IBM Outlines Priorities For Developing Mobile Computing Software

Lotus Notes collaboration software

The Lotus support for Android was one of several announcements IBM made in the mobility software arena Wednesday. The company also formally opened a software development lab in Littleton, Mass. -- the company’s largest in North America -- where developing software for mobile applications will be a focus.

But IBM has no intention of getting into the mobile device market itself, said Steve Mills, senior vice president and head of IBM’s Software Group, speaking at the dedication ceremony for the new IBM Mass Lab. “There’s no IBM brand name out there on any mobile devices, nor do we intend to put the IBM brand name onto any mobile devices,” he said.

Mills made it clear that in the mobile communications market IBM sees its opportunities as providing collaboration, service management, business integration, information management and data analysis software, particularly to communications service providers.

Wednesday, for example, IBM unveiled Intelligent Site Operations, a new collection of software and services for communications service providers to maintain customer services and troubleshoot problems. The package includes IBM’s Tivoli Netcool service management software and Maximo asset management tools.

IBM also unveiled WebSphere CEA Mobile Widgets, software that retailers, insurance companies and other businesses can use to assemble transaction-processing applications for mobile devices.

Mills, in a presentation, said spending by the mobile communications industry for application development, analytics, traffic management, information storage, unified communications, application management and business process integration technology would reach $250 billion by 2015.

“We see a lot of opportunity out there and a lot of money that’s going to be spent and we’d like it to be spent with IBM,” Mills said.

The IBM Mass Lab campus, made up of sites in the adjoining towns of Littleton and Westford along Route 495, is intended to pull together personal from some 14 area companies IBM has acquired in recent years, including Ascential Software, Cognos, Guardium, Ounce Labs and Rational Software.

IBM has 70 software development labs worldwide and the Littleton facility is the largest in North America, the company said. The IBM Mass Lab will house 3,400 developers and software engineers -- 10 percent of all IBM developers, Mills said.

The facility, with a 59,000-square-foot data center, will develop software for systems management, mobile computing, collaboration, social networking, cloud computing and analytics. IBM also has a research center in Cambridge, Mass., and an innovation center for customers and business partners in Waltham, Mass.

Attending the formal dedication of the IBM Mass Lab was Mass. Governor Deval Patrick, who said information technology provides a foundation for other fast-growth industries Massachusetts is trying to attract, including biotechnology and clean energy.

And the governor, who is up for re-election in November, made it clear he’d like to see even more IBM jobs in Massachusetts. “Am I clear Steve?” he said to Mills, to the audience’s laughter.