Front cover

Introduction to IBM Power

Virtual Server Private Cloud

Tim Simon
Vijaybabu Ananimuthu
Samvedna Jha
Marius le Roux
Raydo Matthee
Arnold Ness
Adrian Orben
Borislav Stoymirski
Keith Uplinger
Henry Vo

IBM Power

Redpaper
IBM Redbooks

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

January 2025

REDP-5745-00
 Note: Before using this information and the product it supports, read the information in “Notices” on page v.

First Edition (January 2025)

This edition applies to IBM Power Virtual Server (December 2024).

This document was created or updated on February 3, 2025.

© Copyright International Business Machines Corporation 2025. All rights reserved.

Note to U.S. Government Users Restricted Rights -- Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GSA ADP Schedule
Contract with IBM Corp.
Contents

Notices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .v
Trademarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Now you can become a published author, too! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Comments welcome. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Stay connected to IBM Redbooks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

1.1 The IBM Hybrid by Design approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.2 Introduction to IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.3 Benefits of using IBM Power as your cloud platform. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.3.1 TCO Benefits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.3.2 No refactoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.3.3 Security and availability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.3.4 IBM Power Virtual Server Benefits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1.4 Cloud offerings for IBM Power systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
1.4.1 IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1.4.2 IBM Power Virtual Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
1.4.3 IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1.4.4 Choosing your cloud option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
1.5 Government regulations and compliance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.5.1 Black or disconnected sites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
1.6 Use cases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
1.6.1 Burst to cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
1.6.2 AI on Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
1.6.3 Database support . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
1.6.4 Development and test environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

2.1 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
2.1.1 Same management interface as IBM Power Virtual Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
2.1.2 Security and data governance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
2.1.3 Pay as you go model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
2.1.4 Dynamic provisioning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.1.5 Scalable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.1.6 Ease of implementation and migration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.2 Technology components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
2.2.1 Pods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
2.2.2 Compute . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
2.2.3 Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
2.2.4 Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
2.2.5 OS licensing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
2.2.6 IBM Cloud catalog. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
2.3 Pricing concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
2.3.1 Total cost of ownership versus cost of acquisition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
2.3.2 Pricing tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. iii

 Chapter 3. Planning Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
3.1 Planning overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
3.2 Prerequisites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
3.2.1 Basic Prerequisites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
3.2.2 Minimum size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
3.2.3 Supported Workloads and Operating Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
3.2.4 Proximity to IBM Cloud data center. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
3.2.5 Countries supported . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
3.3 Application assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
3.4 Sizing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
3.4.1 Compute sizing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
3.4.2 Storage sizing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
3.4.3 Scalability and flexibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
3.5 Network connectivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
3.5.1 Network prerequisites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
3.5.2 Network architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
3.6 Compliance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
3.7 Planning for integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
3.7.1 Network Connectivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
3.7.2 Data Migration. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
3.7.3 Backup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
3.7.4 Disaster Recovery. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
3.7.5 Application Compatibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
3.7.6 Security and Compliance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
3.7.7 Management and Monitoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
3.7.8 Steps for Effective Integration Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
3.7.9 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
3.8 Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
3.8.1 IBM services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
3.8.2 Unplanned network disconnection of management control plane. . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Chapter 4. Ordering and Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

4.1 Process overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
4.2 Finalizing configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
4.2.1 Technical delivery assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
4.3 Customer responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
4.3.1 Prerequisites for installing the Pod . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
4.3.2 Additional customer requirements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
4.4 IBM installation and decommission services. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
4.4.1 Deployment services. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
4.4.2 End of services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Chapter 5. Setup and operation examples for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud . 113
5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
5.2 Setting up your workspace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
5.3 Setting up a virtual server instance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Related publications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

IBM Redbooks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Online resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Help from IBM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124

iv Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Notices

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vi Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Preface

Enterprises adopting hybrid cloud and AI technologies require a flexible infrastructure for
performance, security, and interoperability. This adaptability enables organizations to remain
competitive, cut costs, and better respond to customer demands. To achieve this, enterprises
need platforms that allow for quick adjustments in workload management and placement,
focusing on business outcomes over infrastructure maintenance. IBM's Hybrid Cloud strategy
prioritizes flexibility and choice.

IBM Power Virtual Server has provided infrastructure-as-a-service globally since its 2019
launch, combining compute, storage, and networking in IBM data centers. This reliable
architecture supports mission-critical workloads and facilitates easy cloud migration without
refactoring. IBM has introduced a new Private Cloud version of IBM Power Virtual Server,
which installs infrastructure in a client data center, connecting a local zone to IBM Cloud® and
offering a consistent as-a-service experience. This model enhances agility, reliability, and
security, optimizing IT operations for diverse enterprise needs.

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud helps customers leverage hybrid cloud architecture
benefits, even when workloads are regulated, or data must stay in a specific country due to
government regulations.

Authors
This paper was produced by a team of specialists from around the world working at IBM
Redbooks, Remote Center.

Tim Simon is an IBM® Redbooks® Project Leader in Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA. He has over 40
years of experience with IBM, primarily in a technical sales role working with customers to
help them create IBM solutions to solve their business problems. He holds a BS degree in
Math from Towson University in Maryland. He has worked with many IBM products and has
extensive experience creating customer solutions using IBM Power, IBM Storage, and IBM
System z® throughout his career.

Vijaybabu Ananimuthu is a Technical Consultant at IBM Systems Experts Labs in India. He

holds a bachelor's degree (BE) in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Anna
University, Chennai. He has over 16 years of experience working with customers designing
and deploying solutions on IBM Power server and AIX®. He focuses on areas such as IT
Infrastructure Enterprise Solutioning, technical enablement and implementations relative to
IBM Power servers, Enterprise Pools, Performance, and automation. His areas of expertise
include capacity planning, migration planning, system performance and automation.

Samvedna Jha is a Senior Technical Staff Member in the IBM Power Systems organization,
Bengaluru, India. She holds a masters degree in Computer Application and has more than
twenty years of work experience. In her current role as Security Architect, IBM Power, she has
worldwide technical responsibility to handle security and compliance requirements of Power
products. Samvedna is a recognized speaker in conferences, has authored blogs and
published disclosures. She is also the security focal point for Power products secure release
process.

Marius le Roux is an adept IBM i professional with a robust background in operations,

development, and integration since 2006. His expertise extends beyond technical skills to a

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. vii

 profound understanding of overall enterprise concepts, enabling him to make impactful
decisions that enhance system functionality and business alignment. Through his
comprehensive experience with IBM i environments, Marius effectively bridges the gap
between complex IT solutions and strategic enterprise objectives. This unique blend of
technical acumen and business insight ensures that he not only executes projects but also
innovates and optimizes them for long-term success.

Raydo Matthee is a South African technology leader and Solutions Architect at Skunkworks
(Pty) Ltd, with over 15 years of experience in cloud computing, security, and enterprise
integration. Specializing in IBM Power Virtual Server and hybrid cloud solutions, Raydo helps
businesses integrate cloud technologies with a focus on security, compliance, and scalability.
He has authored multiple courses on topics like OWASP, HashiCorp, and cloud security,
reflecting his commitment to advancing IT education and consultancy.

Arnold Ness is a Senior Power Technology Sales Leader in Canada. He has 40 years of
experience in IBM and Ciena working with customers designing and implementing business
solutions leveraging technology. He holds an MBA in Information Technology Management
from Royal Roads University, an Electrical Engineering degree from the University of Alberta
and completed IBM's Client Executive program at Harvard. His areas of expertise include
solution design and development across x86, IBM Power and IBM 390 platforms. He was
awarded the Lou Gerstner Award for Client Excellence in 2022 and has implemented
solutions with clients across North and South America. His interests lie in technology
innovation, sustainability, Hybrid cloud, Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity, Internet of Things
(IoT), and Quantum-Safe Computing.

Adrian Orben joined IBM in 2003. Since 2006, he has been a member of the Storage
Support Team that is responsible for IBM high-end disk products. His focus is supporting IBM
DS8000®, IBM XIV®, and IBM Flash Systems. During this time, Adrian achieved several
storage-related certifications. Adrian holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Informatics from
the University of Applied Science Mainz, Germany.

Borislav Stoymirski is an IBM Power Servers Hardware Product Engineer at IBM Bulgaria,
specializing in solving complex hardware and software issues on IBM Power Servers,
including IBM AIX, VIOS, HMC, IBM i, PowerVC, PowerVM® NovaLink, PowerVM, Linux on
IBM Power Servers, and Red Hat OpenShift. Since joining IBM in 2015, he has provided
reactive break-fix, proactive, preventative, and cognitive support to several clients worldwide.
Borislav earned a masters degree in Computer and Software Engineering from the Technical
University of Sofia, Bulgaria, a masters degree in Transport Machinery and Technologies from
the Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria, and another masters degree in Ecology and
Environmental Protection from the University of Chemical Technology and Metallurgy,
Bulgaria. He has authored several publications and has led technical training programs both
inside and outside IBM. His interests lie in Green Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence, Deep
Learning, Machine Learning, Cybersecurity, Internet of Things (IoT), Edge Computing, Cloud
and Quantum Computing.

Keith Uplinger is an IT Architect for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud in Dallas, Texas,
USA. He has over 20 years of experience in developing full stack software solutions as well
as designing custom hardware solutions. He holds a degree in Computer Science from Texas
Tech University. He was the lead on IBM World Community Grid for many years and worked
towards optimizing research applications to further research in fields of Cancer, Weather,
Water Filtration and Covid. Keith was crucial to the development of Asynchronous Replication
Exchange for molecule folding application used for drug discovery. Most recently Keith has
been the primary developer on Power Virtual Server Private Cloud integrating many different
software requirements in automated fashion to accelerate the delivery time for a Pod ordered
by a customer.

viii Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Henry Vo is an IBM Redbooks Project Leader with more than 10 years of experience in IBM.
He has technical expertise in business problem solving, risk/root-cause analyze, and writing
technical plans for business. He has had multiple roles in IBM such as Project management,
ST/FT/ETE Test, Back End Developer, DOL agent for NY and is certified in IBM zOS
Mainframe Practices, IBM Z® System programming, Agile, and Telecommunication
Development Jumpstart. Henry holds a Master of MIS (Management Information System)
from the University of Texas at Dallas since 2012.

Thanks to the following people for their contributions to this project:

Dan Sundt
IBM i Power as-a-Service Product Manager
IBM Rochester, MN, USA

Boby Kuruvila George

Senior Solution Architect | IBM Cloud Infrastructure Solutions
IBM Sydney, NSW, Australia

Joe Cropper
Distinguished Engineer, Power as-a-Service & Hybrid Cloud; IBM Master Inventor
IBM Austin, TX, USA

Meera Rangarajan
Program Director, PowerVS Product Management, IBM Power
Bangalore, KA, India

Paul Finley
STSM, Power Hybrid Cloud XaaS
IBM Austin, TX, USA

Martin Vasica
Program Director for IBM Power XaaS Product Management
Bratislava, BL, Slovakia

Shrikant Joshi
IBM Consulting
IBM Cambridge, MA, USA

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Preface ix
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x Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 1

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design

IBM continues to invest in concepts that bring value to enterprises seeking to increase their
return on investment for infrastructure and cloud implementations. Hybrid by Design, a proven
architectural framework, leverages hybrid cloud technology to maximize business value. It
provides the agility, speed, and integration necessary for achieving future business outcomes.

Hybrid by Design, originally rooted in cloud architecture, outlines how organizations can
shape their hybrid cloud environments based on business priorities. By combining public and
private clouds with on-premises data centers, enterprises enhance their agility, speed, and
ability to scale initiatives. With the rise of generative AI, Hybrid by Design extends beyond
cloud computing to encompass the entire enterprise technology landscape—including
platforms, security, AI, cloud, and data. This approach transforms diverse technologies into a
cohesive system, amplifying business outcomes through thoughtful design and integration.

The IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offering, based on Hybrid by Design, allows
enterprises to install infrastructure within their own data centers, providing added security and
control of their data. This solution allows the use of cloud resources with no upfront costs and
pay-as-you-go pricing.

This chapter introduces the Power Virtual Server Private Cloud and discusses the benefits it
brings to enterprise IT environments.

The following topics are included in this chapter:

򐂰 1.1, “The IBM Hybrid by Design approach” on page 2
򐂰 1.2, “Introduction to IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud” on page 3
򐂰 1.3, “Benefits of using IBM Power as your cloud platform” on page 7
򐂰 1.4, “Cloud offerings for IBM Power systems” on page 12
򐂰 1.5, “Government regulations and compliance” on page 21
򐂰 1.6, “Use cases” on page 26

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. 1

1.1 The IBM Hybrid by Design approach
As enterprises embark on their journeys to adopt innovative hybrid cloud and AI technologies,
its increasingly vital for these organizations to have a flexible infrastructure that delivers
performance, security, and interoperability to support evolving IT needs. To remain
competitive, reduce technology costs, and improve the ability to respond to changing
customer needs, enterprises will need platforms that allow workload consumption to ramp up
or down quickly, place workloads on cloud or on-site, with a focus on business outcomes and
less on infrastructure management. Generative AI also has the potential to be a key factor in
business transformation, and enterprises that take a more intentional approach with hybrid
cloud could be better positioned to accelerate their impact.1

The IBM Hybrid by Design2 approach is a comprehensive framework for the strategic
implementation of a hybrid cloud architecture with 5 Key Priorities:
1. Drive product-centric mindset to enable business priorities.
2. Build intentional architecture to accelerate & scale business competencies.
3. Create a consistent development and operational experience across platforms.
4. Empower product teams to exploit hybrid capabilities.
5. Harness the power of all data and scale Gen AI deployment.

Figure 1-1 presents the results of a current IBM Institute for Business Values study, which
reveals that enterprises are working toward operating at enterprise scale. The study shows
that enterprises expect to significantly increase their platform operational capabilities, and
hybrid by design platforms are tailored to meet this growth requirement.

Figure 1-1 Results of IBM Institute for Business Value study

1 https://newsroom.ibm.com/blog-infuse-ai-into-ibm-power-mission-critical-workloads-on-the-cloud-at-ou
r-site-or-yours
2
https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevemcdowell/2024/06/18/hybrid-by-design-a-new-paradigm-for-enterprise
-cloud-success/

2 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 The Hybrid by Design versus a Hybrid by Default approach involves:
򐂰 Business-Centric Product Mindset3 - The framework emphasizes a business-centric
product mindset, prioritizing business objectives and enhancing productivity. This
approach ensures that technology investments yield tangible business benefits and
fosters a consistent development and operational environment across different platforms
using common technology standards.
򐂰 Intentional Design - The core principle of IBM's Hybrid by Design framework is
intentionality. Each technical component supports specific business objectives versus
adopting cloud solutions haphazardly to avoid silos and incompatible islands of solutions.
򐂰 Scalability and Flexibility - Focus on creating systems that can scale with evolving
business needs. The architecture is designed to adapt to changes in demand,
technological advancements, and market conditions, enabling companies to remain agile
and responsive.
򐂰 Value Creation4 - Leverage a common automation strategy for installation, operations and
development across all platforms. An enterprise API catalog supercharges innovation and
productivity that can utilize Gen AI over time.
򐂰 Security and Compliance - Security is built into the product from the beginning. AI is used
to consistently apply the highest standards for security across all environments and
provide visibility across platforms with embedded automation.
򐂰 Operational Efficiency - Automate and streamline processes using standardized tools and
processes to increase development productivity and reduce time to market.
򐂰 AI Integration5 - IBM Hybrid by Design emphasizes the integration of AI within the hybrid
cloud framework to drive transformative outcomes, optimize operations, and maintain a
competitive edge in an increasingly digital landscape.
򐂰 Open and Integrated Foundation - Building an open, integrated foundation across all
digital environments that leverages expertise with hybrid multi-clouds to maximize ROI.

IBM’s Hybrid Cloud strategy is focused on harnessing the power of choice and flexibility for
clients. That’s why we recently extended the capabilities of Power Virtual Server to deploy in a
client data center. This delivers flexibility around consumption and management capabilities
of the cloud while keeping the data on-premises to help address regional compliance and
governance requirements of the business.

1.2 Introduction to IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Since 2019, IBM has offered IBM Power Virtual Server to provide IBM Power resources in the
cloud. The offering has grown to 21 data centers worldwide (with additional locations
expected) and combines an infrastructure as a service (IAAS) model which includes
IBM Power compute nodes with SAN attached IBM Storage and associated network
connections within IBM Cloud locations. And now, as part of IBM’s distributed hybrid
infrastructure strategy, Power Virtual Server Private Cloud extends all the benefits of
IBM Power Virtual Server into your (or a partner’s) data center. The enhanced
capabilities of IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud provide managed infrastructure as a
service at client locations, with metered consumption and no upfront costs to support Hybrid
by Design delivery of services.

3 https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/institute-business-value/en-us/report/hybrid-by-design/hybrid
-by-design-architecting-for-agility
4
https://www.ibm.com/consulting/hybrid-by-design
5 https://www.ibm.com/hybrid-cloud

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 3

 Figure 1-2 illustrates the comprehensive Power Virtual Server offering, spanning both IBM
data centers and client locations. Power Virtual Server provides a platform for hosting IBM
Power in a fully hybrid cloud enabled solution. This allows you to make the choice whether to
place your workload in the IBM data centers or in your own data center (with an infrastructure
owned and managed by IBM).

Figure 1-2 Power Virtual Server – a true hybrid cloud solution for your IBM Power workloads

Clients can achieve true hybrid cloud capabilities with their critical Power workloads either in
IBM Cloud or on-premises for secure, sovereign, sensitive and regulated workloads. IBM
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud provides the following benefits:
򐂰 Private and secure
You will enjoy the flexibility of Infrastructure-as-a-Service and cloud management, while
keeping your data on-premises to ensure security and data sovereignty, meeting regional
compliance and governance requirements.
򐂰 Flexible and intentional placement of workloads
Choose the best location to run each workload, off-premises in Power Virtual Server or
on-premises in your data center based on your business requirements for security and
data governance.
򐂰 Hybrid cloud enabled
You will experience the same user interface available in Power Virtual Server and IBM
Cloud, making hybrid cloud operations more efficient to manage your on-premises
infrastructure.

4 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

򐂰 Metered usage-based pricing with flexible consumption and acquisition
You pay only for what you use each month – compute, memory, storage, and operating
system licenses are fully metered with no upfront costs6.
򐂰 Streamlined IT operations and accelerated client Time to Value
IBM provides the expertise to maintain and operate the infrastructure platform up to the
Virtual Machine allowing clients to focus on their business outcomes.
򐂰 Constant improvements and enhancements
IBM continues to improve Power Virtual Server with new capabilities, such as:
• Identical management interfaces for workloads whether placed on Power Virtual
Server in the cloud or on-premises.
• Same architecture and support for a broad range of IBM Power servers, including
scale up and scale out servers.
• A single consolidated bill for IT services whether on-premises or off-premises.
• Completely flexible consumption with the ability to grow to meet evolving business
requirements.

