IBM unveils $1 billion investment in cloud software development

IBM revealed a more than $1 billion cloud platform-as-a-service investment on Monday, opening its middleware to the cloud for the first time and bolstering the connectivity of enterprise applications and data to the cloud. The investment was disclosed to more than 9,000 clients, partners and developers at IBM’s Feb. 23-26 cloud conference in Las Vegas, which kicked off in earnest on Monday.

International Business Machines Corp. (IBM:US) is expanding its cloud services to lure customers to its SoftLayer Technologies Inc. business that it’s counting on to help reverse seven quarters of falling sales (IBM:US). IBM is making it easier for developers to build and adjust applications in the cloud, where information is delivered online instead of stored on local servers, said Danny Sabbah, chief technology officer of IBM’s Next Generation Platform. The Armonk, New York-based company plans to spend (IBM:US) more than $1 billion on cloud software development through 2015, a double-digit percentage increase from the past two years.