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Emerging markets, cloud in IBM focus

Emerging markets, such as Brazil, China and India, along with cloud-computing, analytics tools and solutions for a smart planet are IBM Corp.’s four main global initiatives. Big Blue believes that the combination of these four sectors will drive its growth in the coming years. “While we celebrate IBM’s 100th anniversary, we need to look at next 100 years, and it will be driven by innovation and IT benefits for society,” said Ricardo Pelegrini, IBM Brazil CEO, during the opening of IBM Forum in São Paulo.

Cloud-computing is becoming one of the fastest-growing markets worldwide, and IBM estimates that cloud solutions will represent US $7 billion of company’s revenue by 2015. “We are aggressively embracing the cloud,” emphasized Erich Clementi, senior VP at IBM Global technology services.

Asked about why many CIOs still resist adopting cloud-computing, Clementi explained that in the enterprise segment there are some problems to be solved, such as security, privacy and compliance. In the other hand, consumers are largely adopting cloud-based services. Enterprise deployment is going to happen. “We see a transformation in how companies outsource, from full outsourcing to vendors creating specialized delivery centers. For the next five years we will be an increase in new models and technologies, such as cloud computing.”

Emergent markets
Brazil presents a potential growth market for IBM. However, the country must to resolve some issues such as investments in research and development. “Brazil has a huge gap in innovation. Compared to other countries, Brazilian private-sector investments are lower. Private companies invest 0.5% of GDP in innovation, while in Japan it’s about 2.7% and in the U.S. 1.9%,” said Pelegrini, IBM Brazil CEO.

However, executives emphasized that IT sector growth is two times bigger than Brazilian GDP. This could explain why IBM decided to install in Brazil its ninth lab, called IBM Research. Globally, IBM invests about US $6 billion per year on R&D. “We are investing in Brazil, China and India and we want to participate in their growth,” said Clementi.

IBM also has installed in Brazil its Service Innovation Lab (SIL), which is dedicated to integrate knowledge from IBM’s scientist, mathematics, researchers and service specialists around the globe. Globally, SIL comprises about 200 technology experts hand-picked from around the company. IBM believes that the lab will accelerate the expansion of real-time analytics and software automation in both IBM’s technology services offerings and its global services delivery capabilities. Initially, the lab is focusing on the creation of services software applications for cloud computing, analytics and mobility.

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ABOUT AUTHOR

Roberta Prescott
Roberta Prescott
Editor, [email protected] Roberta Prescott is responsible for Latin America reporting news and analysis, interviewing key stakeholders. Roberta has worked as an IT and telecommunication journalist since March 2005, when she started as a reporter with InformationWeek Brasil magazine and its website IT Web. In July 2006, Prescott was promoted to be the editor-in-chief, and, beyond the magazine and website, was in charge for all ICT products, such as IT events and CIO awards. In mid-2010, she was promoted to the position of executive editor, with responsibility for all the editorial products and content of IT Mídia. Prescott has worked as a journalist since 1998 and has three journalism prizes. In 2009, she won, along with InformationWeek Brasil team, the press prize 11th Prêmio Imprensa Embratel. In 2008, she won the 7th Unisys Journalism Prize and in 2006 was the editor-in-chief when InformationWeek Brasil won the 20th media award Prêmio Veículos de Comunicação. She graduated in Journalism by the Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Campinas, has done specialization in journalism at the Universidad de Navarra (Spain, 2003) and Master in Journalism at IICS – Universidad de Navarra (Brazil, 2010) and MBA – Executive Education at the Getulio Vargas Foundation.