IBM i On Google Cloud Not GA Yet
October 9, 2019 Alex Woodie
IT Jungle has learned that the IBM i portion of the IBM Power Systems for Google Cloud offering that IBM and Google jointly unveiled earlier this year is not yet generally available. The AIX portion, however, is ready for customers.
We have been tracking the progress of IBM i and Power Systems in Google Cloud since June 2018, when IBM i Chief Architect Steve Will mentioned during a panel discussion at the inaugural POWERUp conference that IBM was in close discussions with the Web giant to bring IBM i to its public cloud.
In April at the Google Next 2019 event in San Francisco, Carl Burnett, a distinguished engineer in the Power Systems software group, provided details of the new IBM Power Systems for Google Cloud, a new infrastructure as a service (IaaS) offering in the Google Cloud.
As part of the offering, Burnett explained, IBM would be responsible for maintaining all the hardware, firmware, and system software in the Google data center, while the customer is responsible for maintaining everything from the operating system on up.
Burnett’s presentation confirmed that he program involved IBM Power Systems S922 servers in US-East 4, a Google Cloud data center in Northern Virginia. The service entailed selling access to slices of IBM i, AIX, and Linux operating systems carved up by PowerVM, he said. You can access a recording of the presentation here.
We detailed all this in our September 18 story. This was the first time that we had confirmation from the companies that an IBM i IaaS cloud offering was in the works at Google Cloud. Several astute IT Jungle readers tried contacted Google to learn more, and were apparently told that the IBM i IaaS offering wasn’t available yet, despite what was shown in the demos.
A spokesperson for IBM, which added IBM i to its public cloud offering earlier this year, was unable to comment on the availability of the IaaS offering for IBM i at Google Cloud. A Google spokesperson confirmed that the IBM i portion of the IBM Power Systems for Google Cloud offering is not yet available.
While the AIX offering is generally available now, the IBM i offering is currently available only as part of a limited early access program. IBM i customers that are interested in participating in the early release program are encouraged to contact their business partners for more information on how to join the program.
Support for IBM i on public clouds appears to be building quickly. Last month we detailed how Skytap is working with Microsoft to support Power Systems running IBM i in its Azure public cloud. Amazon Web Services, it would appear, is the odd cloud out now when it comes to Power Systems in the public cloud.
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