Figure 1-3 shows how a unified platform with both a public and private cloud offering can
allow customers to intentionally place their workloads in the best environment.

Figure 1-3 Hybrid cloud view of the Power Virtual Server offering

The IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud platform supports:

򐂰 Existing Power workloads with co-existence with new container based micro-services and
modernization of legacy applications on a shared infrastructure.
򐂰 Support for products from independent software vendors (ISVs) running on IBM Power.
򐂰 Virtualized platform to replace VMware based Linux workloads to lower the total cost of
delivery and increase the virtualization rate for applications.
򐂰 A cloud solution that provides the capability to meet specific regulatory requirements for
data protection and data sovereignty.

6
Clients are required to commit to a minimum monthly usage for the term (3 or 5 years) of the agreement and pay
the greater of usage or the minimum commitment fees.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 5

 򐂰 Red Hat OpenShift 4.15 with Installer Provisioned Infrastructure (IPI) simplifies and
automates deployment of OpenShift on IBM Power Virtual Server (~2 hours to setup
OpenShift cluster vs. days/weeks)
򐂰 Infusing business applications on IBM Power with AI.
Integrate AI onto IBM Power to run your business operations and AI integration on the
same platform. This seamless integration enables you to incorporate AI into your existing
workflows, where transactions are run, and data is located. Figure 1-4 illustrates this,
showing how IBM Power Virtual Server applications integrate with watsonx to provide an
enhanced AI experience.

Figure 1-4 AI integration with Power Virtual Server and watsonx

With Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, customers can:

򐂰 Maintain customer data and workloads on their own site.
Enterprises may have workloads or data that is regulated and cannot be hosted
off-premises. In some cases, enterprises can have workloads that are sensitive or with
ultra-short latency requirements that are better served on-site and in very close proximity
with other on-site workloads.
򐂰 Maintain customer data in region and specific geographies in the location of their choice.
Country sovereignty regulations require some data and workloads to stay in that country.
According to a recent IBM Institute of Business Value study, 61% of cloud leaders cite
security or compliance as reasons for moving certain workloads from public clouds to
private clouds or on-premises data centers.
򐂰 Provide a seamless hybrid cloud experience.
Enterprises can foster a unified hybrid cloud landscape by seamlessly integrating Power
Virtual Server running both at an IBM site and at a client site location with the ability to
manage all the virtual machines (VMs) and infrastructure effortlessly through a unified
user interface. Clients can receive the flexibility utilizing as-a-service with intentional
workload placement on and off premises.
򐂰 Deliver a predictable charging model with committed monthly spend combined with flexible
consumption with metered usage-based pricing.
Both IBM site and at client site offerings include compute, memory, storage, and operating
system licenses that are metered by the hour allowing clients to pay for how much they
use each month with no upfront payment.

6 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 򐂰 Streamline IT operations.
Whether in the cloud or at an enterprise’s site, IBM manages the infrastructure, freeing
enterprises to focus on business outcomes and less on managing infrastructure. IBM will
own, deliver, and set up the Power Virtual Server in your datacenter of choice, and provide
a fully managed solution, including monitoring, security, firmware updates, and
infrastructure management.
򐂰 Provide enhanced security and control of data.
IBM Power Virtual Server is designed to provide comprehensive security for IBM Power
infrastructure by integrating with IBM Cloud tooling to manage security. This alleviates the
need to manage Power infrastructure security with the added benefit of maintaining
sensitive data and workload on-premises.

1.3 Benefits of using IBM Power as your cloud platform

The same benefits that led to investment in IBM Power infrastructure in private data centers
are provided by utilizing IBM Power Virtual Server infrastructure, either in the cloud or now a
datacenter of choice. “Build on Power” for security, performance, reliability, availability,
scalability, sustainability and a lower Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).
Fewer cores = Fewer licenses = Lower TCO.

Beyond the TCO benefits of using IBM Power based cloud infrastructure, there are migration
efficiencies, management advantages, reliability and availability advantages, and security
benefits. This section discusses the benefits IBM Power can bring to your cloud platform.

1.3.1 TCO Benefits

Hardware is typically less than 15% of the cost of an IT solution – with software and services
comprising 85%. IBM Power is designed to support more workload per core when compared
to x86 architecture alternatives. The power of the IBM Power processor core often results in
only needing between 25-50% of the number of licenses compared to an x86 solutions. This
is shown in Figure 1-5.

Figure 1-5 TCO comparison of Power and x86

Fewer cores equals fewer software licenses. The ongoing yearly support and service fees
(which can be 20-25% of the initial purchase), and the additional cores required to support
workloads on x86 can double your cost every 4-5 years. Choosing to implement a solution on

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 7

 x86 could result in doubling the overall cost of the solution. Design for affordability by running
on IBM Power servers to reduce TCO!

IBM Power servers are an integrated solution designed to provide:

򐂰 Reliability - Ranked #1 for the 15th year in a row by ITIC's global reliability report7
򐂰 Pervasive security - Most secure open system in the market:
– Provides Transparent Memory Encryption,
– 2.5X faster AES crypto performance per core with 4 crypto engines
– Future ready for Quantum Safe Cryptography & Fully Homomorphic Encryption
򐂰 Performance:
– Runs Oracle and other database workloads better than other platforms
– 4.1 x more containerized throughput per core versus x86 running Red Hat OpenShift
– Supports 8 threads/core and significantly higher utilizations
– Significantly greater memory bandwidth versus x86
– Collocate cloud applications and legacy applications on the same platform
– AIX, IBM i, Linux (RHEL, SUSE), KVM, OpenShift can all be supported in separate
partitions, running at the same time
򐂰 Sustainability - Reduce carbon footprint – 2x more capacity with the same energy usage
򐂰 AI-ready - 4 matrix math accelerators per core for faster inferencing

1.3.2 No refactoring
Prior to the introduction of IBM Power Virtual Server running in the cloud, migrating workloads
from an existing IBM Power infrastructure to the cloud involved moving the applications and
data to an x86 platform. This was complicated for several reasons:
– Compatibility Issues: Applications and workloads designed for IBM Power may not run
natively on x86, requiring refactoring or recompiling.
– Performance Variations: Some workloads, particularly those that are compute intensive
or require high throughput, may perform differently on x86 hardware.
– Data Migration: Moving data from one architecture to another can be complex,
especially if it involves different database systems or file formats.

With IBM Power Virtual Server (either the public cloud or the new Private Cloud), the cloud
target now uses the same technology. Migrating workloads are now much easier and there
are a variety of tools that can be used to assist in the migration. While migration still takes
careful planning, there is no need for refactoring or recompiling the applications.

The flexibility and ease of migration of applications and data makes IBM Power Virtual Server
in the IBM Cloud an ideal solution for backup, disaster recovery, and development.
Meanwhile, IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers secure, dedicated data centers
tailored to each client’s needs.

1.3.3 Security and availability

Security and avail9ability are two important components of any enterprise application
environment. Having a critical application down due to hardware issues can cost thousands of
dollars an hour in some industries. In addition to the lost business caused by an unreliable
infrastructure, your company’s reputation can be harmed. The IBM Power Virtual Server
Private Cloud leverages IBM Power10 systems that provide industry leading availability as
7 ITIC 2023 Global Server Hardware, Server OS Reliability Report

8 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

measured by the amount of unplanned downtime customers experienced. Security is also
critical in an environment. Having a security breach can cost millions of dollars in lost
business, loss of reputation and regulatory fines. IBM Power10 systems are designed with
security in mind, with built-in encryption and available security tools to help secure and
manage your environment.

Availability
The reliability of IBM Power10 is ranked #1 by ITIC with 99.999% availability as shown in
Figure 1-6.

Figure 1-6 ITIC Reliability Report

In addition to the built-in reliability of the Power10 servers, IBM Power Virtual Server (both the
public version and Private Cloud) are designed with reliability and availability built in.
Redundant resources and the ability to restart your workloads automatically using those
redundant components are designed into the solution. Also provided are storage solutions to
keep your data accessible with backup and data replication services available to be
configured to meet your availability requirements.

Another quote from Pfizer in reference to the requirement for availability and reliability in an
ERP instance:
“To operate a single global ERP instance, you need a highly robust platform able to
support very complex applications. Reliability, availability, serviceability, flexibility and
similar strengths were all traits we needed to be ingrained into the platform—and IBM
Power provided all of these.”8

Security
In today’s digital landscape, IBM Infrastructure serves as a formidable shield against increasingly
sophisticated cyber threats through its robust and integrated security solutions. IBM weaves
security into the fabric of its systems and platforms, allowing businesses to operate confidently
amid evolving risks.

At the heart of IBM's approach is the integration of security throughout its systems, building
trust and resilience from the ground up. This includes safeguarding firmware integrity with
secure boot processes and bolstering data protection through hardware-based encryption
acceleration.

IBM goes beyond basic protection with a proactive cybersecurity strategy. IBM offers secure
storage solutions and advanced threat prevention and detection mechanisms. In the event of

8 Pfizer creates a healthier tomorrow with IBM Power

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 9

 an incident, IBM provides rapid response and recovery options to minimize downtime and
effectively manage operational risks.

Privacy and confidentiality are paramount, supported by IBM advanced encryption technologies.
These include pervasive encryption throughout the data lifecycle and quantum-safe cryptography,
designed to guard against emerging threats such as quantum computing. Figure 1-7 shows the
IBM Power security architecture and how security is integrated across all of the layers.

Figure 1-7 IBM Power Security Architecture

IBM simplifies regulatory compliance with continuous compliance and audit capabilities.
Automated monitoring and enforcement tools ensure adherence to industry standards, while
unified security management tools facilitate consistent governance across diverse IT
environments.

Collaborating closely with ecosystem partners, IBM integrates security across hybrid cloud
environments, networks, software systems, architectures, and chip designs. This comprehensive
approach ensures holistic protection and resilience across all facets of IT infrastructure.

The IBM Power security architecture provides safe, simple security with isolation and integrity
controls between each layer of components. This architecture supports the industry evolution
to Software Bill of Materials (SBOMs) to allow open-source industry collaboration while
ensuring we can validate the source and integrity of each component. IBM works closely with
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to track and fix vulnerabilities and is
working to support the evolution to Post Quantum Cryptography in the future. IBM is also
working on “Fully Homomorphic Encryption” (FHE) which enables applications to work with
encrypted data to further enhance security. 9

By consolidating security insights across various domains, IBM enables informed decision-making
and proactive threat management. This integrated approach dissolves traditional security silos,
turning security into a catalyst for innovation and business growth.

In summary, IBM Infrastructure sets a high standard for security excellence by embedding
advanced features into its solutions and equipping businesses to address both current and
future cybersecurity challenges with confidence. Through collaborative efforts with ecosystem
partners and a focus on regulatory compliance, IBM delivers secure, resilient, and compliant
infrastructure solutions, empowering businesses to thrive in the digital age amidst evolving cyber

9 https://research.ibm.com/topics/fully-homomorphic-encryption

10 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 threats. The IBM PowerSC architecture provides safe, simple security with isolation and
integrity controls between layers and components.

1.3.4 IBM Power Virtual Server Benefits

IBM Power Virtual Server has offered a cloud-based, off-premises solution since 2019,
allowing customers to dynamically provision IBM Power servers and storage with a
pay-as-you-go charging model. This enables clients to quickly migrate existing IBM
Power-based workloads to the cloud.

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud extends this offering, providing enterprises with
secure, integrated data center services at their chosen location, also on a pay-as-you-go
basis. Leveraging the data center expertise gained through IBM Power Virtual Server, the
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud solution delivers performance, scalability, flexibility,
security, and industry-leading reliability. It integrates servers, storage, network, security, and
solution patterns to enable self-service capabilities in the client's data center.

Replicating these cloud capabilities and maintaining this integrated solution would require an
enterprise to invest millions of dollars and months or years of development time.

Fully metered consumption

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud provides fully metered consumption, allowing you to
pay for the infrastructure as you use it and eliminating capital expense for the infrastructure.
The terms of the offering are:
– 3-year or 5-year term with 1-year renewal
– Pay-as-you-use monthly billing with Committed Monthly Spend (CMS)
– IBM owned and managed

Lowest TCO, fastest Time to Value

Moving IBM Power workloads to the cloud can be challenging and expensive. Prior to the
availability of Power Virtual Server, that migration usually meant an expensive and risky
refactoring of the applications to be able to run them on x86 base hardware.

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers the best TCO value for customers wishing to
move to on-premises cloud solutions compared to our competitors as shown in Table 1-1.

Table 1-1 TCO comparison

IBM Power Virtual Server at client AWS Outposts
򐂰 Highest security servers 򐂰 Higher energy costs
򐂰 Highest reliability servers 򐂰 Higher software costs
򐂰 High performance processors 򐂰 Lower performance processors
򐂰 Metered usage billing 򐂰 Delivered capacity billing

Lowest TCO TCO 1.5x higher

AWS Outposts AWS Outposts

򐂰 Higher energy costs 򐂰 Higher energy costs
򐂰 Higher software costs 򐂰 Higher software costs
򐂰 Lower performance processors 򐂰 Lower performance processors
򐂰 Delivered capacity billing 򐂰 Metered usage billing

TCO 1.2x higher TCO 1.2x higher

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 11

 IBM offers Power Virtual Server Private Cloud with no upfront capital on a pay-as-you-go
consumption model with a monthly minimum fee for a 3-year or 5-year term. The
configuration can be designed as a small or medium Pod depending on the client workloads.

If you are choosing whether to use Power Virtual Server versus choosing to build your own
infrastructure consider the points illustrated in Figure 1-8. Beyond just the up-front capital
expense for the equipment, you need to consider the costs of creating the support structure
for all of the other components involved in the solution, for example storage, networking,
security and monitoring.

Figure 1-8 DIY comparison

Choosing IBM Power Virtual Server – either in IBM data centers or client locations – provides
an excellent option to implement a Power based infrastructure with no up-front investment
and with usage-based costs.

1.4 Cloud offerings for IBM Power systems

IBM has a range of cloud solutions designed to provide flexible acquisition and consumption
options for IBM Power servers.
򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server in IBM data centers
IBM Power Virtual Server is a cloud-based offering running in IBM data centers with IBM
Power servers and storage can be dynamically defined. There is no customer up-front
investment, and you pay only for resources consumed.
򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server at client locations (i.e., IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud)
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is an extension of IBM Power Virtual Server. In
this case, the customer is responsible for providing data center space, and IBM is
responsible for installing and managing the servers, storage, and networking for the
customer’s usage. There is no customer up-front investment, and you pay for resources
consumed with a minimum monthly commitment.
򐂰 IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity

12 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 The Power System Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity (also known as Power
Enterprise Pools 2 or PEP2) is a client managed offering. The Power servers are installed
and managed by the client in their data center. The Shared Utility Capacity allows flexibility
of paying some portion of the cost of the Power processors and memory that are installed
in the servers initially and then paying for additional capacity as it is consumed. Capacity
utilization is pooled across all the servers in the PEP2 pool, providing the ability to move
workloads to any server based on business demand.

The three options are shown in Figure 1-9

Figure 1-9 Comparison of IBM Power based cloud options

With these options, IBM provides a full range of cloud solutions, giving you the ability to
choose where you want to deploy the infrastructure for your IBM Power based workloads:
򐂰 Off-premises, managed by IBM
򐂰 On-premises, managed by IBM
򐂰 On-premises, fully managed by you

The cost of running an IT infrastructure consists of more than just the acquisition costs and
initial capital investment required and also includes the costs of operating and maintaining the
infrastructure. For each option you are considering, you need to understand those additional
management costs and who is responsible for the operations of each component. Figure 1-10
on page 14 illustrates who provides support for the many layers and components of your
application infrastructure from the server hardware, to the data, to the applications, and
including the networking and storage infrastructure.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 13

Figure 1-10 Operational support assignments across cloud implementation models

For the PEP2 option, the responsibilities are shown in the first column. The Power Virtual
Server options are shown in the next two columns. The ability to have IBM manage the server
layer, the virtualization layer, and the storage layer in the Power VS offerings, allows you to
focus on running your business instead of managing the infrastructure.

The next sections discuss each of the options in more detail.

1.4.1 IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity
IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity – previously named Power
Enterprise Pools 2.0 – provides the ability to pool resources across multiple IBM Power
systems within an enterprise. The value proposition of Private Cloud with Shared Utility
Capacity is the ability to move to a pay-as-you-go model, reducing the initial investment in
hardware and replacing it with a metered consumption offering. This solution is significantly
more flexible in comparison to other Capacity on Demand (CoD) offerings that are available
on IBM Power servers.

The Shared Utility Capacity solution is managed through the use of the IBM Cloud
Management Console (CMC), which is used to meter the usage across the Shared Utility
Capacity pool.

As more enterprises look at ways to reduce costs while maintaining the scalability that is
required to stay competitive in today's fast paced business environment, pay-as-you-go or
consumption-based infrastructure models have grown increasingly popular. These purchase
models enable clients to quickly scale up or down their IT infrastructure to optimize costs
while quickly adapting to dynamic business environments. To maintain a competitive
advantage, use an IT model that helps you adapt rapidly to the changing tech landscape.

14 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

A consumption-based IT model thrives in this environment because it has the following
characteristics:
򐂰 Balances the flexibility of a cloud infrastructure with the control, security, and reliability that
you expect from on-premises data centers.
򐂰 Pays for IT resources when they are consumed, which reduces the up-front capital
expense and other costs that are associated with traditional procurement processes.
򐂰 Enables rapid infrastructure expansion to quickly accommodate the needs of new projects
and workloads.

All these benefits contribute to a greater alignment between business and IT leaders, and
when both sides of an organization are aligned, you are better prepared to deliver innovative
products and services to your clients. Regardless of industry or company size, the shift to
consumption-based IT is clear.

Flexible consumption offerings provide many of the attributes that clients like about public
cloud in an on-premises, private cloud with better control and security.

IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Capacity provides greater flexibility and
scalability within your data centers. This new end-to-end solution enables you to take
advantage of cloud agility and economics while getting the same business continuity and
security that you are used to from IBM Power. There are three core components that make up
the IBM Power Systems Private Cloud Solution:
򐂰 Dynamic cost optimization with pay-as-you-go pricing.
򐂰 Automated, consistent enterprise IT management.
򐂰 Increased flexibility for hybrid cloud.

Pool Options
Power Enterprise Pools 2.0 provides enhanced multisystem resource sharing and
by-the-minute consumption of on-premises compute resources to clients who deploy and
manage a private cloud infrastructure.

