Automation behind IBM's Australian Open cloud

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 17 January 2012 11:40

Blue skies greeted the opening days of the Australian Open tennis tournament, but the IT behind the event is cloudier than ever.

IBM has a longstanding relationship with several major sports event, and 2012 marks the nineteenth year it has been the IT provider to Tennis Australia.

Tennis Australia CIO Samir Mahir (right) and Patrick Childress, program manager of IBM's events group

A key characteristic is the extreme peaks in demand around such event, with much lower levels of demand for resources for the rest of the year. This makes the Australian Open and similar events ideal candidates for what IBM previously called 'on demand' computing but has now adopted the more widely used label of private cloud.

Tennis Australia CIO Samir Mahir said the focus this year was on the resilience and scalability that cloud computing can provide. "IBM is uniquely positioned to help an event like ours," he said.

The main change since 2011 was enhanced disaster recovery, building on the experience at last year's US Open when Hurricane Irene approached the area just before the tournament. "You want to make sure you're ready in case something happens," said Mr Mahir.

Patrick Childress, program manager of IBM's events group, said "IBM's very good at sharing experience with other partners."

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