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Computerworld - AT&T Corp. will launch a managed utility computing service late this year based on hardware from Sun Microsystems Inc. as one of several improvements to its hosting service, AT&T executives revealed in interviews last week.
The utility computing service, to be formally announced and offered sometime in the fourth quarter, would give businesses automatic and on-demand access to computing resources to scale up and down efficiently, said Mike Jenner, vice president of hosting and application management services at AT&T.
Jenner also said AT&T will add server virtualization capabilities for its hosting clients in the fourth quarter.
For users, the big advantages of both utility computing and server virtualization include the ability to rapidly provision IT resources and avoid the cost of investing in server hardware, Jenner said.
"Customers spend a lot in capital, while their systems often go underutilized much of the year," said Christina Costello, director of product management for AT&T's managed hosting and utility computing services unit.
Service Charges
Companies that choose the utility computing option will pay a base fee each month to get access to a dedicated server -- roughly half the cost of leasing one -- plus a variable utilization charge, AT&T said.

Turbine Inc. is interested in utility computing to cope with surges in server demand when it releases new online multiplayer games like this one.

One existing AT&T hosting customer, Turbine Inc., has been discussing the utility computing service with AT&T "quite seriously," said Michael Hogan, vice president of technology and operations at the Westwood, Mass.-based maker of online games. Turbine is looking at utility computing as a means of handling the enormous surges in network usage it experiences when it releases new multiplayer games.
"We're always looking for ways to spike up capability for the first weeks [after a new game release] and then back off," he said.
With one earlier game release, Hogan noted, Turbine "grossly underestimated resources" and ended up trying to throw hardware at the problem. Conceivably, with a utility computing service, Turbine would "have a plan in place, quickly scale up in the near term and roll off," he said.
Analysts said AT&T's utility computing service appears to be the first offered by a network services provider. Sun, IBM, Savvis Inc. and Electronic Data Systems Corp. offer utility computing and utility storage services, but the market hasn't grown as much as first projected two years ago, said Ted Chamberlin, an analyst at Gartner Inc.
"Utility computing has been cooking along for a while, but there is limited interest init," Chamberlin said. "Customers don't exactly call up and say, 'Give me some of that utility computing.'"

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