There are multiple pools supported in PEP2 where servers of similar capabilities can be
mixed within a pool. For example, Power E1080 and Power E980 can be in a pool, but Power
E1080 and Power E1050 must be in separate pools. Currently the following types of pools are
available in Power Enterprise Pools 2.0:
– Power E1080 and Power E980
– Power E1050 and Power E950
– Power S1022, Power S1024, Power S922, and Power S924

Activations and usage charges

Base Processor Activation features and corresponding software license entitlements are
purchased for each server in a Power Enterprise Pool 2.0. Base Memory Activation features
are purchased for each enterprise server in the pool (E1080, E1050, E980 and E950). Base
Memory Activation features are not supported for the scale out servers (S1022, S1024, S922,
and S924) as all installed memory is included with the purchase of these systems. However,
memory usage can still be tracked.

When acquiring systems to include in the Shared Utility Capacity offering, you can purchase
as little as one base processor activation and 256 GB of base memory activation (for the
enterprise servers, for the scale out servers all installed memory is purchased up-front). This
allows acquisition of server capacity with minimal capital expense replaced by a

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 15

 pay-as-you-go model. The offering allows you to balance the initial capital investment with a
metered approach to meet your specific business requirements.

All installed processors and memory on servers in a Power Enterprise Pool 2.0 are activated
and made available for immediate use when a pool is started. Processor and memory usage
on each server are tracked by the minute and aggregated across the pool. Any usage under
the base capacity across the pool is not charged. This allows the resources to be shared
across the pool without having to move them from server to server as workloads expand or
decrease.

Any unpurchased capacity in the pool can be used on a pay-as-you-go basis. Resource
usage that exceeds the pool's aggregated base resources is charged as metered capacity by
the minute, on a real-time basis. Metered capacity can either be debited against
prepurchased capacity credits or it can be billed monthly.

Processor usage is tracked based on actual consumption by partitions. Memory usage is

tracked based on the assignment of memory to active partitions and is not based on
Operating System (OS) usage of the memory. Both processor and memory usage are tracked
and charged by the minute. Both processor and memory usage are based on the average
usage for one minute and not the peak usage during the minute.

The cloud-like agility and resilience that is offered with the IBM Power Systems Private Cloud
Solution on-premises can ensure the business continuity and security that you look for and
always count on from IBM Power servers with new economics around the ability to pay per
use, by the minute, for compute resources to optimize your costs. IBM CMC provides robust
monitoring and drill-down of resource consumption in real time and historically for systems
within a pool.

Summary
Shared Utility Capacity delivers enhanced multi-system resource sharing and by-the-minute
consumption of on-premises compute resources for clients deploying and managing a private
cloud infrastructure. This flexibility combined with IBM Power security, reliability, and
scalability provides clients with the consumption-based IT solution that is required in today's
dynamic, hyper-competitive market. Shared Utility Capacity simplifies system management,
so clients can focus on optimizing their business results instead of moving resources and
applications around within their data center. Resources are easily tracked and monitored by
IBM CMC, which automatically tracks usage by the minute and debits against Capacity
Credits, which are based on actual usage. With Shared Utility Capacity, you no longer need to
worry about over provisioning capacity to support growth because all resources are activated
on all systems in a pool. Purchased Base Activations can be seamlessly shared between
systems in a pool, and all unpurchased capacity can be used on a pay-per-use basis.

1.4.2 IBM Power Virtual Server

IBM Power Virtual Server is a cloud-based infrastructure service that allows businesses to
run workloads on IBM Power Systems hardware. It combines the performance and reliability
of IBM's Power architecture with the flexibility and scalability of a virtualized environment. Key
features include:
򐂰 Flexibility: Users can scale resources up or down based on demand, making it suitable for
various workloads, including enterprise applications and databases.
򐂰 Performance: Leveraging IBM Power processors, the service is designed to be for high
performance computing tasks.
򐂰 Hybrid Cloud Integration: It supports seamless integration with on-premises systems and
other cloud services, facilitating a hybrid cloud approach.

16 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 򐂰 Security: Built-in security features help protect sensitive data and comply with industry
standards.
򐂰 Managed Services: IBM provides management options, allowing users to focus on their
applications rather than infrastructure.

IBM Power Virtual Server is targeted at organizations looking for robust, enterprise grade
cloud solutions that can support demanding applications. IBM Power Virtual Server resources
reside in IBM data centers with dedicated networking and storage area network attached
Fibre Channel storage. You can choose one of the regions that is listed in the specifications
that are nearest to your data center. There are currently 21 data centers located around the
world hosting Power Virtual Server. IBM Power clients who rely on private cloud infrastructure
can now quickly and economically extend their Power IT resources on the cloud.

In the data centers, the Power Virtual Servers are separated from the rest of the IBM Cloud
servers with separate networks and direct attached storage. The internal networks are fenced
but offer connectivity options to IBM Cloud infrastructure or private cloud environments. This
infrastructure design enables Power Virtual Server to maintain key enterprise software
certification and support as the Power Virtual Server architecture is identical to certified
private cloud infrastructure.

Power Virtual Server is an infrastructure as a service offering (IaaS) where there are no
up-front costs for deploying resources and resources are paid for based on usage. Power
Virtual Server uses a monthly billing rate that includes the licenses for the AIX, IBM i, or Linux
operating systems. The monthly billing rate is prorated by the hour based on the resources
that are deployed to the Power Virtual Server instance for the month. When you create the
Power Virtual Server instance, you can see the total cost for your configuration based on the
options that you specify. You can quickly identify what configuration options provide you with
the best value for your business needs. There is also an option for a “bring your own Linux
image”. In this case the customer is responsible for acquiring the subscription and paying the
Linux distributor for licenses used.

You can configure and customize the following options when you create a Power Virtual
Server:
– Number of virtual server instances
– Number of cores
– Amount of memory
– Data volume size and type
– Network interfaces

Configuration, billing and management are all handled by IBM Cloud through a cloud based
graphical user interface and through defined APIs.

1.4.3 IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

IBM Power Virtual Server private cloud is an extension of IBM Power Virtual Server where the
resources utilized in your cloud environment are located on your data center floor instead of
using resources in the IBM Power Virtual Server data centers.

This offering is designed to provide a private cloud option for clients that need to meet specific
regulations about data privacy and data sovereignty. The equipment that is installed in the
client data center is the same set of Power servers, SAN attached storage devices, and
networking equipment that is installed in the Power Virtual Server public cloud and is
managed using the same Power Virtual Server management tools.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 17

 This is an IaaS solution with no up-front capital expense and the on-premises equipment is
owned and managed by IBM. Pricing for the offering is usage based like the public cloud
version of Power Virtual Server, with a minimum monthly spending commitment.

The client works closely with the IBM team in selecting the appropriate configuration from a
list of supported options and then that configuration is assembled and delivered to the client
data center. The client is responsible for providing the necessary floor space, power, heat and
air movement, and networking connections from the client data center to one of the IBM data
centers that support connectivity to a Power Virtual Server Private Cloud location.

Once the Power Virtual Server Point of Delivery (Pod) is delivered to the client data center,
IBM service representatives install the Pod and connect it to the IBM cloud. At that point the
customer manages the resources using the same management interface used for any Power
Virtual Server implementation.

1.4.4 Choosing your cloud option

When businesses decide to move workloads to the cloud, selecting the right cloud
environment is a critical decision. It involves balancing factors such as cost, security,
performance, compliance, and scalability. IBM Power cloud solutions offer several options,
including IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity, Power Virtual
Server, and Power Virtual Server Private Cloud. Each of these options provides unique
benefits suited to different business needs, ranging from hybrid cloud flexibility to
on-premises control. Table 1-2 provides a comparison of the cloud options by feature. This is
a starting point for making your decision.

Table 1-2 Feature comparison of the cloud options

IBM Power Systems
Private Cloud with
Shared Utility Power Virtual Server
Feature Capacity Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Pay-as-you-go, no Pay-as-you-go, Pay-as-you-go,

Cost Model
upfront cost metered hourly metered hourly

Highest level of control Enterprise-grade Full control with IBM

Security
and security security, encryption management

Full compliance for Complies with major Fully compliant for

Compliance
sensitive data standards in-country hosting

High-performance, low Elastic, global cloud Low latency, high

Performance
latency infrastructure performance

Hybrid Cloud Seamless with IBM Public cloud hybrid Hybrid cloud with
Integration Cloud and others capabilities on-premises control

Mission-critical, Scalable, flexible cloud Hybrid cloud with strict

Use Cases
on-premises apps workloads data control

As an example, a financial services company with highly sensitive customer data and
compliance needs may choose Power Virtual Server Private Cloud for their core banking
systems. This option allows them to host critical applications on private infrastructure within
their own data center, ensuring compliance with data sovereignty regulations, while using
Power Virtual Server for less sensitive workloads such as development and testing.

18 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Factors to consider when choosing your cloud option
There are many factors involved in choosing which cloud option fits your requirements. Each
option has benefits across each of the factors and depending on which factors are most
important for the specific workloads you are considering, these factors will have different
weights. Consider the following factors:
򐂰 Cost Efficiency
– IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity
For businesses that want the flexibility of a private cloud without large upfront costs,
IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity offers a pay-as-you-go
model. This makes it ideal for businesses looking to reduce capital expenditure
(CapEx) while still enjoying cloud flexibility. The OPEX model also allows businesses to
align costs with usage, making it easier to scale resources as needed.
– Power Virtual Server
For businesses that need scalability and flexibility, Power Virtual Server offers an
elastic compute infrastructure, where businesses can scale up or down based on
demand. It is suited for workloads that experience fluctuations, such as seasonal
applications or testing environments.
– Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
This option provides the same pay-as-you-go flexibility as Power Virtual Server but
within a fully private, on-premises environment. This is ideal for businesses that need
to maintain physical control over their infrastructure but want the benefits of cloud
billing models.
򐂰 Security and Compliance
– IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity
This solution is designed for businesses that need complete control over their
environment but still want to benefit from cloud technologies. Since the infrastructure is
hosted within the business's own data center or collocation facility, it provides the
highest level of security and control, ensuring compliance with strict regulatory
standards.
– Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
For industries that handle sensitive data (e.g., finance, healthcare), Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud offers cloud services that meet stringent security and compliance
requirements. The private infrastructure is fully managed by IBM but hosted on the
client's premises, giving businesses full control over data locality and privacy.
– Power Virtual Server
While offering the flexibility of a public cloud, Power Virtual Server includes
enterprise-grade security measures such as encryption, identity management, and
compliance certifications, making it a good option for businesses needing to comply
with global regulatory standards.
򐂰 Performance and Latency:
– IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity
For businesses that require low latency and high-performance workloads, especially
those running mission-critical applications or AI workloads, IBM Power Systems
Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity ensures that applications run on dedicated
infrastructure with consistent performance.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 19

 – Power Virtual Server
Power Virtual Server offers elastic computing resources spread across multiple global
regions. This can be beneficial for workloads where performance is less critical but
global reach and availability are important. However, businesses with strict latency
requirements should evaluate the proximity of their users or systems to IBM Cloud
regions to ensure optimal performance.
– Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
By offering cloud flexibility in an on-premises setup, Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
minimizes latency for locally critical workloads while providing the scalability and
flexibility of a cloud solution. This is particularly important for businesses that cannot
tolerate delays due to remote connections but still want cloud-like capabilities.
򐂰 Hybrid Cloud Capabilities
– IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity
Designed for businesses looking for hybrid cloud solutions, IBM Power Systems Private
Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity allows seamless integration between on-premises
and public cloud environments. Businesses can extend workloads to IBM Cloud or
other public clouds when needed, while maintaining core applications and data on
private infrastructure.
– Power Virtual Server
Power Virtual Server is a fully public cloud solution that can integrate with existing
on-premises environments to create a hybrid cloud. It is well-suited for businesses that
need a flexible approach to scaling out workloads to the cloud while maintaining some
control over core infrastructure.
– Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
This option provides the best of both worlds: cloud features within a private
environment. It is ideal for businesses with hybrid cloud strategies that want to keep
sensitive workloads on-premises while extending less sensitive workloads to public
cloud environments.
򐂰 Workload-Specific Considerations
– Development and Testing
If the cloud is primarily required for development and testing, then Power Virtual Server
offers the fastest provisioning, flexible scaling, and cost-efficiency. Development teams
can spin up and tear down virtual servers as needed, making this option ideal for agile
testing cycles.
– Mission-Critical Workloads
For production and mission-critical workloads that require high performance, low
latency, and disaster recovery features, IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared
Utility Capacity or Power Virtual Server Private Cloud provide the security,
performance, and resilience necessary to maintain continuous operation.

20 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Table 1-3 provides a summary of the factors listed above and the strengths of each of the
options.

Table 1-3 Summary of factors to consider in choosing your cloud option

IBM Power Systems
Private Cloud with
Shared Utility Power Virtual Server
Capacity Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

򐂰 On-premises
򐂰 Pay-as-you-go
򐂰 Pay-as-you-go flexibility
model
model 򐂰 Pay-as-you-go
Cost efficiency 򐂰 Elastic compute
򐂰 Reduced Capex model
򐂰 Scale up/down
򐂰 OPEX model 򐂰 Private
򐂰 Flexible resources
infrastructure

򐂰 Complete control 򐂰 Enterprise grade 򐂰 Sensitive data

򐂰 On-premises or security handling
Security and
collocation 򐂰 Encryption 򐂰 On-premises
compliance
򐂰 Highest security 򐂰 Compliance control
certification 򐂰 Full data locality

򐂰 Low latency 򐂰 Global reach 򐂰 On-premises

򐂰 High performance 򐂰 Multiple regions performance
Performance 򐂰 Dedicated 򐂰 Elastic resources 򐂰 Low latency
infrastructure 򐂰 Cloud-like
scalability

򐂰 Seamless 򐂰 Public cloud 򐂰 Best of both worlds

integration solution 򐂰 Sensitive
򐂰 Extend to public 򐂰 Integrate with workloads
Hybrid cloud
cloud on-premises on-premises
򐂰 Core apps 򐂰 Flexible scaling 򐂰 Extend to public
on-premises cloud

Workload specific considerations:

򐂰 Development and testing consider Power Virtual Server for fast provisioning and flexible scaling.
򐂰 Mission critical workloads consider Power Private Cloud or Power Virtual Server Private Cloud for
high performance, low latency and security.

Choosing the right cloud option for IBM Power workloads depends on the specific
requirements of the business. Factors such as security, compliance, performance, and cost
must all be carefully considered. IBM offers a range of cloud solutions that cater to different
needs, from fully private clouds to highly flexible public cloud options. Businesses should
evaluate their workloads and operational requirements to make an informed decision about
which cloud model best supports their strategic goals.

1.5 Government regulations and compliance

Government regulations and data protection laws play a pivotal role in how organizations
approach cloud adoption and management. These rules, particularly in industries like
healthcare, finance, and government, determine where and how sensitive data must be
stored, processed, and transmitted. Understanding and adhering to these regulations is
crucial when selecting a cloud provider.

IBM Power Virtual Server is designed to provide you with a solution that enables you to meet
regulatory requirements for data processing and has already earned several certifications for

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 21

 differing regulations. such as General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), System and
Organization Controls (SOC), and PCI-DSS. IBM continues to conduct regular compliance
audits to ensure continuous compliance with legal and regulatory standards. By taking
advantage of the on-premises Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, you can meet additional
regulatory standards – specifically in data control and data sovereignty. Figure 1-11 shows
how Power Virtual Server can help with your compliance requirements.

Figure 1-11 Government regulations and compliance

Monitoring and compliance tools

Power Virtual Server provides several key monitoring, security, and auditing tools. These tools
allow organizations to track system performance, security, and data access, ensuring that any
compliance gaps or risks are identified and addressed promptly. Figure 1-12 shows the IBM
compliance and audit tools found in the IBM Cloud.

Figure 1-12 IBM Cloud compliance tools for Power Virtual Server

22 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Below are the essential tools available within IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud to assist
in compliance and monitoring:
򐂰 IBM Cloud Monitoring
Provides real-time insights into the health, performance, and availability of cloud
resources.
How it Helps:
– Tracks system performance, resource utilization, and network metrics.
– Monitors the status of virtual machines, applications, and infrastructure components.
– Allows businesses to set up alerts based on custom thresholds, helping identify
compliance violations or performance degradation.
Ensures continuous operational compliance by monitoring the system and identifying
issues before they impact service availability.
򐂰 IBM Cloud Security and Compliance Center
A centralized platform that monitors and manages compliance with industry standards and
regulations.
How it Helps:
– Automates compliance checks by comparing infrastructure settings and configurations
against regulatory standards like HIPAA, PCI DSS, and GDPR.
– Provides compliance dashboards and generates audit reports to ensure that security
configurations meet legal requirements.
– Helps detect misconfiguration, vulnerabilities, and potential risks that could lead to
non-compliance.
Regularly audits the system's compliance status and provides actionable insights to
maintain regulatory adherence.
򐂰 IBM QRadar® (SIEM - Security Information and Event Management)
A comprehensive security monitoring tool that detects and responds to security incidents
across the entire environment.
How it Helps:
– Collects and analyzes log data from various sources, including network traffic, user
activity, and system events.
– Identifies potential security breaches, unauthorized access attempts, and other
suspicious activities in real-time.
– Provides audit trails and incident reports to support security audits and investigations.
Helps organizations meet compliance standards by detecting and reporting security
violations and incidents in real-time, ensuring prompt remediation.
򐂰 IBM Spectrum Protect
A data protection and backup tool that ensures business continuity and compliance with
data retention policies.
How it Helps:
– Automates backup processes and ensures that data is securely stored in line with
regulatory requirements.
– Provides detailed reports on data backups, recovery points, and retention periods to
support audit processes.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 23

 – Offers data encryption both at rest and during transmission, ensuring compliance with
standards that mandate data protection.
Supports compliance with data protection laws by ensuring that backup and recovery
policies align with retention and encryption standards (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA).
򐂰 IBM Guardium®
A security solution focused on data protection and database activity monitoring.
How it Helps:
– Monitors access to sensitive data and logs all database activity, including user access,
changes, and queries.
– Provides detailed audit trails of database transactions, ensuring that sensitive data is
accessed and modified in accordance with security policies.
– Enforces data access controls and generates reports for compliance audits.
Compliance Role: Ensures compliance with data protection regulations like PCI DSS and
SOX, which mandate strict controls over access to sensitive data.
򐂰 IBM Log Analysis
Provides centralized logging for tracking and analyzing system and application logs across
Power Virtual Server environments.
How it Helps:
– Collects logs from various cloud components and aggregates them for detailed
analysis.
– Identifies anomalies, errors, and security events based on logs, providing a clear audit
trail.
– Generates compliance reports and ensures that logs are stored securely for later
retrieval.
Supports compliance efforts by maintaining detailed log records for auditing purposes,
ensuring traceability and accountability for system activities.
򐂰 IBM PowerVC (Power Virtualization Center)
A cloud management tool for managing and monitoring virtualized Power systems.
How it Helps:
– Manages resource allocation, provisioning, and monitoring of virtual machines.
– Provides real-time monitoring of cloud performance and infrastructure status.
– Supports compliance by offering visibility into infrastructure configurations, ensuring
alignment with regulatory requirements.
Helps monitor compliance by tracking system configurations, resource allocations, and
changes within the virtualized environment.

