Search giant follows Microsoft in offering route to legacy workload modernization via new Power Systems service in Google Cloud Platform. Credit: Reuters Enterprises looking for a way to modernize legacy AS/400 workloads now have a new option: Move them onto Google Cloud Platform. Google won’t host your old AS/400 for you, but it is renting time on IBM Power Systems servers, the AS/400’s architectural successors. Its announcement follows a similar one from Microsoft in September. At the same time, Google is introducing a Premium Support plan to maintain high-availability services, making the GCP more attractive to CIOs averse to down-time. IBM introduced its AS/400 midrange computers in 1988, shipping over half a million units over the next decade. They were succeeded by the iSeries server and later the Power Systems range, while the operating system they ran, OS/400, has been replaced by IBM i. Today’s systems can — and sometimes do — still run much of the same software. Vormittag Associates Inc. (VAI), a developer of enterprise management software in Ronkonkoma, N.Y., still targets the platform and is one of the companies, along with its customers, that stands to benefit from Google’s and Microsoft’s moves. Its software now runs on IBM i but “it goes back to the heritage of System i and iSeries, and way back to the AS/400 days,” says VAI’s CIO Kevin Beasley. “Now Google hosts IBM i, IBM hosts it, Microsoft hosts it. … Back when we started there weren’t many places that you could actually find IBM i hosted.” Thousands of other companies are still running systems built on the old AS/400 architecture, according to all400s.com, a website that tracks job offerings for IT workers with AS/400 skills, prompting the cloud giants to look for ways to serve these businesses. Microsoft introduced IBM Power9 instances to its Azure cloud last Fall with the help of another Seattle company, Skytap. Google began quietly offering access to IBM Power Systems servers running AIX, IBM’s own flavor of Unix, around the same time. This week Google took the wraps off a fuller offering, now also able to run Linux on IBM Power and the successor to the AS/400, IBM i. Among the applications that run on IBM i are SAP, Oracle and IBM’s own DB2 database. Putting these into the cloud will allow enterprises to link them with more modern technologies. In Google’s case, that means giving legacy apps private API access to other Google Cloud resources, and allocating private IP addresses to each Power Systems logical partition, all on the same bill as other cloud services. Alongside the Power Systems servers, Google is also introducing a premium 24/7 support plan with 15-minute response time and a cloud API for integration with an enterprise’s own IT support system, for any cloud customer willing to pay the price. Pricing starts at $150,000 per year, plus a percentage of spend on the services supported. Related content news US government extends warrantless FISA monitoring Section 702 of FISA has a new lease on life thanks to a reauthorization passed over the weekend. By Jon Gold Apr 23, 2024 3 mins Regulation Government Privacy opinion Will AI kill jobs? History says otherwise AI, like previous technological advancements, will transform how we live, work, and think. What can we learn from the past for guidance on how to thrive during today’s intelligence revolution? By Dave Wright Apr 23, 2024 8 mins Enterprise Artificial Intelligence Careers feature 7 enterprise cloud strategy trends for 2024 Cloud customers are always searching for new approaches, technologies, and strategies. Here’s what to look for — and look out for — in a rapidly evolving field. By John Edwards Apr 23, 2024 7 mins Technology Industry Cloud Management Hybrid Cloud feature SAFe certification: launch your Scaled Agile Framework career The Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) helps large organizations leverage the benefits of agile, putting those who have SAFe certification in demand. Here's how to point your SAFe career in the right direction. By Moira Alexander Apr 23, 2024 12 mins Certifications Agile Development Project Management PODCASTS VIDEOS RESOURCES EVENTS SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe