INDUSTRY

SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HWP) today announced it plans to offer the HP Utility Data Center (UDC) to help extend grid computing for commercial use. By connecting the HP UDC to the grid, HP is helping accelerate the adoption of grid technologies by providing both technical and commercial computing environments with more security and flexibility. "Security has been a primary concern when companies consider the grid environment as a viable option for getting computing power as a service," said Vernon Turner, vice president, commercial systems and servers, IDC. "By hosting the grid environment through its Utility Data Center, HP is providing customers with the best of both worlds -- computing power on demand and the highest levels of data security." The HP UDC segments the pool of computing power into varying levels of security and allows for dynamic allocation of resources without compromising that security. "The grid must be trusted to be used, and one of HP's priorities is to build trust and security into the computing infrastructure from the hardware up," said Rick Hayes-Roth, chief technology officer, HP Software. "Though many companies can host grid environments, HP can now provide data security through the HP UDC across the physical infrastructure, as well as across grids." The HP UDC, announced last November, is self-adapting, self-healing and policy-driven, meaning computing power allocation and management is automated. In addition, the HP UDC's open system supports multiple hardware vendors and operating systems, giving customers more flexibility. This marriage of grid computing and HP's Utility Data Center is a result of HP's extensive research, which, according to a recent report from Gartner, gives HP up to an 18-month lead in the policy-based computing space. For more information visit www.hp.com