Table 1-4 provides a summary of the tools previously discussed.

Table 1-4 Compliance and monitoring tools summary

Tool Primary Use Compliance Role

Ensures continuous operational

Monitors real-time performance compliance by detecting
IBM Cloud Monitoring
and health of cloud resources performance and security
issues.

24 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Tool Primary Use Compliance Role

Manages security policies and Automates compliance checks

IBM Cloud Security and
checks against compliance and generates regulatory
Compliance Center
standards reports for auditing purposes.

Provides audit trails for security

Analyzes security events and
IBM QRadar (SIEM) violations and helps respond to
detects potential incidents
incidents in real-time.

Ensures compliance with data

Automates backup and data
IBM Spectrum® Protect retention policies and
protection
encryption standards.

Supports compliance by
Monitors database activity and logging database access and
IBM Guardium
protects sensitive data ensuring data security
standards are met.

Provides audit trails and logs for

Centralized logging and
IBM Log Analysis compliance auditing and
analysis
investigation purposes.

Monitors resource usage and

Manages virtualized Power system configurations,
IBM PowerVC
systems ensuring infrastructure meets
compliance standards.

Case Study: Multinational Compliance in Action

A global pharmaceutical company adopting a hybrid cloud model must comply with GDPR in
Europe, HIPAA in the U.S., and local data laws in Asia. By using Power Virtual Server Private
Cloud in each region, the company ensures that sensitive healthcare data remains compliant
with regional regulations, while benefiting from the cloud's scalability and flexibility.

Summary
These tools ensure that businesses using Power Virtual Server Private Cloud can automate
compliance checks, generate audit reports, and continuously monitor their environment to
maintain compliance with industry regulations. Regular use of these tools enables businesses
to proactively address compliance challenges and maintain robust security.

Navigating government regulations is a critical aspect of cloud adoption. By using IBM Power
Virtual Server Private Cloud, organizations can ensure compliance with data sovereignty,
security, and industry-specific regulations, all while taking advantage of the cloud's flexibility.
Whether managing healthcare, financial, or government data, Power Virtual Server offers a
comprehensive solution to meet regulatory needs.

1.5.1 Black or disconnected sites

For an enterprise or organization which has locations with security requirements that do not
allow any outside network connectivity, then those locations are not a good fit for the Power
Virtual Server Private Cloud offering. The IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud requires a
management network connection to the IBM Cloud Management Console (CMC) for remote
provisioning and management of the infrastructure. The CMC does not enable access to any
client data or applications.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 25

1.6 Use cases
There are many ways to get started on moving workloads to the cloud. The following sections
provide some use cases for workloads that are good choices to implement in a hybrid cloud
environment.

1.6.1 Burst to cloud

Burst to cloud refers to the capability of extending an organization's on-premises
infrastructure by temporarily utilizing cloud resources during periods of high demand. This
hybrid cloud strategy allows businesses to “burst” workloads into the cloud when local
resources are insufficient, providing additional computing power, storage, and other
resources without the need for permanent hardware investments. IBM Power Systems,
especially when used with IBM Power Virtual Server, enables businesses to burst workloads
to IBM Cloud seamlessly, offering both flexibility and cost savings.

Key features of burst to cloud

By leveraging burst to cloud, organizations can optimize their IT infrastructure, reduce costs,
and improve their ability to handle unpredictable workloads. Figure 1-13 provides an
illustration of burst to cloud.

Figure 1-13 Burst to cloud

1. Dynamic Resource Expansion

When the demand on an organization's on-premises infrastructure exceeds capacity,
workloads can be automatically redirected to cloud environments to maintain
performance. This is ideal for businesses experiencing seasonal traffic spikes, sudden
increases in customer demand, or data processing bursts.
Example: A retailer could use burst-to-cloud during Black Friday or holiday shopping
seasons to accommodate spikes in web traffic.
2. Cost Efficiency
Rather than investing in additional on-premises servers that may only be needed
occasionally, businesses can leverage pay-as-you-go cloud resources. This avoids
over-provisioning and helps manage costs more efficiently.
Example: A media company streaming a large live event can temporarily use cloud
resources to handle the spike in viewer traffic without purchasing new hardware.

26 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3. Hybrid Cloud Integration
IBM Power Virtual Server allows for seamless integration between on-premises
environments and IBM Cloud. Workloads can be shifted between the two environments
with minimal disruption, giving organizations flexibility in where they run their applications.
This model is perfect for companies that require a balance between data residency and
cloud scalability.
4. Disaster Recovery and Flexibility
Cloud bursting can also be used as part of a disaster recovery strategy, where critical
workloads can shift to the cloud in case of on-premises failures. This ensures business
continuity without investing heavily in secondary infrastructure.

Implementing burst to cloud

Implementing a burst to cloud requires some planning and preparation. To be successful you
need to implement a hybrid cloud architecture that integrates your private infrastructure and
public clouds. You need to be able to utilize load balancing techniques to distribute workloads
between on-premises and cloud resources.

When deciding to use a burst to cloud strategy, be sure to consider data transfer costs and
latency when workloads are moved between environments and ensure that your cloud
provider meets your security and compliance requirements.

Here are some additional considerations:

1. Monitor Usage Patterns
Regularly monitor resource usage to predict when cloud bursting might be necessary.
Automating the scaling process based on performance metrics can help avoid bottlenecks
and downtime.
2. Optimize Workload Placement
Identify which workloads are suitable for bursting to the cloud. Applications with variable
demand or batch processing tasks are ideal candidates for cloud bursting.
3. Leverage Auto-Scaling Tools
Use IBM Cloud Auto-Scaling to automatically adjust resources based on preset
thresholds, ensuring workloads remain responsive while minimizing unnecessary cloud
usage.
Example Use Case: A financial services firm experiences fluctuating demand for its data
analysis services. During normal operation, its on-premises Power Systems handle the
workload. However, at quarter-end, when demand for financial reports surges, the firm
bursts workloads into IBM Cloud. This strategy allows the firm to avoid hardware
over-provisioning while ensuring timely report generation.

For more information see the following documents:

򐂰 IBM Power Systems for Hybrid Cloud
򐂰 Power Virtual Server Burst to Cloud Guide
򐂰 IBM Auto-Scaling Overview

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 27

1.6.2 AI on Power
IBM Power is designed for AI and advanced workloads, positioning enterprises to inference
and deploy AI algorithms on sensitive data and transactions that reside on Power systems.
More specifically, IBM Power Virtual Server can help enterprises by providing a flexible,
scalable, and secure platform to run mission-critical workloads, including AI, which extends
on-premises environments to the cloud.

At the same time, clients want to be agile and drive stronger business outcomes with simpler
experiences. This includes ramping up quickly, spending less time maintaining infrastructure,
and paying as they go. With a flexible as a service offering, we’re helping clients with
frictionless workload migration and modernization from on-premises to the cloud. This is
possible because of architectural parity between IBM Power and IBM Cloud that helps our
clients achieve growth while adopting innovative AI and hybrid cloud technologies. Power
Virtual Servers delivers a virtual machine as a service on Power architecture, engineered to
run your mission critical applications. With the same architecture on premises and on cloud,
workload migration does not require re-platforming to move it to other clouds.

We are continuing to make improvements to our IBM Power Virtual Server offering on IBM
Cloud, including enhancing the user experience and capabilities and expanding the
infrastructure itself, so clients can focus on business outcomes.

IBM Power clients have valuable data residing on their servers, giving them an opportunity
with enterprise AI to derive insights from this data to help address business challenges such
as providing a more seamless and secure customer experience. IBM Power10 has on-chip
acceleration for production-ready AI at the point of data to enable faster time to insight and
lower latency.

Technology services provider OpenTech utilizes OpenXAI platform, a private document

sourced knowledge-based generative AI chat application that generates content for users
based on their own private data. Choosing the right infrastructure to run OpenXAI was critical
for OpenTech as the company’s chat application was being trained on sensitive and
confidential documentation. Furthermore, OpenTech needed to stay on-premises within the
country to comply with local regulations regarding data privacy and sovereignty.

IBM and OpenTech joint clients use IBM Power10 processor-based servers to run generative
AI chatbots that leverage private documentation to keep confidential data secure.

“Putting our OpenXAI platform on Power10 gives us the best of both worlds. Our open-source
technology stack makes development and expansion easy to handle as we add new features
constantly,” said Moatasim Al-Masri, CEO, OpenTech. “In addition, clustering multiple
Power10 servers together with IBM Storage solutions gives our clients a unique and robust
generative AI solution that takes the worry out of having to find hardware to match the
software. This solution is powerful for today and into the future and can be a closed
on-premises private solution or a private corporate cloud solution hosted on-prem, keeping
confidential information secure to meet data privacy and sovereignty requirements.”10

Statement of direction
IBM intends to incorporate the IBM Spyre accelerator in future Power offerings to provide
additional AI compute capabilities. Working together, IBM Power processors and IBM Spyre
accelerator will enable the next generation infrastructure to scale demanding AI workloads for
businesses.11

10
Delivering an On-Prem Generative AI Chatbot with IBM Power
11 https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/announcements/statement-direction-spyre-accelerator-power-platform

28 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

1.6.3 Database support
IBM Power is an excellent platform for databases due to its high availability design, its
performance and scalability, and its integrated security capabilities. The data managed by the
database is the life blood of an enterprise’s business and if it is unavailable for any reason,
business operations are crippled. This can lead to a financial loss due to lost business and
also can lead to a loss of reputation as customers are unable to interface with the enterprise.

IBM Power is the choice to host databases for many enterprises and IBM works closely with
database vendors to ensure that our customers can get the best value when running their
databases on IBM Power.

As IBM Power Virtual Server is based on the same IBM Power architecture as is run
on-premises, database vendors do not need to specifically provide support for databases on
Power, if it runs on-premises, then it will run on IBM Power Virtual Server. This section focuses
on database support for IBM Power Virtual Server including IBM Db2, Oracle Database, and
other databases that run on IBM Power.

IBM Db2
IBM Db2 is a relational database product that allows users to store, manage, and retrieve
data in a structured format. Db2 offers features like data security, scalability, and support for
various data types. It can also handle complex queries and transactions.

IBM Db2 is the cloud-native database built to power low–latency transactions and real-time
analytics at scale, providing customers with both self-managed and fully managed (SaaS)
options on the cloud. It provides a single engine for DBAs, enterprise architects and
developers to keep critical applications running. It also stores and queries anything and
powers faster decision-making across organizations.

For the past three decades, Db2 has provided stability and dependability for customers’ data
management solutions. Its robust architecture and proven performance have given
businesses uninterrupted access to critical data while powering their enterprise-level
applications. Db2 has been recognized as a leading data management product as shown in
Figure 1-14.

Figure 1-14 Db2 recognized as a leader

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 29

 IBM Db2 first started as a mainframe database over 40 years ago. After its success on that
platform, it was ported to run on Linux, Unix (for example AIX), and Windows hence the name
Db2 LUW. Since then, it has grown into a highly utilized cloud-ready database engine for use
both on-premises and in the cloud. IBM Db2 is integrated into IBM i as an integral component
in the IBM i ecosystem.

Many customers run Db2 on IBM Power, running in AIX or Linux, and do all IBM i users. It is
known for its integrated features for performance and data replication, serving data for
business-critical applications across many industries.

IBM Power Virtual Server provides an excellent infrastructure and environment to relocate
your Power on AIX assets to high performance virtual computing infrastructure. With IBM Db2
on Power Virtual Server you get the option to leverage Db2 backup/restore procedures and
Db2 HADR database synchronization commands. You can create an off-premises backup of
your Db2 database for disaster recovery or fully migrate your Db2 workload from on-premises
to a Power Virtual Server environment in a safe and secure IBM datacenter, quickly and easily
using common Db2 tools.

Power Virtual Server can offer significant price performance advantages over comparable
x86-based platforms. Consider the following:
– IBM Power9®-based Power Virtual Server processors, available now, offer competitive
price performance.
– Since Db2 LUW licensing is per core based, the per core performance advantage of
Power Virtual Server over x86-based compute provides significant TCO advantages.
– Power10 processors, which are becoming generally available in more datacenters,
offer > 2x per core performance advantage Power9.

In addition, modern AIX on Power Virtual Server infrastructure can provide significant
operational benefits. For example, an IBM Aspera® client/server infrastructure can be
installed to facilitate extremely fast data transfers across networks.

The future of IBM Db2® is bright, and performance, modernization and TCO benefits can be
realized by migrating Db2 on AIX from Power servers to IBM Power Virtual Server.

Oracle
Clients worldwide, across multiple industries, are finding an edge over competitors with
Oracle workloads running on IBM Power. Running on IBM Power provides better performance
than x86 based options and takes advantage of the high availability of the IBM Power
platform. The ability to run more workload per core on IBM Power also allows those clients to
reduce licensing costs, providing a high performance and cost-effective choice for running
business critical workloads based on Oracle. Figure 1-15 on page 31 lists five key motivations
for running your Oracle workloads on IBM Power.

Utilizing IBM Power Virtual Server, clients can build a hybrid cloud environment to run Oracle
on an IBM Power stack – either in IM data centers or client locations – identical to their
existing on-premises Power-based infrastructure for Oracle workloads. Running Oracle on
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud allows clients to leverage the 1:20 entitled core-to-virtual
processor ratio (just like traditional on-premises implementations) to maximize Oracle
licensing TCO. Power Virtual Server uses a fully Oracle certified stack with PowerVM, AIX,
IBM i, SAN based storage, and network adapters which enables full Oracle support. IBM and
Oracle work closely together to identify and fix any issues that might arise.

30 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 1-15 Five motivations for running Oracle on IBM Power

Importantly, running on IBM Power Virtual Server meets Oracle’s hard partitioning
requirements which can reduce the number of licenses required for your solution. This
provides:
– Sub-capacity licensing with the ability to license only the CPUs available to Oracle
Database and middleware. This allows a company to optimize Oracle licensing to
provide a reduced TCO, lower than any hyperscale cloud environment.
– Full support for Oracle Database, RAC, Fusion Middleware, and Applications. Any IBM
Power supported Oracle solutions are supported on Power Virtual Server.
– Highest off-premises scalable Oracle DB Single Instance capability.
– Superior storage resiliency with an enterprise class platform with all flash NVMe
enabled SAN storage.

Figure 1-16 summarizes the reasons that clients choose IBM Power to run their Oracle
business workloads.

Figure 1-16 Summary of why clients choose IBM Power for Oracle workloads

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 31

 Other databases
There are many other databases, either SQL based or noSQL available on IBM Power. As
such, they can also be easily installed in your IBM Power Virtual Server servers. Running
these databases on Power Virtual Server can provide a significant TCO advantage compared
to running them on x86 servers while providing enterprise level support.

Figure 1-17 shows a number of databases that are supported on IBM Power.

Figure 1-17 Other database choices for IBM Power Virtual Server

You can run these databases on Power Virtual Server by bringing your own licenses.

1.6.4 Development and test environment

For an organization to build, test, and validate an application before going live into production,
development and test environments are necessitated. That is where the developers make
new features, test their performance, and debug problems without affecting the live production
environment.

Creating a development and test environment in an on-premises location can be a difficult

and time-consuming process. Developers need to work with the infrastructure team to find
resources for their environment. In some cases, this requires that new servers be purchased,
requiring time to acquire funding, order and install the equipment and then when the
equipment is no longer needed, find another project that can utilize that equipment.

Moving development and test to the cloud can provide a significant productivity benefit for the
development staff as well as reduced expenses for the business. IBM Power Virtual Server is
ideal for creating a temporary sandbox environment for testing, as a step before deploying
production applications. For example:
򐂰 You need a remote environment to test software or hardware updates. You have temporary
needs for some system resources.
򐂰 You need to assess, plan, or test next-generation hardware or OS versions.
򐂰 You are interested in an isolated infrastructure, and you need it temporarily just for testing
applications.

32 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

򐂰 You want to test hardware before a hardware refresh.

Using IBM Power Virtual Server for your development environment provides:
򐂰 Dynamic Resource Allocation
Cloud platforms allow you to quickly scale up or down computing resources based on
project demands. This ensures that you have the necessary capacity for peak workloads
without over investing in hardware.
򐂰 Flexible Environments
You can easily create and configure different development and testing environments with
varying configurations (e.g., different operating systems, databases, or software versions)
to accommodate diverse project requirements.
򐂰 Pay-as-You-Go Model
Cloud services typically follow a pay-as-you-go pricing model, meaning you only pay for
the resources you use. This can significantly reduce upfront costs and eliminate the need
for long-term hardware commitments.
򐂰 Reduced Overhead
Cloud providers manage infrastructure maintenance, updates, and security, reducing your
operational overhead and freeing up resources for core development activities.
򐂰 Rapid Provisioning
Cloud environments can be provisioned in minutes, allowing you to quickly set up new
development or testing environments. This accelerates development cycles and enables
faster time-to-market.
򐂰 Simplified Management
Cloud platforms often provide user-friendly interfaces and automation tools, simplifying the
management of development and testing environments.
򐂰 Remote Access
Cloud-based environments can be accessed from anywhere with an internet connection,
enabling seamless collaboration among development teams, regardless of their physical
location.
򐂰 Centralized Repository
Cloud-based version control systems and artifact repositories can provide a centralized
location for storing and managing code, ensuring that everyone has access to the latest
versions.
򐂰 Data Backup and Recovery
Cloud providers often offer robust data backup and recovery services, helping to protect
your valuable assets and minimize downtime in the event of a disaster.
򐂰 High Availability
Cloud infrastructure is typically designed for high availability, ensuring that your
development and testing environments remain accessible even in the face of hardware
failures or disruptions.

In summary, the cloud offers a flexible, scalable, and cost-effective solution for development
and testing environments. By leveraging cloud-based resources, organizations can
accelerate development cycles, improve collaboration, and enhance their overall agility and
competitiveness.

Chapter 1. Hybrid by Design 33

 Modernizing your applications
The advantages of using IBM Power Virtual Server as a development environment are also
applicable to clients that are developing Cloud Ready applications. IBM Power Virtual Server
provides an excellent platform to modernize your applications utilizing Red Hat OpenShift.

