IBM today announced that JVC KENWOOD Holdings, Inc., the joint holding company of Victor Company of Japan, Limited (JVC), and Kenwood Corporation (Kenwood), has signed a 2.6 billion yen, six-year strategic outsourcing contract with IBM Japan for the management of its information technology (IT) systems and shared hosting services.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20090416/IBMLOGO )

JVC KENWOOD Holdings will leverage cloud computing to create a dynamic infrastructure that acts more like the Internet to allow access to vast pools of technology resources during periods of high volume.

The new system will IBM's Shared Hosting Services for IBM System z mainframes (zSHS) and will be hosted out of IBM's data center in Makuhari, Chiba, Japan. The zSHS model will provide flexible IT assets and resources according to system demands and needs. The shared, virtual infrastructure on System z gives the company enterprise-class qualities of service at an optimal cost. IBM will also centralize IT resources by relocating JVC KENWOOD Holdings' existing data centers in Saitama and Tokyo to IBM's Makuhari Data Center, which has a sophisticated seismic- isolated structure and fully redundant electrical system for increased resiliency and security.

IBM System z has a long history of providing shared workloads in a single server with rapid automation of server provisioning and de-provisioning, making it an ideal candidate to deliver virtual assets to a multitude of tenants.

  The contract was signed in April 2009.

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  For more information, visit www.ibm.com/services.

  Media Contacts:
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  IBM Media Relations
  kazk@jp.ibm.com
  03-3808-4770

  Jen Knecht
  IBM Media Relations
  knechtj@us.ibm.com
  917-472-3607

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FCMN Contact: knechtj@us.ibm.com

SOURCE: IBM