Building upon the company's commitment to providing clients open solutions based on Linux and virtualization technologies, IBM announced its extensive portfolio of middleware and systems platforms will support Novell's new SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 offerings. The new SUSE Linux Enterprise offerings incorporate the open source Xen virtualization software to help businesses increase server utilization and lower management costs.

IBM will support Xen technology as part of the Virtualization Engine portfolio on the company's Intel and Opteron processor based server and IBM BladeCenter systems. Additionally, IBM has plans to support SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 from Novell across its entire IBM systems hardware line and IBM middleware portfolio and provide services support.

Xen is an open source virtualization software that allows multiple operating systems to run concurrently on the same physical server, allowing customers to consolidate their current workloads onto a single server. Recent tests by Novell shows customers may have the ability to increase server utilization by nearly 70 percent, as well as help increase the efficiency of managing and provisioning Linux systems.

"This combination of SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 and Xen offers clients the most innovative open technology solution in the market today for running virtualized IT environments," said Scott Handy, vice president, Worldwide Linux and Open Source, IBM. "IBM is committed to Xen because we believe it is a powerful open source technology that will help accelerate a standard virtualization technology platform to enable high levels of simplicity across diverse platforms."

These announcements are the latest initiative in IBM's continuing strategy to embrace virtualization across its entire product portfolio. By 2007, IDC expects the virtualization market to reach $18 billion.  Already, IBM offers products and services to help virtualize and manage more than 80 percent of a heterogeneous IT environment.

Jeff Jaffe, executive vice president and chief technology officer for Novell, said, "Novell is the first company to delivery fully supported Linux innovations like Xen virtualization technology. The combination of IBM's deep expertise with virtualization and our new distribution incorporating Xen is a powerful combination that can help clients reduce their total cost of ownership."