Clients can begin their modernization journey by deploying Red Hat OpenShift on IBM Power
Virtual Server utilizing the simplified Installer Provisioned Infrastructure (IPI). IPI is designed
to simplify and automate the deployment of a Red Hat OpenShift cluster on Power. For more
information on using Red Hat OpenShift on Power see Deploy Red Hat OpenShift.

Power Virtual Server allows integration with on-premises environments to create a hybrid
cloud development environment where part of the environment is on-premises while others
are on the cloud. This will be helpful in cases when organizations require an on-premises
infrastructure due to compliance or performance reasons but would like to have the flexibility
of the cloud for testing new features.

CI/CD Pipeline Support

Power Virtual Server environments can support the integration into a Continuous
Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline. Developers will be able, using their own
scripting and automation, to automate the deployment of test environments and run
automated tests and promote builds to production seamlessly and in an automated workflow.

Example of Development and Test Environment in Power Virtual Server

A software company development leverages the IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud to
establish multiple test environments. Each environment emulates a different development life
stage, all the way from simple unit testing to preproduction.

In the cloud, the development team provisions an isolated VM for different application
modules. They run their tests on IBM AIX VMs and scale up the resources with growing test
data complexity.

The company automates the deployment of new builds, execution of unit tests, and reporting
by integrating the Power Virtual Server test environments into their CI/CD pipeline. This
increase in release cycles ensures that only high-quality code reaches production.

Conclusion
IBM Power Virtual Server provides agile development and testing in an economical, highly
scalable environment. The use of Power Virtual Server for development accelerates
development cycles through on-demand provisioning, seamlessly integrated hybrid cloud,
and automation in workflows while taking ultimate control to the business by assuring
maximum utilization of budget spent on resources. Utilizing Power Virtual Server provides a
test environment for new applications or to validate updates, and provides the flexibility
required by modern development teams.

34 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 2

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private

Cloud
Enterprises adopting innovative hybrid cloud and AI technologies need flexible infrastructures
that ensure performance, security, and interoperability to meet evolving IT demands. To stay
competitive, reduce technology costs, and respond to changing customer needs,
organizations require platforms that enable quick adjustments in workload consumption,
whether on the cloud or on-site, prioritizing business outcomes over infrastructure
management. Generative AI applications hold significant potential for driving business
transformation, and enterprises taking a strategic approach to hybrid cloud may maximize its
benefits.

IBM's Hybrid Cloud strategy prioritizes client choice and flexibility. IBM recently expanded the
capabilities of Power Virtual Server to allow deployment within client data centers. This
approach combines the benefits of cloud consumption and management with on-premises
data storage, addressing regional compliance and governance requirements. Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud is designed to meet these goals.

Clients have the choice of fully managed off-premises services or private on-premises
capabilities in their data center, providing:
򐂰 Predefined server, storage, and network architecture in semi-configurable options.
򐂰 No re-platforming required.
򐂰 Consistent cloud user experience.
򐂰 Highly reliable infrastructure with leading business continuity and disaster recovery.
򐂰 Superior IBM Power security and comprehensive Cloud compliance.
򐂰 Flexible consumption, fully owned and operated by IBM, delivering industry-leading
service level agreements (SLAs) using in-country resources.
򐂰 Fully metered consumption model with no upfront cost, pay-as-you-use billing, and a
minimum monthly commitment.
򐂰 Intentional workload placement, integrating with IBM Cloud or on-premises, and benefiting
from a strong ecosystem for IBM i, AIX, and Linux.

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. 35

 The following topics are covered in this chapter:
򐂰 2.1, “Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Design” on page 37
򐂰 2.2, “Technology components” on page 43
򐂰 2.3, “Pricing concepts” on page 65

36 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

2.1 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Design
IBM Power Virtual Server is an IBM offering providing cloud services for IBM Power
workloads in IBM Cloud data centers. Power Virtual Server was originally offered in 2019 and
has grown to 21 data centers world-wide and over 650 customers.

The new on-premises extension of IBM Power Virtual Server was created to provide
intentional workload placement while maintaining a consistent management experience. IBM
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud benefits clients that:
– Have data sovereignty requirements in a country with no IBM Public Cloud.
– Have regulated or sensitive data and workloads that need to remain on-premises.
– Have workloads with ultra short latency requirements to other on-premises
infrastructure.

The newer IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offering is engineered to:
򐂰 Maintain customer data and workloads on your own site
Enterprises may have workloads or data that is regulated and cannot be hosted
off-premises. In some cases, enterprises can have workloads that are sensitive or with
ultra-short latency requirements that are better served on site and in very close proximity
with other on-site workloads.
򐂰 Maintain customer data in region and specific geographies in the location of their choice
Country sovereignty regulations are require some data and workloads to stay in the
country. According to a recent IBM Institute of Business Value study, 61% of cloud leaders
cite security or compliance as reasons for moving certain workloads from public clouds to
private clouds or on-premises data centers.
򐂰 Provide a seamless hybrid cloud experience
Enterprises can foster a unified hybrid cloud landscape by seamlessly integrating Power
Virtual Server running both at an IBM site and at a client site location with the ability to
manage all the virtual machines (VMs) and infrastructure effortlessly through a unified
user interface. Clients can receive the flexibility utilizing as-a-service with intentional
workload placement on and off premises.
򐂰 Deliver predictable charging model with committed monthly spend combined with flexible
consumption with metered usage-based pricing
Both Power Virtual Server offerings, off-premises running at an IBM location and
on-premises running at the client site, include compute, memory, storage, and operating
system licenses that are fully metered by the hour allowing clients to pay for how much
they use each month with no upfront payment.
򐂰 Streamline IT operations
Whether in the cloud or at an enterprise’s site, IBM manages the infrastructure, freeing
enterprises to focus on business outcomes and less on managing infrastructure. IBM will
own, deliver, and set up the Power Virtual Server in your datacenter of choice, and provide
a fully managed solution, including monitoring, security, firmware updates, and
infrastructure management.
򐂰 Provide enhanced security and control of data
IBM Power Virtual Server is designed to provide comprehensive security for IBM Power
infrastructure by integrating with IBM Cloud tooling to manage security. This alleviates the
need to manage Power infrastructure security with the added benefit of maintaining
sensitive data and workload on-premises.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 37

2.1.1 Same management interface as IBM Power Virtual Server
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is designed to be managed with the same interface
that is currently used in the public or off-premises version of the offering. This allows easy
integration and migration of workloads between the offering options.

Provisioning a Power Virtual Server environment starts at the IBM Power Virtual Server page
in IBM Cloud. Before you can provision any cloud resources you need to have set up an IBM
Cloud account with a valid username and password. Figure 2-1 shows the initial screen for
provisioning Power Virtual Server.

Figure 2-1 Power Virtual Server provisioning page

The first thing that you need to select, depending on your requirements and how you are
planning to use these resources, is the type of instance to be created. There are two options
available:
1. Quick start for dev / test
2. Advanced for production

Choosing Quick start for dev/test provides a simplified process allowing an immediate
creation of Power Virtual Server resources intended for dev/test work in the cloud. In contrast
choosing Advanced for production displays additional panels to enter options with an
emphasis on network and security configuration.

Next note that there are two panels to be chosen from.

1. Create a workspace.
2. Create a virtual server instance.

A workspace is a logical container or cloud instance that is used to create and deploy virtual
server instances. A workspace is tied to a specific Power Virtual Server cloud location – either
off-premises or on-premises. An active workspace has to be configured with the correct
region specified and allows for resource grouping and utilization.

A virtual server instance (VSI) is a single server image or logical partition (LPAR) defined in
Power Virtual Server. The VSI definition includes defining processors, memory, networking
and storage resources that are defined for the specific LPAR. Multiple VSI can be defined

38 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 within a workspace. If you have more than one physical location or region, you will have
multiple workspaces defined.

Figure 2-2 shows a sample list of workspaces defined within an account. This list is accessed
by selecting the Workspaces tab on the left of your screen.

Figure 2-2 List of defined workspaces

Important: A workspace must be defined before you can create a VSI. At least one
workspace needs to be defined in each location that you want to run workloads within
Power Virtual Server.

If you do not have a workspace defined in the location you wish to define Power Virtual Server
LPARs, then you need to select Create a Workspace from the initial Power Virtual Server
provisioning screen shown in Figure 2-1 on page 38. The process of defining a workspace is
detailed in section 5.2, “Setting up your workspace” on page 115. This is the point where you
differentiate between defining resources in the public cloud or in your own private cloud
infrastructure.

Once your workspace is defined, you can define your Virtual Server Instances within your
workspace. Defining your VSI is detailed in 5.3, “Setting up a virtual server instance” on
page 117.

2.1.2 Security and data governance

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud implements foundational security measures, covering
Security and Privacy by Design, security controls, data management and encryption, data
privacy and jurisdiction considerations, and incident management.

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud prioritizes adherence to privacy regulations, particularly
those governing application data placement and location, for customers evaluating the
service. To ensure data jurisdiction, Power Virtual Server Private Cloud implements robust
security principles and controls, keeping customer data exclusively within their data center or
premises.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 39

 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud's architecture segregates the tenant and management
networks robustly. The tenant networks, which handle customer workload data and VM
communication, use both Ethernet and SAN Fiber Channel storage. In contrast, the
management network handles control plane traffic, as discussed in the Data management
and encryption section. This segregation starts at the physical layer, where each server has
at least two Ethernet network interface controllers (NICs), one dedicated solely to
management/control traffic. Only Power Virtual Server site reliability engineering (SRE)
personnel and service accounts can access the tenant network, with no access to the
management network. The tenant network also remains isolated from the internet, ensuring
customer workload data on the SAN network and storage systems does not traverse the
management network.

Customer data remains in the client data center and is not transferred to the control or
management plane. All customer data stored in IBM FlashSystems is encrypted while at rest.

IBM Security and Privacy by Design

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud follows IBM Security® and Privacy by Design1 (SPbD)
practices, which focus on threat modeling, privacy assessment, security testing, static and
dynamic code scans, and vulnerability management based on IBM Product Security Incident
Response Team (PSIRT) guidelines. The team maintains and reviews the threat model
annually or upon significant architectural changes, as required by IBM SPbD.

Security controls
IBM and clients divide security responsibilities according to the joint responsibility model
shown in Figure 2-3.

Figure 2-3 Joint responsibility model

In this model:
򐂰 IBM handles logical controls within the blue boundary, including Power hardware and
firmware, Virtual I/O Servers (VIOS), Network Installation Management servers, IBM
PowerVC, NovaLink, Hardware Management Console (HMC), physical network

1 https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/ibm-security-and-privacy-design

40 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 infrastructure, and storage infrastructure, including storage area network (SAN) switches,
storage controllers, and storage arrays.
򐂰 Clients handle logical controls within the red boundary, covering operating systems,
middleware, applications, logical networking, and application data.
򐂰 Data center physical security controls, including physical access and environmental
controls, are a joint responsibility between customers and Power Virtual Server.

For more information see IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud: Security overview.

Data management and encryption

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud minimizes data flow out of the customer data center to the
IBM Cloud data center virtual private cloud instance, limiting it to infrastructure device
configuration, control/management information, monitoring status, telemetry, and security
event data. This data transmission is crucial for the product's optimal functionality and does
not include customer workload data or sensitive personally identifiable information, unless
explicitly authorized by the customer. All communications between the customer data center
and the IBM Cloud VPC instance adhere to stringent security protocols, employing Transport
Layer Security (TLS) 1.3 or TLS 1.2 protocols along with National Institute of Standards and
Technology (NIST) approved ciphers and algorithms.

Virtual machine lifecycle events, such as VM creation and deletion, are communicated over a
dedicated management plane, strictly adhering to TLS 1.2 and above protocols for HTTPS
traffic. Connections to infrastructure devices for configuration management, patching, and
problem resolution are secured using Secure Shell (SSH).

2.1.3 Pay as you go model

The IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud commercial terms are:
򐂰 Fully metered flexible capacity consumption (usage) with minimum commit at pod level
– Metering of actual usage on hourly basis [core, memory (GB), storage (GB)]
– Monthly minimum commit with monthly true-up if monthly usage < monthly minimum
commit
򐂰 Contract terms 3 or 5-year with 1-year renewal
– Option to terminate after 12 months with 60-day notice and pay only 50% of remaining
commit
򐂰 Single monthly bill one month in arrears
– Capacity consumption details available on IBM Cloud Portal (UI)
򐂰 Advanced support default w/ Premium upgrade option
– SLA’s and SLO’s aligned to IBM Cloud
򐂰 Technology & upgrades:
– Add Building blocks of Compute & Storage
– Expand capacity into a pod that is not fully populated
– Increase the memory capacity only by adding new server(s)
– Removing Servers and/or Storage from pod not supported
– Pod upgrades to latest technology only if deemed by IBM
򐂰 Countries planned for Limited & General availability:
– USA, Canada, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Austria,
Denmark, UK, Australia

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 41

2.1.4 Dynamic provisioning
Power Virtual Server offers Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) in the public cloud or in a
customer's designated data center, known as Power Virtual Server Private Cloud. IaaS
solutions are designed to quickly and efficiently allocate compute and storage resources for
client workloads. You can create a new Virtual Server Instance, or logical partition (LPAR),
through a simple GUI interface, API calls, or automation scripts in just minutes.

IBM PowerVM provides the underlying virtualization function for IBM Power servers, efficiently
sharing server resources across multiple LPARs. You can dynamically modify each LPAR
configuration by adding or removing processors and memory while it runs. This dynamic
provisioning and deprovisioning also applies to storage configuration, allowing you to add
storage capacity to an operational LPAR. In some cases, you can even remove storage
capacity if the application is not accessing data on those volumes.

This flexibility enables you to scale your infrastructure up or down to meet business
requirements. For example, you can quickly increase processing capability during peak
workload times and reduce it when the peak subsides, resulting in lower computing
expenses.

2.1.5 Scalable
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is an as-a-service offering that includes a prescriptive
set of physical infrastructure which includes compute, network, and storage. The physical
infrastructure, also known as, the pod, is deployed in the customer data center. The pod is
maintained and operated by IBM site reliability engineering (SREs) and managed through the
IBM Cloud platform. Each pod is associated with an IBM Cloud Satellite™ location that is
owned by customer IBM Cloud account.

The architecture is set up to allow clients to scale their existing pods by adding additional
compute and storage within the existing racks. For medium pods with two racks, the
architecture supports the expansion to four racks. It is also possible to add additional pods to
scale the environment horizontally to meet additional workload demands.

2.1.6 Ease of implementation and migration

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, an as-a-service offering is designed to be easy to
implement, giving customers cloud experience with infrastructure in their data center. Here
are some of the features that make it easy to use:
򐂰 Quick deployment
򐂰 Automation interfaces
GUI, CLI, API, or Terraform interfaces makes the management of resources very easy
򐂰 Bring your own image
Customers have flexibility to bring their own custom IBM AIX, Linux, or IBM i images
򐂰 Dynamic resource adjustment
Configure and customize number of cores, amount of memory and storage volume size on
the virtual server.
򐂰 Private virtual server access
Customer can use a VPN to access the virtual server.

42 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 򐂰 Pay-as-you-use-billing
Based on specific needs, customers can choose to scale up or down resources
dynamically based on need.

2.2 Technology components

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is an as-a-service offering with highly prescriptive
infrastructure (compute, storage, and network) residing in the customer's location (on-
premises). The management will be performed via IBM Cloud interfaces (GUI, API, CLI,
Terraform). The various IBM Cloud regions (i.e., Dallas, Washington DC, London, Frankfurt,
Sao Paulo, etc.) will host the Power Virtual Server Private Cloud control plane software
(Power Service Broker) and the client locations will be configured to connect to the nearest
IBM Cloud region.

Figure 2-4 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud high level view2

2 https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/power-iaas?topic=power-iaas-private-cloud-architecture

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 43

2.2.1 Pods
A point of delivery (pod) is the physical component which resides within the client datacenter
and contains the compute, storage and network components. A pod contains one or more
racks where each of the components are installed. The racks are interconnected to provide a
completely self-contained infrastructure, including both customer usable components, spare
components, and management components.

As of the time writing this book, the following pod sizes are available:
򐂰 Small: 1 rack of IBM Power10 (S1022 and E1050) processors, storage, networking and
management components
򐂰 Medium: Either 2 or 4 racks of IBM Power10 (S1022, E1050, or E1080) processors.
storage, networking and management components.

Small pods
Small pods are designed as an entry configuration that support either the Power S1022
processor or the Power E1050. When using the Power S1022, the small pod supports up to
297 customer available cores and 36 TB of memory. With the Power E1050, a small pod
supports up to 340 customer available cores and 32 TB of memory. A small pod provides
either 438 TB or 876 TB of usable storage. Table 2-1 shows the different capabilities of the
small pod.

Table 2-1 Small pod attributes

Attribute Value

Client-usable hosts Min: 6

S1022 2 TB Max: 9

Client-usable hosts Min: 5

S1022 4 TB Max: 9

Client-usable hosts Min: 2

E1050 Max: 4

Client-usable cores per Pod

S1022 (2U): 40 total; 33 usable Min: 198 – S1022 (2 TB)
Min: 165 – S1022 (2 TB)
Max: 297 – S1022

E1050 (4U): 96 Total; 85 usable Min: 170 – E1050

Max: 340 – E1050

Client-usable memory per Pod

S1022 (2U) 2/4 TB options Min: 12 TB –S1022 (2 TB)
Max: 36 TB–S1022

E1050 (4U) 4/8 TB options Min: 8 TB – E1050

Max: 32 TB – E1050

Racks per Pod 1

Redundant HMC No

Client usable storage per Pod

Assumes 2x compression Min: 438 TB
1– 2 FS5200 controller Max: 876 TB
12 19.2 TB drives per controller

Max power consumption Rack 1: 24.7 kVA

Estimated max weight Rack 1: 1748 lbs

44 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 2-5 is a diagram showing the small pod setup.

Figure 2-5 Small Pod

Medium pods
The medium pods support any of the Power10 models, the Power E1080, the Power E1050 or
the Power S1022, providing significant flexibility. Depending on the configuration, the medium
pod consists of either 2 racks or 4 racks. A medium pod can provide up to 1287 usable cores
using the Power S1022, up to 1615 usable cores using the Power E1050, or up to 535 usable
cores using the Power E1080. A medium pod provides up to 160 TB of memory (using the
Power E1080).

Up to 3.5 PB of storage is available with 2 racks and up to 7 PB is available with 4 racks in the
medium pod. Additionally, the medium pod provides a redundant HMC. Table 2-2 shows the
attributes of the medium pod.

