IBM launches z13 mainframe, ‘built for mobile economy’

• Big Blue claims it’s the most powerful and secure system ever built
• Result of US$1bil investment, 5yrs of development, 500 new patents

IBM has announced the z13, which it claimed is the most sophisticated computer system ever built, and which delivers scale and economics together with real-time encryption and analytics to help meet the expectations of consumers for speed and safety for trillions of transactions in the mobile economy.
 
The z13 system is the result of a US$1-billion investment, five years of development and the innovation of more than 500 new patents, and represents a collaboration with more than 60 clients, the company said in a statement.

IBM's new mainframe provides unprecedented new capabilities, including:

• The z13 is the first system able to process 2.5 billion transactions a day, equivalent of 100 Cyber Mondays every day of the year. z13 transactions are persistent, protected and auditable from end-to-end, adding assurance as mobile transactions grow – estimated to grow to 40 trillion mobile transactions per day by 2025.

• It is the first system to make practical real-time encryption of all mobile transactions at any scale. The z13 speeds real-time encryption of mobile transactions to help protect the transaction data and ensure response times consistent with a positive customer experience, IBM said.

• The system includes 500 new patents including cryptographic encryption technologies that enable more security features for mobile initiated transactions.

• It is the first mainframe system with embedded analytics providing real-time insights on all transactions. This capability can help guarantee the ability of the client to run real-time fraud detection on 100% of their business transactions by delivering ‘on the fly’ analytic insights that are 17 times faster than compared competitive systems at a fraction of the cost, the company claimed.

The rapid growth of mobile applications has created consumers who expect mobile transactions to be fast and seamless, regardless of which mobile payment platform, retailer, or financial organisation is providing the service, IBM said.
 
As a result, businesses are being forced to evaluate whether their IT infrastructures can support mobile applications that meet and exceed these consumer expectations – or face the potential of losing clients to competing businesses.

“Every time a consumer makes a purchase or hits refresh on a smartphone, it can create a cascade of events on the backend of the computing environment,” said Tom Rosamilia, senior vice president, IBM Systems.
 
“The z13 is designed to handle billions of transactions for the mobile economy. Consumers expect fast, easy and secure mobile transactions.
 
“The implication for business is the creation of a secure, high performance infrastructure with sophisticated analytics,” he added.

Secure, trusted mobile transactions

As mobile adoption grows, consumers are driving exponentially larger numbers of mobile transactions. Each of these mobile transactions triggers a cascade of events across computing systems, IBM said.
 
These events include comparisons to past purchases, data encryption and decryption, bank-to-bank reconciliations, and customer loyalty discounts.
 
This cascade of events causes a so-called ‘starburst effect,’ where a single transaction can trigger as few as four or as many as 100 additional system interactions.

Consequently, the starburst effect can create security vulnerabilities at each interaction point. In fact, 71% of CIOs (chief information officers) and IT managers surveyed by IBM indicated that security is their most significant mobile enterprise challenge.
 
With data and transactions under constant threat from multiple points of attack, consumers want to know that their mobile transactions are as secure as financial data held by banks.

When combined with IBM MobileFirst solutions, the z13 delivers enhanced performance, availability, analytics and security that will drive optimal mobile user experiences, the company said.
 
IBM MobileFirst Platform enables organisations to deliver better, more secure apps. IBM MobileFirst Protect delivers seamless security and end-to-end management of clients’ infrastructure and all its devices, apps, content and transactions.

Insight with every transaction, fighting fraud

The z13 features the world’s fastest microprocessor, two times faster than the most common server processors, 300% more memory, 100% more bandwidth and vector processing analytics to speed mobile transactions, IBM claimed.
 
As a result, the z13 transaction engine is capable of analysing transactions in real time and will be able to help prevent fraud as it is occurring, allowing financial institutions to halt the transaction before the consumer is impacted.
 
IBM has designed the z13 to integrate real-time scoring and guarantees this capability as a feature of the system. This scoring can be used for fraud detection on 100% of a client's business transactions.

In addition to assistance with fraud prevention, businesses looking to enhance their customer loyalty programmes will be able to use new z13 capabilities to add more personalisation by gaining a real-time view of a client’s purchasing habits to offer up-sell and cross-sell promotions before they leave the store – and in some cases before they even enter.

Businesses today don’t have the ability to analyse 100% of a consumer’s transaction. With the z13, businesses will be able to use IBM’s predictive analytics modelling technology, SPSS, and personalise the transaction as it occurs.

For more information on the z13 and the IBM z Systems portfolio, visit ibm.com/systems/z.

IBM Global Financing offerings for the new model z13 include customised Fair Market Value leases with payment deferrals for credit qualified customers that want to upgrade from older models to the z13, convert an owned z system to leasing while upgrading, or acquire a net new z13.

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