Services - IBM Global Services is offering customized services around the new IT service management solutions as a natural extension of IBM's move to asset-based services. This hybrid software-service delivery model speeds the development and deployment of software and services to solve specific business problems, combining software code, intellectual property and best practices accumulated by IBM Global Services and its work with clients

Just as importantly, IBM Tivoli is enhancing existing products to support IT Service Management. Specific product enhancements will be announced as they are released throughout the year. "This is not a rip and replace situation," said Chris O'Connor, vice president of Availability and Business Service Management, Tivoli Software Group. "Essentially, we're taking the expertise we've gained from years of helping clients implement best practices for integration, and packaging that expertise into tools our clients can use to integrate the technology they already have. Through IT Service Management enhancements, we're more effectively enabling clients to manage IT as a business."

IT organizations are under tremendous pressure to adapt to change, meet increasingly stringent compliance issues, manage the complexity of heterogeneous systems and composite applications, and at the same time lower operational management and administration costs. IBM IT Service Management enhancements improve the way in which clients can call on IBM to address the escalating need for process integration.

With these enhancements, IBM can help businesses better manage their IT infrastructures to more efficiently and effectively deliver IT services where they need them most in the organization. A solid IT services and infrastructure management strategy combined with IT management technologies enables clients to: harness key IT technologies to drive business value and support the success of the organization; manage IT the way it should be - as an integrated set of business and IT processes; deliver IT services based on priorities of the business; and create repeatable processes for delivering IT services and use those processes to measure and improve the business value IT delivers.

To help clients more efficiently achieve true enterprise-wide integration, IBM Tivoli has drawn on IBM's extensive experience helping clients implement industry-wide best practices - expertise based on more than 10 years in a leadership role with the standards body responsible for ITIL. IBM Tivoli also has been working closely with clients, analysts and industry advisory groups to build on this comprehensive approach.

"As our clients around the world already know, IBM laid the foundation for systems management nearly thirty years ago, and has been a leader in helping clients run IT as a business using our own experience blended with best practice frameworks such as ITIL," said David Parker, vice president of Business Lines Marketing, IBM Global Services. "We are excited about how these new software offerings will allow clients to address ITIL even more quickly and efficiently."

Rich Ptak, of Ptak, Noel Associates, stresses the need: "IT services deliver the business services that drive competitive advantage and success. In an On Demand computing environment, IT service management must be well-planned, intelligent, automated, and integrated to provide the information and control needed by operations and line of business executives. IBM clearly understands and is delivering solutions to address these needs."

For the latest information on IBM IT Service Management, visit: www.ibm.com/software/tivoli/itservices

For information about IBM's involvement with ITIL and currently available services, visit:
http://www-1.ibm.com/services/us/index.wss/dt/its/a1000593



If you have been forwarded this Newsletter and would like to subscribe please click here.