Table 2-2 .Medium pod details

Attribute Value

Client-usable hosts Min: 12

S1022 Max:15 (2-rack)
Max: 39 (4-rack)

Client-usable hosts Min: 5 (2-rack)

E1050 Min: 8 (4-rack)
Max:7 (2-rack)
Max: 19 (4-rack)

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 45

 Attribute Value

Client-usable hosts Min: 2 (4-rack)

E1080 Max: 5 (4-rack)4

Client-usable cores per pod

S1022 (2U): 40 total; 33 usable Min: 396 – S1022
Max: 495 – S1022 (2 Rack)
Max: 1287 – S1022 (4 Rack)

E1050 (4U): 96 Total; 85 usable Min: 425 – E1050 (2 Rack)

Min: 680 – E1050 (4 Rack)
Max: 595 – E1050 (2 Rack)
Max: 1615 – E1050 (4 Rack)

E1080 (10U): 120 Total; 107 usable Min: 214 – E1080 (4 Rack)
Max: 535 – E1080 (4 Rack)

Client-usable memory per pod

S1022 (2U) 2/4 TB options Min: 24 TB –S1022 (2 TB)
Max: 60 TB–S1022 (4 TB) (2 Rack)
Max: 156 TB–S1022 (4 TB) (4 Rack)
E1050 (4U) 4/8 TB options
Min: 20 TB – E1050 (4 TB)
Max: 56 TB – E1050 (8 TB) (2 Rack)
Max: 152 TB – E1050 (8 TB) (4 Rack)

E1080 (10U) 8/16/32 TB options Min: 16 TB – E1080 (8 TB)

Max: 160 TB – E1080 (32 TB) (4 Rack)

Racks per pod 2 or 4 (must add in pairs)

Redundant HMC Yes

Client usable storage per pod

Assumes 2x compression Min: 1.75 PB (24 drives per controller; 2 Rack)
2 FS9500 controllers (2 Rack) Max: 3.5 PB (48 drives per controller; 2 Rack)
1 – 4 FS9500 controllers (4 Rack) Max: 7.0 PB (48 drives per controller;4 Rack)
28 or 48 19.2 TB drives per controller

Max power consumption Rack 1: 22.3 kVA

Rack 2: 22.3 kVA
Rack 3: 24.6 kVA
Rack 4: 24.6 kVA

Estimated max weight Rack 1: 1581 lbs

Rack 2: 1581 lbs
Rack 3: 1593 lbs
Rack 4: 1593 lbs

46 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Figure 2-6 shows the configuration of the medium pod with four racks.

Figure 2-6 Four rack medium pod diagram

2.2.2 Compute
The compute nodes used in the IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud all utilize IBM
Power10 based processors. The IBM Power10 processor is the newest generation of IBM
Power processors, providing highly available, high-performance systems specifically built with
security in mind.

The IBM Power10 processor was introduced to the public on 17 August 2020 at the 32nd
HOT CHIPS1 semiconductor conference. At that meeting, the new capabilities and features of
the latest IBM POWER® processor microarchitecture and the Power Instruction Set
Architecture (ISA) v3.1B were revealed and categorized according to the following Power10
processor design priority focus areas:
򐂰 Data plane bandwidth
Terabyte per second signaling bandwidth on processor functional interfaces, petabyte
system memory capacities, 16-socket symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) scalability, and
memory clustering and memory inception capability.
򐂰 Powerful enterprise core
New core micro-architecture, flexibility, larger caches, and reduced latencies.
򐂰 End-to-end security
Hardware-enabled security features that are co-optimized with PowerVM hypervisor
support.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 47

 򐂰 Energy-efficiency
Up to threefold energy-efficiency improvement in comparison to IBM Power9 processor
technology.
򐂰 Artificial intelligence (AI)-infused core
A 10 - 20x matrix-math performance improvement per socket compared to the IBM
Power9 processor technology capability.

The IBM Power10 Processor session material that was presented at the 32nd HOT CHIPS
conference is available through the HC32 conference proceedings archive at this web page.

IBM S1022 Server (9105-22A)

The Power S1022 (9105-22A) 2U rack mount server is a powerful one- or two-socket server
that is available with one or two processors per system, with the following options:
򐂰 One or two 12-core Power10 processors running at a typical 2.90 - 4.0 GHz (maximum)
򐂰 Two 16-core Power10 processors running at a typical 2.75 - 4.0 GHz (maximum)
򐂰 Two 20 core Power10 processor running at a typical 2.45 - 3.90 GHz (maximum)

All processor cores can run up to eight simultaneous threads to deliver greater throughput.
When two sockets are populated, both must be the same processor model.

The Power S1022 server is available in small and medium Pods. Within the Power Virtual
Cloud Private configuration, it comes with the features shown in Table 2-3.

Table 2-3 Resource specifications for IBM Power S1022

Attribute Value

Applicable pod sizes small; medium

Rack space 2U

Total cores 40

Total usable cores 33

Memory options 2 TB
4 TB

H/W-based transparent memory encryption Yes

VIOS configuration 2 LPARs

3 cores/VIOS
16 GB memory/VIOS

NovaLink configuration 1 core

16 GB memory

Network adapters Small: 25GbE (2X)

Medium: 100GbE (2X)

Fibre Channel adapters 64 Gbps; 2-port (2X)

Max kVA 1.513

Amps 7.57

Watts 1,468

BTU per hour 5010

Weight 71 lbs

48 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 2-7 shows the S1022 server from the front and the back.

Figure 2-7 S1022 server

For more information regarding the IBM S1022, see IBM Power 10 Scale Out Servers
Technical Overview S1012, S1014, S1022s, S1022 and S1024, REDP-5675.

IBM E1050 Server (9043-MRX)

The Power E1050 server is ideal for cloud deployments because of its built-in virtualization,
flexible capacity, and high usage. The machine type model number of the Power E1050
server is 9043-MRX. It is a single enclosure server that is four EIA units tall (4U). It can be
configured with two, three, or four dual-chip modules (DCMs). Three processor options are
available:
򐂰 Twelve cores running at a typical 3.35 - 4.00 GHz (max) frequency range
򐂰 Eighteen cores running at a typical 3.20 - 4.00 GHz (max) frequency range
򐂰 Twenty-four cores running at a typical 2.95 - 3.90 GHz (max) frequency range

The Power E1050 server is available in small and medium Pods. Within the Power Virtual
Cloud Private configuration, it comes with the features shown in Table 2-4.

Table 2-4 Resource specification for IBM Power E1050

Attribute Value

Applicable pod sizes small; medium

Rack space 4U

Total cores 96

Total usable cores 85

Memory options 4 TB
8 TB

H/W-based transparent memory encryption Yes

VIOS configuration 2 LPARs

5 cores/VIOS
32 GB memory/VIOS

NovaLink configuration 1 core

16 GB memory

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 49

 Attribute Value

Network adapters Small: 25 GbE (4X)

Medium: 100 GbE (4X)

Fibre Channel adapters 64 Gbps; 2-port (4X)

Max kVA 3,109

Amps 15.55

Watts 3,016

BTU per hour 10,292

Weight 153 lbs

Figure 2-8 shows the Power E1050.

Figure 2-8 IBM Power E1050

For more information on the IBM Power E1050 see IBM Power E1050 IBM Power E1050
Technical Overview and Introduction, REDP-5684

IBM E1080 Server (9080-HEX)

The Power E1080, also referred to by its 9080-HEX machine type-model designation,
represents the most powerful and scalable server in the IBM Power portfolio. It is comprised
of a combination of CEC enclosures that are called nodes (or system nodes) along with other
drawers to support additional i/o adapters or internal disk capacity. The Power E1080 is
designed with reliability, scalability, and security built in and has fully integrated encryption
capability as well as advanced AI capabilities.

50 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

The Power E1080 server provides the following hardware components and characteristics:
򐂰 10-, 12-, or 15-core Power10 processor chips that are packaged in a single chip module
per socket.
򐂰 One, two, three, or four system nodes with four Power10 processor sockets each.
򐂰 Redundant clocking in each system node.
򐂰 Up to 60 Power10 processor cores per system node and up to 240 per system

In Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, the IBM Power E1080 Server is only available in
Medium Pods. The configuration supplied in Power Virtual Server Private Cloud includes two
system nodes, each with four 15-core 3.55 - 4.00 GHz (max) processor for a total of 60 cores
in each system node. This provides a total of 120 processors per system – of which 107 are
available for customer deployments. There are three memory configurations available – 8 TB,
16 TB and 32 TB – for configuration flexibility. More details about the configuration are shown
in Table 2-5.

Table 2-5 .Resource specification for IBM Power E1080

Attribute Value

Applicable pod sizes medium

Rack space 10U

Total cores 120

Total usable cores 107

Memory options 8 TB
16 TB
32 TB

H/W-based transparent memory encryption Yes

VIOS configuration 2 LPARs

10 cores/VIOS
48 GB memory/VIOS

NovaLink configuration 1 core

16 GB memory

Network adapters 100 GbE (4X)

Fibre Channel adapters 64 Gbps; 2-port (4X)

Max kVA 7.621

Amps 38.10

Watts 7,392

BTU per hour 25,229

Weight 410 lbs

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 51

 Figure 2-9 shows an IBM Power E1080 system node. A Power E1080 built for Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud will have two of these system nodes and a System Control Unit which
contains additional components for reliability and serviceability.

Figure 2-9 IBM Power E1080

For more information regarding the IBM E1080 Server, see IBM Power E1080 Technical
Overview and Introduction, REDP-5649

Additional Compute components

In addition to the compute components listed above, the pod contains an IBM Hardware
Management Console and display and an IBM System Management node (9105-22A).

2.2.3 Storage
Storage within the pod is provided by IBM FlashSystem® controllers which are connected
using SAN switches to the compute nodes to provide storage. Small Pods have options for
either one or two IBM FlashSystem 5200 storage controllers with a capacity of 435 TB per
controller. Medium Pods have options for either two or four FlashSystem 9500 storage
controllers with a capacity of 1.75 PB per controller.

The underlying Brocade-based SAN fabric connects the compute nodes at 64 Gbps and the
storage nodes connect at 32 Gbps with redundancy built in at both the port and switch levels.

IBM FlashSystem 5200

For small Pods, storage is provided by SAN attached FlashSystem 5200 storage controllers.
Each controller enclosure has dual redundant storage controllers that connect to the SAN
utilizing Fibre Channel connections. The control enclosure supports 12 FlashCore Modules
(FCMs). The FlashCore Module design utilizes the NVMe protocol, a PCIe Gen4 interface,
and high-speed NAND memory to provide high throughput and IOPS with consistent and
predictable latency. The FCM supports hardware-based data compression and
self-encryption.

At least one FlashSystem 5200 controller is required in each small Pod, with the ability to
choose two. This allows support for up to 876 TB of allocatable storage. Figure 2-10 on

52 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

page 53 shows the IBM FlashSystem 5200 (4662-6H2). The FlashSystem 5200 is always
populated with 12 19.2 TB FCMs.

Figure 2-10 shows the IBM FlashSystem 5200.

Figure 2-10 IBM FlashSystem 5200

Table 2-6 shows the attributes of the FlashSystem 5200 as configured in the pod.

Table 2-6 FlashSystem 5200 attributes

Attribute Value

Applicable pod sizes small

Rack space 1U

Total capacity per controller 438 TB

Drives per controller 12

Network management connections 1 GbE (2X)

Fibre Channel connections 32 Gbps (8X)

Max kVA 0.928

Amps 4.64

Watts 900

BTU per hour 3,072

Weight 43 lbs

For more information regarding the IBM Storage FlashSystem 5200 see IBM Storage
FlashSystem 5200 Product Guide for IBM Storage Virtualize 8.6, REDP-5617.

IBM FlashSystem 9500

Storage for medium Pods is provided by the FlashSystem 9500. The FlashSystem 9500 is a
storage controller with dual redundant controllers and supports up to 48 storage devices. The
storage controllers attach via SAN connections to the SAN switches built into the pod. For
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Pods, each controller is configured with either 24 or 48
19.2 TB FCMs providing either 876 TB or 1.75 PB per controller. A medium pod must have at
least one FlashSystem 9500 and can have up to four for a total maximum storage capacity of
7 PB.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 53

 Figure 2-11 shows the IBM Flash System 9500 (4666-AH8) which is used in the medium
Pods.
Figure 2-11 FlashSystem 9500 used in medium Pods

Table 2-7 details the attributes of the FlashSystem 9500 in the medium Pods.

Table 2-7 FlashSystem 9500 attributes

Attribute Value

Applicable pod sizes medium

Rack space 4U

Total capacity per controller 876 TB (24 drives)

1.75 PB (48 drives)

Drives per controller 24

48

Network management connections 1 GbE (2X)

Fibre Channel connections 32 Gbps (32X)

Max kVA 3.403

Amps 17.01

Watts 3,300

BTU per hour 11,263

Weight 155 lbs

For more information on the FlashSystem 9500, see IBM Storage FlashSystem 9500 Product
Guide: Updated for IBM Storage Virtualize 8.7, REDP-5742.

54 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Storage tiers
IBM Power Virtual Server provides a tier-less storage offering that removes the notion of a
disk type and replaces it with a storage pool. Each storage pool can support multiple storage
tiers. The storage tiers are based on different IOPS levels.

Storage tiers are designed to provide different levels of storage pricing. The client is charged
more for higher performance and less for lower performance or inactive data. Storage tier
pricing is based on I/O operations per second (IOPS).

Tier0, Tier1, and Tier3 performance is based on IOPS per GB, meaning that the performance
of your storage volumes is connected to the size of the volume. This works well for many
workloads, but there are some workloads that have a smaller amount of data and are
hampered by the IOPS/GB calculation. For these workloads, Power Virtual Server provides
the Fixed IOPS tier which provides 5000 IOPS per data volume, regardless of the size.

Note: The Fixed IOPS tier is only available for volumes with a size of 200 GB or less.
Above 200 GB using Tier0 provides higher performance (200 GB @ 25 IOPS/GB = 5000
IOPS).

Table 2-8 shows the supported storage tiers with corresponding IOPS.

Table 2-8 Storage tiers within Power Virtual Server

Tier level IOPS Performance

A 100-GB volume receives 2500 IOPS.

Tier 0 25 IOPS/GB This is 2.5x faster than tier 1 and 8.3x faster
than tier 3.

A 100-GB volume receives 1000 IOPS. This is

Tier 1 10 IOPS/GB
3.3x faster than tier 3.

Tier 3 3 IOPS/GB A 100-GB volume receives 300 IOPS.

5000 IOPS regardless

Fixed IOPSa A 100-GB volume receives 5000 IOPS.
of size
a. The use of fixed IOPS is limited to volumes with a size of 200 GB or less, which is the
break-even size with Tier 0 (200 GB @ 25 IOPS/GB = 5000 IOPS).

Data resiliency
Power Virtual Server provides a highly available storage environment with redundant SAN
connections to the storage controllers and RAID protection to protect from storage media
failures. In addition, Power Virtual Server supports two methods of data replication to avoid
application outages due to site failures such as power failures and other issues such as fires
or floods that prevent access to the data stored in the pod; application or system-based data
replication, or asynchronous storage replication.

Application or system data replication

System and application replication replicates the data over the network to a Power Virtual
Server pod in another physical location or even to a Power Virtual Server instance in an IBM
datacenter. This can be done using:
򐂰 Cluster tools such as IBM PowerHA® SystemMirror® for AIX or IBM i, and high availability
clustering solutions utilizing PaceMaker on Linux.
򐂰 Other system replication tools such as MIMIX or Maxava.
򐂰 Database replication technologies such as IBM DB2® Mirror for i.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 55

 When utilizing system-based or application-based tools, data is copied to a server in a remote
location and in case of an outage, the tools restart the application on the remote server if a
failure occurs (often described as a role swap). When the site is recovered, the data is
migrated back to the primary site and the applications are then restarted in the primary site.

Asynchronous Storage Replication with Global Replication Services

Global Replication Services (GRS) is the Power Virtual Server offering that provides
asynchronous storage replication. Replication at the storage layer is where the primary
storage controller located in the pod in your Power Virtual Server Private Cloud instance is
connected over the network to a storage controller in a remote location - either in another
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud pod or in a Power Virtual Server instance in an IBM
datacenter.

In case of a site failure, the applications are restarted on a server in the remote location and
production can be resumed. When the site is recovered the storage replication is restarted to
copy the data from the remote site back to the primary site. When the data is fully replicated
the applications can be restarted in the primary location.

The primary advantage of storage replication is that the data replication does not take any
additional compute resources from your application or database servers which can either
reduce the consumption costs of your Power Virtual Server Private Cloud or provide
additional compute resources for other applications and services. GRS replicated volumes
are charged as twice the rate of equivalent tier volumes.

Additional details on GRS can be found in “Storage Replication using Global Replication
Services” on page 96.

SAN Fabric
A Storage Area Network is built into the design of the pod. It is not customer accessible. The
design of the SAN is done using best practices and provides switch level redundancy within
the pod. In addition, each component of the SAN is designed with port level redundancy to
eliminate any single point of failure within the SAN.

56 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 2-12 shows the SAN setup for the small Pods.

Figure 2-12 Small pod SAN design

Similarly, Figure 2-13 shows the SAN design for the medium pod. When only two racks are
configured in a medium Pod, all the servers, the storage controllers and the SAN switches are
installed in those two racks. When racks three and four are added to the medium Pod, those
racks contain additional servers and the third and fourth storage controllers (if configured).
Racks three and four also contain additional SAN switches which are used to connect the
servers in those racks. These switches are connected via inter-switch links (ISL) to the
switches in racks 1 and 2. All of the storage controllers are connected to switches in rack 1
and rack 2.

Figure 2-13 Medium pod SAN design

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 57

2.2.4 Network
The Power Virtual Server Private Cloud pod comes with all of the networking components for:
򐂰 Interconnections for data traffic between the virtual servers running in the pod.
򐂰 Connections for data traffic between the virtual servers running in the pod and the client
data center network.
򐂰 Connections to the IBM Cloud network for control and management.
򐂰 Connections to the servers for management and control.
򐂰 Connections to the storage controllers for management and control.
򐂰 Connectivity to the hardware management consoles for management and control.

Other than the connections to the client data center and the IBM Cloud control points, the pod
is completely self-contained, and no other connectivity is supported.

Network components
Depending on which pod configuration is being installed, the actual components being used
are slightly different. The following is a list of the components that are used in the pod.
򐂰 Cisco ASR1001 Router
򐂰 Cisco APIC M4 Server
򐂰 Cisco 400G Spine Switch (N9K-C93600CD-GX) (medium pod only)
򐂰 Cisco Leaf 25G Switch (N9K-C93180YC-FX)
򐂰 Cisco Leaf 100G Switch (N9K-C93600CD-GX) (Used as Spine on small pod)
򐂰 Cisco Leaf 1G Switch (N9K-C9348GC-FXP)
򐂰 Cisco 1G Switch (N9K-92348GC-X), OOBM (medium pod only)
򐂰 Vertiv Avocent ACS Serial Console

Network Internal Design

The networking topology in the pod is a leaf-spine design. Leaf-spine is a two-layer network
topology composed of spine and leaf switches. A spine-leaf architecture helps data center
networks reduce network latency and hop count and improve network efficiency. Servers and
storage connect to leaf switches which aggregate traffic from servers and connect directly to
the spine.

