In UK, the press office is selling a rather pedestrian InfoPrint Solutions and IBM Lotusphere as top two slightly stale releases. In the US the Era of Stream Computing is complemented by IBM Research and SAP demonstrate new Cloud technology in the press releases.

Clearly unless one is a well known/famous blogger or the acceptable face of the print/web industry, nothing else matters. Gaberlunzie having been taught that the press release was a basic given, to be followed up with expert opinion and deductions, realises that the horse’s mouth has long since gone to the knacker’s yard! So in accordance with IBMs 
intentions, Gaberlunzie offers second sourced information.

According to the Register,  with the Smart Cube on both Linux and i platforms this could be extended to AIX or Windows if wanted, but the contact will be IBM controlling the distribtuion and installation of the machines. The Smart Cube 7200 has dual core Xeon E3110 processor at 3Ghz, $GB main memory, four 250 GB SATAdisc and 500GB removable for archiving. The Smar Cube 7401 has quad core Xeon X330 at 2.66GHz, 8GB memory, four 500GB SATA discs and removable 1TB archiving. 
  
For price, a configured base x64-Linux Smart Cube with (applications) QuickBooks Enterprise sells for $7,745 for five users. Some applications get towards the $70,000 to $100,000 range, and a number of them even higher. Appliances are expensive.

IBM has not said when it will launch the Smart Cube appliances in Europe, but it is probably trying to get a core set of application providers in Germany and Italy together to flesh out the European Smart Market before it launches.  IBM will push Smart Cubes and local applications into Russia, China, and other high-growth markets where SMBs are short on IT skills and better equipped than their US counterparts on cash.

As for S stream (telling point released to Investors - different releases to analysts and the press) At its annual investor briefing last week, IBM announced the availability of its unique "stream computing" software that enables massive amounts of data to be analyzed in real time according to  Record Online      

The new software is called IBM System S. Big Blue is making System S trial code available at no cost to help clients better understand the software's capabilities and how they can take advantage of it for their business. This trial code includes developer tools, adapters and software to test applications.

Nearly instantaneous analysis System S is built for perpetual analytics — utilizing a new streaming architecture and mathematical algorithms to create a forward-looking analysis of data from any source — narrowing down precisely what people are looking for and continuously refining the answer as additional data is made available.

System S can analyse hundreds or thousands of simultaneous data streams — stock prices, retail sales, weather reports, etc. — and deliver nearly instantaneous analysis to business leaders who need to make split-second decisions. It believes the software will be invaluable to organizations that must react to changing conditions in real time, such as government and law enforcement agencies, financial institutions and hospitals. (And banks?)

IBM also opened its IBM European Stream Computing Center, HQ in Dublin, Ireland which serves as a hub of research, customer support and advanced testing for European clients who want to apply stream computing to their business problems.

IBM and Scotland?
Er.. "You need strong SOA leadership to enforce design and governance patterns," said Irwin, Group Technology director for Standard Life, headquartered in Edinburgh, Scotland. He spoke as part of IBM's Impact Smart SOA Conference 2009 in Las Vegas."

And an ex IBM livewire... Bloomberg announced that it has named Maureen A. McGuire chief marketing officer. McGuire spent more than 30 years at IBM, most recently as VP worldwide strategy and marketing, IBM Systems and Technology Group starting in January 2005. McGuire earned an MA from Glasgow University, Scotland.