In the small Pod, the connections between the compute nodes and the ACI fabric use the
25gig leaf switches. The 25 gig leaf switches connect into 100gig spines. The customer
connections would be between either the ASR1k or the 25 gig border leafs.

On the medium Pod, the connections between the compute nodes and the ACI fabric use the
100gig leaf switches. All leafs in the ACI fabric connect up to 400gig spines. The customer
connections would also use either the ASR1k or the 25gig border leafs.

Figure 2-14 on page 59 shows the networking components and connectivity options for the
customer data center switches. The customer data center connection can be either Layer 2 or
Layer 3 and we support 10G, 25G or 100G.

58 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Figure 2-14 External connections for networking

Network External Design

Based on what is shown in Figure 2-14, customers would need to provide IBM with either an
IBM Cloud Direct Link or internet connectivity with guaranteed 1gig connection and less than
200ms latency. This connection would be utilized for the control plane that IBM would utilize to
maintain the pod.

For connections into the pod for customers we can set up either an L2 or L3 connection
connecting to the ASR1k or directly into the ACI Fabric.

2.2.5 OS licensing
For AIX, IBM i, and Linux, OS licenses are included in the cost of the processor cores. IBM
Power Virtual Server On-premises provides a complete Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
offering experience with RHEL stock images. The offering includes support from IBM and
access to RHEL bug fixes from Satellite servers that are hosted in IBM Cloud. Currently, you
must bring your own licenses for all the other operating system images. For more flexibility,
you can always bring your own custom Linux image that is tested and deployed. The AIX
stock images are supported on the Power10 with AIX operating system.

IBM i
When you select IBM i, in addition to the IBM i operating system, the following LPP, and IBM i
operating system features are included in the IBM Power Virtual Server offering:
– 5770-SS1 IBM i processor and unlimited users
– 5770-SS1: IBM i Option 23, OptiConnect
– 5770-SS1: IBM i Option 44, Encrypted Backup Enablement

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 59

 – 5770-SS1: IBM i Option 45, Encrypted ASP Enablement
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Option 18 Media & Storage Extensions
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Option 26 Db2 Symmetric Multiprocessing
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Option 27 Db2 Multisystem
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Option 38 PSF for IBM i Any Speed Printer Support
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Option 41 HA Switchable Resources
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Option 42 HA Journal Performance
– 5770-SS1 IBM i Options: all other IBM i Options that are included with IBM i at no
additional charge. Examples:
• Option 8, AFP Compatibility Fonts
• Option 12, Host Servers
• Option 13, System Openness Includes
– 5770-DG1: HTTP Server for i
– 5770-JV1: Developer Kit for Java
– 5770-NAE: Network Authentication Enablement for i
– 5733-SC1: Portable Utilities for i
– 5770-TC1: TCP/IP
– 5770-TS1: Transform Services for i
– 5770-UME: Universal Manageability Enablement for i
– 5770-XE1: IBM i Access for Windows operating system
– 5733-ACS: IBM i Access Client Solutions
– 5733-ARE: IBM Administration Runtime Expert
– 5798-FAX: IBM Facsimile Support for i
– 5770-SM1: IBM System Manager for i
– 5770-DFH: IBM CICS® Transaction Server for i
– 5770-MG1: IBM Managed System Services for i
– 5770-AF1: Advanced Function Printing for i
– 5761-AMT: IBM Rational® Application Management Toolset
– 5761-AP1: Advanced DBCS Printer Support
– 5733-B45: AFP Font Collection for i
– 5770-BR1: Backup, Recovery, and Media Services
– 5770-BR2: Backup, Recovery, and Media Services
– 5761-DB1: System/38 Utilities
– 5761-CM1: Communications Utilities
– 5761-DS2: Business Graphics Utility
– 5648-E77: InfoPrint Fonts
– 5769-FN1: AFP DBCS Fonts
– 5769-FNT: AFP Fonts
– 5722-IP1: Infoprint Server for i
– 5770-JS1: Advanced Job Scheduler for i
– 5770-PT1: Performance Tools
– 5770-QU1: Query for i
– 5770-ST1: IBM Db2 Query Manager and SQL Dev Kit for i
– 5733-XT2: XML Toolkit
– 5770-XH2: IBM i Access for web
– 5770-XW1: IBM i Access Family

Each LPP in the package contains all the features, which includes the optional features. For
example, the 5770-BR1 solution includes the network feature and the advanced features in
addition to the base product.

60 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

2.2.6 IBM Cloud catalog
The IBM Cloud Catalog serves as a comprehensive and user-friendly interface that allows
businesses to explore, select, and deploy cloud-based services and products. This
marketplace simplifies the cloud journey by offering a centralized location where users can
quickly find and deploy relevant IBM cloud solutions, including IBM Power Virtual Server
Private Cloud. Whether users are looking for compute, storage, or networking solutions, the
IBM Cloud Catalog provides access to both IBM-native and partner services.

Figure 2-15 shows a screen shot of the catalog.

Figure 2-15 IBM Cloud catalog

The catalog also supports a seamless integration of preconfigured templates and custom
configurations for cloud services, ensuring that businesses can easily meet their technical
and operational needs.

Key Features of IBM Cloud Catalog

The following are some key features and capabilities of using the IBM Cloud Catalog:
򐂰 Efficient Search and Discovery
At the top of the interface, the Search Bar allows users to quickly search for cloud services
by entering keywords or product names such as “AI,” “Containers,” or “Storage,” or “Db2”
as shown in Figure 2-16.

Figure 2-16 Catalog search

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 61

 The search function supports fast, intuitive access to products, ensuring that users can
easily locate relevant services.
򐂰 Comprehensive Category Filters
The Category Sidebar is located on the left-hand side of the interface and offers users the
ability to filter their search based on product categories. Users can select categories such
as:
• Compute
• Networking
• Storage
• Enterprise Applications
• AI and Analytics
This is shown in Figure 2-17.

Figure 2-17 Catalog filters

By filtering by category, users can quickly navigate to services that fit their specific
business needs.
򐂰 Product Display and Detailed Information
In the center of the interface, a Product Grid is displayed where each cloud offering is
displayed as a tile with key details as shown in Figure 2-18.

Figure 2-18 Product grid area

62 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Each catalog product is displayed as a tile with information such as:
• Product Name.
• Provider (e.g., IBM or a third-party partner).
• Description: A brief overview of the product's purpose.
• Tags indicating deployment options, certifications and other essential product
features.
򐂰 Powerful Filtering and Sorting
The filtering and sorting features allow users to refine their searches further as shown in
Figure 2-19.

Figure 2-19 Filter and sort options in the catalog

Choosing a category helps reduce the number of options found and then those options
can be sorted based on characteristics such as:
• Price
• Popularity
• Newest releases
• Industry
• Compliance
This ensures that users can focus on products that align with their specific technical
requirements or financial constraints.
򐂰 Responsive and Flexible Interface
The IBM Cloud Catalog interface is designed to be responsive, meaning it adapts to
different screen sizes and devices. Whether accessing the catalog from a desktop, tablet,
or smart phone, users can easily browse, configure, and deploy services.
This ensures flexibility for teams working remotely or on-site, ensuring cloud resources are
available wherever they are needed.

Navigating the IBM Cloud Catalog for Power Virtual Server Services
Figure 2-20 on page 64 illustrates the process to select and implement Power Virtual Server
services using the IBM Cloud Catalog.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 63

 Figure 2-20 Using Cloud Catalog

To use the IBM Cloud Catalog effectively for IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
deployment, follow these steps:
1. Browse Services
Start by selecting Power Virtual Server Private Cloud from the available services in the
catalog. This includes products related to compute, storage, and networking. Users can
either browse the predefined Power Virtual Server service templates or configure their
own.
2. Select Configuration
Choose from a preconfigured template or build a custom configuration. This flexibility
ensures that the services align with the organization's operational, and scalability needs.
3. Estimate Costs
Use the Cost Estimator to calculate the expenses associated with different configurations.
This step is critical for managing cloud budgets and aligning with financial goals.
4. Deploy Services
Once the configuration and cost estimation are completed, the next step is to deploy the
services. The deployment can be automated or manual, depending on the organization's
requirements and chosen configurations. Manage and Monitor
After deployment, IBM Cloud provides tools to monitor resource usage, manage services,
and ensure that everything is running smoothly. This includes real-time monitoring
dashboards and alert systems to ensure optimal performance.

Recommendations for Using IBM Cloud Catalog

When using cloud services through the IBM Cloud Catalog consider the following:
򐂰 Regularly Review Service Costs: Frequently use the Cost Estimator to ensure you're
staying within budget.
򐂰 Leverage Preconfigured Templates: If you're new to IBM Power Virtual Server, start with a
preconfigured template to simplify the deployment process.

64 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 򐂰 Monitor Resources: Use the monitoring tools provided in IBM Cloud to track your resource
usage and performance in real-time.

The IBM Cloud Catalog is a powerful tool that simplifies cloud service selection, configuration,
and deployment. For businesses using IBM Power Virtual Server, the catalog offers a
seamless interface for managing hybrid cloud infrastructures, ensuring that organizations can
scale efficiently while maintaining full control over their environments.

2.3 Pricing concepts

There are two main concepts involved with the pricing of the IBM Power Virtual Server Private
Cloud:
򐂰 Metered consumption charges
Consumption charges are based on:
– Number of processors allocated to virtual servers
• Pricing varies by processor type (S1022, E1050, E1080)
– Amount of memory allocated
• Pricing varies by processor class (scale out - S1022 or scale out- E1050 or E1080)
– Amount of storage (
• Pricing based on storage tier allocated.
– OS licenses
Consumption billing is based on allocated resources on a monthly basis. This is prorated
based on an hourly rate for virtual servers whose configuration is changed during the
month.
򐂰 Minimum monthly commitment
The minimum monthly commitment is determined by the configuration installed on your
data center floor and the term commitment.
– Term commitment can be either three-years or five-years. Renewals are available for a
one-year term. The minimum monthly commitment is less when choosing the five-year
term.
– Option to terminate after 12 months (with 60 days notice) and pay only 50% of the
remaining commitment.

The amount charged per month is the actual metered consumption charges for your defined
virtual servers unless that amount is less than the minimum monthly commitment, in which
case you are billed the minimum monthly commitment.
– Single monthly bill in arrears.
– Capacity consumption details are available on the IBM Cloud Portal.
– Each client’s billing will be different. Use the pricing estimator to model your expected
usage.

2.3.1 Total cost of ownership versus cost of acquisition

Most clients have had the building blocks used to create a solution like IBM Power Virtual
Server since 2019 but have not invested the development resources and time to create a
self-provisioning portal that enables cloud like service delivery. This is millions of dollars of
development and integration testing to create, enhance and maintain a “cloud service
delivery” capability in addition to the cost of the servers, storage, network, development
pipelines and management software.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 65

 This requires a large, dedicated team of experts at IBM to design and maintain this IaaS
solution that needs to evolve as the technology components and services evolve (follow-on
generations of IBM Power, storage evolution, faster networks, quantum-safe encryption,
continuous service delivery, and other enhancements).

A recent study by Precision IT3 examined the total cost of ownership (TCO) for migrating a
customer’s existing IBM Power servers to an on-premises native cloud solution. The study
compared IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud to several other vendor solutions for a
five-year TCO and found that the IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud was the best option.

The study concluded that:

򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers a “compelling solution” for clients looking for
an on-premises hybrid cloud option offering cloud benefits such as cloud management,
OPEX pricing, and scalability with the security and control of an on-site solution.
򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers superior scaling to x86 based alternatives
while maintaining the advantage of private cloud governance and security.

IBM's new Power Virtual Server Private Cloud requires a 3-5-year commitment to a minimum
monthly charge with no upfront capital costs. This approach enables clients to configure the
target solution they want and implement a private cloud rapidly with just a monthly amount
(the greater of the minimum commitment or actual usage) billed in arrears with a typical 3
year cross-over vs purchasing the elements and developing the cloud services. This allows
clients to start small and expand as required by the business, enabling same day delivery of
new services compared to months that would be required if using equipment that needs to be
ordered and deployed.

2.3.2 Pricing tools

IBM provides an estimating tool which is integrated in the assessment and ordering process.
The tool is available to estimate pricing for Power Virtual Server, both off-premises and
on-premises. Doing a pricing estimate is the first step in the customer journey to
implementing IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud as shown in Figure 2-21.

Figure 2-21 Customer journey

The estimator can be found at https://cloud.ibm.com/power/estimate which is shown in

Figure 2-22 on page 67.

3 https://fk2816.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Precision-IT-White-Paper-v10.pdf

66 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 2-22 IBM Power Virtual Server estimator

When you arrive at the estimator, first choose “On-premises” in the Location Type field at the
top left of the screen. Then you need to choose the cloud data center that will be the
connection point for your on-premises pod from the Location drop down menu in the top
middle of the screen. Note that the right panel shows the estimated price and the
configuration details. This will change as you change the selections in the pricing tool.

Note: When you select “On-premises” you will likely see an error as shown in Figure 2-23.
This warning is to avoid losing any information you might have entered for an estimate
prior to selecting “On-premises”. If you have already saved all previous entries, you may
safely select “Change location type”.

Figure 2-23 Error screen for estimator

Choosing your compute and storage resources

The next step in the process is to choose the compute components you want included in your
pod as shown in Figure 2-24 on page 68.

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 67

 Figure 2-24 System selection

The three choices are the ones described in section 2.2.2, “Compute” on page 47. Choosing
an E1080 will automatically start creating a medium pod as the E1080 is only supported in a
medium pod.

Once you have chosen the system type, you will need to choose additional details such as the
memory and the number of systems you want to include. The tool will identify the minimum
number of systems that need to be included based on these selections. If you choose more
systems than can be supported in a small Pod, the tool will switch to a medium pod instead.
The pricing estimate will automatically be updated as you make different selections.

In addition to the compute resources, the panel allows you to define the storage options you
want to configure and will show you the storage capacities available. If you choose the
FlashSystem 9500, the tool will automatically change you to a medium Pod, while if you
choose the FlashSystem 5200 you will be kept in a small pod configuration. If you select the
FlashSystem 5200 when the number of systems included is larger than what is supported in a
small Pod, the tool will show you an error and tell you that you need to reduce the number of
systems.

Selecting the commitment term

The next panel on the screen is used to define whether you want to price the system with
either a 5-year or a 3-year commitment. as shown in Figure 2-25. You can toggle between the
two options to see the pricing differences between these options. The commitment term and
associated terms are discussed in section 2.3, “Pricing concepts” on page 65.

Figure 2-25 Commitment term selection

68 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Metered consumption cost
Pricing for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is based on consumption with a minimum
monthly commitment component. The usage of resources is metered and reported. The client
is only charged for consumption of resources that exceeds the minimum committed spend.
The pricing tool has a section to allow you to model consumption pricing to help you estimate
your billing. Figure 2-26 show the Metered consumption cost estimator which becomes
available after you have successfully defined your desired configuration.

Figure 2-26 Model consumption

When you select the Model consumption button, you are presented with another screen
which is shown in Figure 2-27. In this screen you can input the expected usage of compute
(cores), memory (TB) and storage (TB across the different storage tiers). The screen then
shows you the minimum monthly commitment and the expected metered usage that would be
billed based on your defined configuration.

Figure 2-27 Modeled metered consumption panel

Chapter 2. IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 69

70 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
 3

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations

A successful implementation of Power Virtual Server Private Cloud on your premises requires
careful planning. This chapter provides an insight into some of the considerations that you
need to plan for as you decide to implement an on-premises Power Virtual Server pod. Your
IBM team will be working with you through each of these considerations in order to make the
implementation successful and ensure that the solution meets your requirements.

The following topics are discussed.

򐂰 3.1, “Planning overview” on page 72
򐂰 3.2, “Prerequisites” on page 73
򐂰 3.3, “Application assessment” on page 75
򐂰 3.4, “Sizing” on page 76
򐂰 3.5, “Network connectivity” on page 80
򐂰 3.6, “Compliance” on page 88
򐂰 3.7, “Planning for integration” on page 89
򐂰 3.8, “Management” on page 98

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. 71

3.1 Planning overview
Planning to utilize IBM Power Virtual Server for your power workloads requires some planning
whether you are planning on using Power Virtual Server off-premises or Power Virtual Server
Private Cloud (on-premises). Some of the same tasks need to be considered in both choices,
for example:
򐂰 Determining network connectivity.
򐂰 Deciding which applications need to be migrated.
򐂰 Sizing your Power Virtual Server virtual servers to match the workload.
򐂰 Choosing how to migrate the workloads.
򐂰 Determining backup and recovery, and disaster recovery requirements.

The major differentiation between the two options is that the on-premises option requires a
more precise sizing to ensure that you choose the right starting configuration to provide the
best ROI for your environment. Choosing a pod configuration that is too large will mean that
you are paying more for the solution than required. Choosing a pod that is too small, will limit
your expansion

Figure 3-1 provides an overview of the planning process that will be used to:
– Size your workload.
– Choose your configuration.
– Determine the cost of the solution.
– Validate that you have the appropriate data center resources to install the solution.
– Have the appropriate network connectivity to support the solution.

Figure 3-1 Lifecycle of an IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud1

IBM will work side by side with your team to ensure that your implementation is successful.
1 https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/allowlist/power-iaas?topic=power-iaas-getting-started

72 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3.2 Prerequisites
Before choosing to implement Power Virtual Server Private Cloud in your data center, ensure
that the following prerequisites are met.

3.2.1 Basic Prerequisites

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is an IBM owned infrastructure installed and operated by
IBM in a client data center.
򐂰 The client is responsible for maintaining the datacenter
– Floor space
– HVAC
– Access security
򐂰 The client needs to provide access to IBM service technicians to install and maintain the
servers and storage.
򐂰 The client needs to provide network connectivity:
– Connection to the IBM Cloud data center for control and management.
– Connection between the pod networking to the client networking for customer data and
workflow.
For more information on the networking connections see section 2.2.4, “Network” on
page 58.

3.2.2 Minimum size

Ensure that the IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud configuration is not oversized for the
workloads that are moving to the offering. If you have multiple smaller workloads, you might
want to consolidate them into a single pod to provide a better ROI. Consider the minimum
configuration for a pod as shown below.

Small pod
The minimum compute configuration of a small pod is:
– 6 S1022(40c) with 2 TB memory each, or
– 5 S1022(40c) with 4 TB of memory each, or
– 2 E1050(96c) with 8 TB of memory each

Medium pod
The minimum compute configuration of a medium pod is:
– 12 S1022(40c) with 2 TB or 4 TB memory each, or
– 5 E1050(96c) with 4TB or 8TB each, or
– 2 E1080(2CEC-120c) with 8TB or 16TB or 32TB each

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 73

3.2.3 Supported Workloads and Operating Systems
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud utilizes IBM Power10 servers. The workloads you
want to move to Power Virtual Server Private Cloud must be able to run on IBM Power10
servers and be hosted by a supported operating system.

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is an excellent choice for enterprise applications such
as Oracle and other databases.

The following operating systems are supported by the IBM Power Virtual Server Private
Cloud offering. If you are running on previous versions of these operating systems, you need
to upgrade to supported versions.
򐂰 AIX
The minimum version of AIX supported on the supported servers in the IBM Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud is:
– S1022 - 7.2 or later
– E1050 - 7.2 or later
– E1080 - 7.2 or later
The following stock images are available when you create a virtual machine:
– AIX 7.3 TL1 SP2
– AIX 7.2 TL5 SP6
– AIX 7.2 TL5 SP8
– AIX 7.3 TL2 SP1
򐂰 IBM i
The IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud (On-premises) supports IBM i 7.3, or later.
IBM i stock images currently available when you create a VM are:
– IBM i 7.5 TR4
– IBM i 7.5 TR3
– IBM i 7.4 TR10
– IBM i 7.4 TR9
– IBM i 7.3 TR13
򐂰 Linux
The IBM Power Virtual Server (On-premises) supports Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
with RHEL stock images that includes support from IBM and access to RHEL bug fixes
from Satellite servers hosted on IBM Cloud. This capability is referred to as the Full Linux
Subscription (FLS) model. For more information, see Full Linux subscription for IBM Power
Virtual Server (On-premises).
FLS provides access to RHEL OS fixes and updates through activation keys for Power
servers, which are hosted on an IBM satellite server within the IBM Cloud environment. To
register for FLS, select one of the stock (RHEL OS) images that are provided by IBM.
The following list is an example of the FLS offerings:
– Stock images: RHEL 8.4, RHEL 8.6, RHEL 9.2
– Support: You pay IBM for support
– Patches: You receive keys for satellite servers to obtain Linux patches from Linux
distribution (Linux distros)

74 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3.2.4 Proximity to IBM Cloud data center
The client data center used for IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud (see list of supported
data centers below) needs to be close enough to the IBM Cloud data centers to provide a low
latency connection between the data centers. The network latency between the client data
center and IBM needs to be less than 200 ms round trip delay.

The following IBM Cloud regions can host connections from the Pods for IBM Power Virtual
Server (On-premises) in your data center. Selection of the IBM Cloud region is one of the
factors for computing pricing. Select the IBM Cloud region that is closest to the physical
location of your data center. Choose from:
– Dallas
– Frankfurt
– London
– Madrid
– Osaka
– Sao Paulo
– Sydney
– Tokyo
– Toronto
– Washington, DC

Important: The network latency between your data center and the selected IBM Cloud
region must maintain a network round-trip time (RTT) of less than or equal to 200
milliseconds.

3.2.5 Countries supported

At the time of publication, IBM Power Virtual Server private cloud is only available in the
following countries.
– United States
– Canada
– Netherlands
– Denmark
– Austria
– Germany
– Belgium
– Luxembourg
– Switzerland
– United Kingdom
– Australia

3.3 Application assessment

Prior to moving workloads to IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, you should do an
assessment of the application environment to ensure that you can successfully migrate those
workloads. some of the things that need to be evaluated are:
򐂰 Is the workload currently running on IBM Power?
If the workloads are currently running on IBM Power, then the process of migration is
greatly simplified. While it is possible to migrate workloads running on x86 platforms to
IBM Power, it does take additional planning.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 75

 򐂰 Is the workload running on a supported operating system?
Migrating a workload from an operating system that is older and not supported on IBM
Power Virtual Server requires that you update to a supported operating system version. In
some cases, this also means updating to newer versions of middleware products such as
the database manager.
򐂰 Is the workload a standalone application or is it split between different systems that require
interconnections and data flow?
If your application requires connections to servers that are not running on IBM Power, you
need to plan for the continued connectivity to those resources after the migration.
򐂰 What are the availability and disaster recover requirements for the workload?
IBM Power Virtual Server provides many capabilities for workloads that require high
availability, such as automatic failover and data replications. You need to plan
appropriately to support these requirements.
For example, if you need disaster recovery, you may want to utilize Power Virtual Server
Private Cloud in a second data center, or consider utilizing Power Virtual Server
off-premises for recovering the workloads. The key is that these solutions require special
planning to be successful.

These are just some examples of the things you need to consider. IBM has several offerings
available to help you build a migration plan. For more information see IBM Technology Expert
Labs.

3.4 Sizing
Sizing your workload to determine the configuration of your Power Virtual Server Virtual
Server Instance consists of two distinct components: sizing the compute requirements (CPU
and memory) and sizing the storage requirements.

3.4.1 Compute sizing

Collecting data from your existing IBM Power servers will provide you with the information
required to correctly size your Power Virtual Server environment. Data can be gathered using
tools such as NMON and TOP or you can use scan reports from your existing Hardware
Management Controllers (HMCs) to get the information on the existing CPU utilization and
memory allocation.

After choosing the size of your LPAR, monitor the performance and adjust as necessary. It is
possible to dynamically Scale LPAR cores and memory on the fly from 0.25x-8x.

CPU Cores
When sizing for CPU, size for typical LPAR processor utilization, not the maximum allocation.
Remember to not include any Virtual I/O Server (VIOS) LPARs in your sizing. Sizing on Power
Virtual Server often saves from 25%-50% of CPU compared to your existing on-premises
utilization as Power Virtual Server doesn't need the control plane and capacity headroom.

If you are not currently running on Power10 based servers, then you will need to convert the
CPU numbers on your existing IBM Power technology to the IBM Power10. You can use a
loose estimate.

76 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Optimize Cores by LPAR loosely based on the numbers in Table 3-1.

Table 3-1 Estimated core conversion factors

Existing technology Power10 technology

1 IBM Power7 core 0.3 Power10 core

1 IBM Power8® core 0.5 Power10 core

1 IBM Power9 core 0.75 Power10 core

Processor type
Processors can be defined as shared uncapped, shared capped or dedicated. For most
LPARs, shared uncapped cores are the appropriate choice. Use shared capped cores for
compliance or ISV license purposes, and use dedicated cores only as required based on
usage in your private on-premises environment.

Memory sizing
Memory is charged on allocated memory at the LPAR, not on the memory utilization shown
by the operating system. In general, the memory size for your Power Virtual Server LPAR will
be the same as your current implementation. Reminder that if you allocate more than 64 GB
of memory per core, then there is an additional charge for the memory. Avoid this 1.5x
memory premium if possible.

Choosing the processor model

Consider using the Power S1022 unless you need additional cores, memory or performance
of the Power E1050 or Power E1080. IBM i on the Power S1022 only supports up to four
cores. For partitions larger than four cores, use the Power E1080.

3.4.2 Storage sizing

There are two components in sizing your storage configuration: amount of storage and the
storage performance requirement or tier.

Storage Tier Selection Guidance

Consider starting with tier 3 storage. All of the storage is IBM FlashSystem, so the difference
between the tiers is the number of IOPs supported. Storage tiers are discussed in “Storage
tiers” on page 55. Tier 0 supports the most IOPS/GB, followed by Tier 1 and then Tier 3.
– Use Tier 3 storage for non-production LPARS, application servers, web servers, and
other low IOPS workloads.
– Use Tier 1 storage for production, mission-critical servers, or databases.
– Use Tier 0 for high-performance databases.
– Fixed 5K IOPS is for databases with high-performance requirements that are <200 GB.

Storage tiers can be mixed as appropriate. The storage tier of a LUN can be dynamically
changed.

Storage sizing
Right-size storage volume sizes based on utilization. Aim for 70-75% utilization of allocated
storage on your volumes. This means that if you have a volume allocated at 20 TB with only
30% utilization, then it can be optimized to 10TB.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 77

 Cloud Object Storage
Cloud Object Storage (COS) is not a primary storage for Power Virtual Server. Instead, use
COS for:
– Archive
– Long-term storage and Backup repository
– Capturing and exporting a virtual machine (VM)
– Importing a boot image

3.4.3 Scalability and flexibility

Scaling is the ability to dynamically adjust computing resources such as CPU, memory,
storage, and network capacity in response to changing workloads. With IBM Power Virtual
Server, either off-premises in the public cloud or on-premises in Private Cloud, businesses
can scale their infrastructure up or down based on demand, ensuring that they maintain
optimal performance while avoiding unnecessary costs.

IBM Power Virtual Server offers both vertical scaling where resources within an existing
virtual machine are scaled up or down, and horizontal scaling where virtual machines are
added to distribute workloads and later removed when the workload requirements go down.
This flexibility allows organizations to handle fluctuating workloads efficiently without needing
to over-provision resources.

Vertical Scaling
Vertical scaling in Power Virtual Server involves increasing or decreasing the resources
allocated to an individual Logical Partition (LPAR). This can include scaling the number of
processors, the amount of memory, or even increasing storage capacity to handle larger
workloads.

Vertical scaling is useful when a single application or LPAR requires more resources to
process higher workloads, such as during peak usage periods for transactional systems or
data-intensive applications.

For example, a retail company running an inventory management system on an AIX LPAR
might increase the processing units and memory allocation during the holiday season when
transactional data is significantly higher, ensuring smooth and fast operations without
downtime.

Horizontal Scaling
Horizontal scaling in Power Virtual Server involves creating additional LPARs to distribute the
load across multiple instances. Instead of increasing resources on a single LPAR, horizontal
scaling adds more LPARs to share the workload, improving redundancy and fault tolerance.

Horizontal scaling is ideal for clustered applications, distributed databases, and other systems
where workloads can be spread across multiple LPARs for better performance and reliability.

For example, a financial services company may create multiple LPARs running instances of
their trading application in Power Virtual Server to handle increased market activity during
high-volume trading periods. By adding more LPARs, they can distribute the processing load
across these instances, improving overall system performance and preventing any single
point of failure.

78 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Scaling in Power Virtual Server
In Power Virtual Server, resources are allocated to LPARs from a shared pool, allowing for
flexible and dynamic scaling. Note that:
򐂰 The hypervisor (PowerVM) manages the allocation of physical resources to LPARs,
enabling efficient use of the underlying hardware.
򐂰 Power Virtual Server supports both dedicated and shared processor LPARs, offering
flexibility in how processing resources are allocated.
򐂰 Memory can be dynamically added to LPARs in Power Virtual Server, allowing for
on-the-fly vertical scaling of memory resources.

Some of the key benefits of Power Virtual Server Private Cloud are:
򐂰 Dynamic Provisioning
Dynamic provisioning allows businesses to add or reduce resources in real-time without
needing to shut down virtual machines. This flexibility helps companies respond to sudden
workload spikes without causing downtime or disruption to services.
Power Virtual Server can automatically scale workloads using preconfigured policies. For
example, resources can be provisioned automatically when CPU utilization reaches a
certain threshold, ensuring workloads always have the necessary resources.
򐂰 Pay-as-You-Go Flexibility
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers a pay-as-you-go model, which ensures that
businesses only pay for the resources they use. Scaling resources dynamically allows
organizations to avoid the costs associated with over-provisioning hardware for worst-case
scenarios.
This model is particularly valuable for seasonal businesses or those with variable
workloads, such as retail during holiday seasons or financial services during tax season.
򐂰 Resource Monitoring and Management
IBM Power Virtual Server includes integrated monitoring tools that allow businesses to
track resource usage across their VMs. These tools provide insights into CPU, memory,
and storage utilization, helping IT teams make informed decisions about scaling.
IBM Cloud Monitoring integrates seamlessly with Power Virtual Server environments,
providing real-time metrics and enabling automated alerts when resources need to be
scaled.
򐂰 Hybrid Cloud Scaling
For organizations using a hybrid cloud strategy, Power Virtual Server supports seamless
scaling between on-premises and cloud environments. Workloads can be moved to the
cloud during periods of high demand and scaled back to on-premises infrastructure when
demand decreases.
This approach is particularly useful for businesses that need to meet regulatory
requirements for data residency while still enjoying the flexibility of cloud-based scaling.

Scaling Strategies in Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

There are multiple strategies for scaling infrastructure in Power Virtual Server to adjust to
expanding workloads.

Proactive scaling involves planning for predictable increases in demand. Businesses can
schedule increases in resources based on known events, such as planned marketing
campaigns, product launches, or seasonal spikes. An example of proactive scaling is when
an e-commerce company increases VM capacity ahead of a major sales event to ensure the
site can handle the expected surge in traffic without performance degradation.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 79

 Reactive scaling allows businesses to respond to unexpected spikes in workload. Power
Virtual Server can automatically provision additional resources based on preset thresholds,
such as CPU or memory utilization exceeding 80%. As an example of reactive scaling
consider a media company which is streaming a live sports event. The company might
experience an unexpected surge in viewers. Power Virtual Server can automatically add more
VMs to handle the load, ensuring uninterrupted service for viewers.

Auto-scaling in Power Virtual Server enables automatic adjustment of resources based on

real-time demand. This means that workloads can be dynamically scaled without manual
intervention, ensuring optimal performance and cost-efficiency. A cloud-based gaming
company uses auto-scaling to manage fluctuating player numbers, automatically increasing
server capacity during peak gaming hours and reducing it during off-peak times.

Effectively managing resources

As described previously, Power Virtual Server provides the ability to dynamically adjust the
resources assigned to an application to enable a business to scale up resources during high
demand events and later scale back down to maintain a cost-effective solution. To be effective
at managing resource utilization to meet business requirements, an enterprise needs to:
򐂰 Monitor Resource Utilization
Use Power Virtual Server monitoring tools to regularly assess resource utilization and
performance metrics. Set up alerts and automated scaling triggers to ensure that you are
not over-provisioning or under-provisioning resources.
򐂰 Implement Scaling Policies
Define clear scaling policies that align with your business objectives. For example, set
thresholds for when to scale up or down, and determine whether to prioritize vertical or
horizontal scaling based on the type of workload.
򐂰 Test Scaling Scenarios
Regularly test your scaling strategies by simulating high-load conditions. This will help you
identify potential bottlenecks or issues with resource allocation, allowing you to fine-tune
your scaling policies.
򐂰 Cost Management
Continuously review the costs associated with scaling. Make use of the IBM Cloud Cost
Estimator to track resource usage and forecast expenses based on your scaling needs.

Conclusion
Scaling in IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers businesses the flexibility to
dynamically adjust resources based on workload demands, ensuring that applications run
efficiently while maintaining cost control. Whether scaling vertically to enhance the
performance of individual VMs or horizontally to distribute workloads across multiple
instances, Power Virtual Server provides the tools needed for seamless scalability. By
leveraging dynamic provisioning, proactive and reactive scaling strategies, and auto-scaling,
businesses can optimize their cloud environments for performance, reliability, and
cost-efficiency.

3.5 Network connectivity

Establishing a connectivity between the pod in your data center and IBM Cloud requires
planning, site preparation, and understanding the network architecture. You also need to
ensure that you have met the prerequisites in order to be successful.

80 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3.5.1 Network prerequisites
To facilitate the IBM Power Virtual Server pod infrastructure connectivity, you must evaluate
the following network requirements:
򐂰 The data center site must provide network cables to connect the IBM Power Virtual Server
(On-premises) network infrastructure and the data network at the site.
򐂰 The site must provide two uplink cables to connect the IBM Power Virtual Server
(On-premises) network infrastructure to the IBM Cloud region through IBM Direct Link
connections or through VPN connections.
򐂰 Contract with a service provider to:
– Provide redundant connections to the IBM Direct Link connection or VPN connection.
– Provide the last mile connection from the point-of-presence (PoP) of your service
provider to the customer data center.

3.5.2 Network architecture

Figure 3-2 provides an overview of the network architecture used to connect to the client data
center and your Power Virtual Server pod.

Figure 3-2 Network architecture

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 81

 Note that there are two networks of interest:
1. Control plane network
The control plane network is used for communication between IBM Cloud and the pod that
is located in your data center. This is used only for setting up and controlling the
operations of the virtual servers running in the pod. No user data is transmitted over this
network.
2. Data plane network
The data plane network is used when clients are accessing the applications running on
the virtual servers or for server-to-server communication between the different servers
and services running in the pod and in your business network.

Control plane network

The control plane network is crucial for communication between your local IBM Power Virtual
Server data center (the Pod) and the IBM Cloud. It enables the Service Broker to manage
virtual machines effectively by starting APIs on PowerVC. To ensure reliable connectivity, this
network includes multiple paths and can be established through either an IBM Cloud Direct
Link 2.0 or a Virtual Private Network (VPN).

Before installing the Pod, make sure to provide the necessary network-specific information to
facilitate the setup of either the IBM Cloud Direct Link 2.0 or VPN connection.

IBM Cloud Direct Link 2.0 Connect

IBM Cloud Direct Link 2.0 Connect is a technology designed to connect remote data centers
with the IBM Cloud. It facilitates the linking of a Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) on IBM Cloud to a
router connected to your pod in your data center. Using IPsec over VPN, also known as
last-mile connectivity, this solution ensures a secure connection to the Pod's router while
minimizing data center environment exposure.

The control plane network is configured for redundancy, providing multiple pathways to
maintain reliable connectivity between the Pods and IBM Cloud regions. IBM facilitates the
setup of the IBM Cloud Direct Link 2.0 Connect using details provided for third-party network
providers (like Megaport or Equinix). Attributes such as service keys are collected during the
ordering process, enabling third-party providers to establish remote connectivity between the
IBM Cloud and your data center.

IBM Cloud Direct Link 2.0 Connect serves as an alternative to traditional site-to-site VPN
solutions, offering enhanced security, privacy, and consistent high-throughput connectivity
between your remote network and IBM Cloud environments. For more information, refer to
the Getting Started with IBM Cloud Direct Link guide.

The connectivity between IBM Cloud and the pod consists of two main components:
1. Shared Connectivity
This involves the integration of IBM Cloud network infrastructure with the third-party
network provider infrastructure.
2. Internet-Based Connectivity
Often referred to as “last-mile connectivity,” this connection typically utilizes an IPsec VPN.
You'll need to contract a service provider to establish this last-mile link.

Establishing this connectivity requires collaboration between you, IBM, and the third-party
network provider.

82 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Virtual Private Network (VPN)
VPN connections between IBM Cloud and the pod can be established in multiple ways:
򐂰 Site-to-site VPN connectivity
A VPN gateway can be created on the VPC housing the service broker, which will provide
an internet-facing IP address. You can also set up a VPN client in your data center with its
own internet-facing IP address. This creates an IPsec VPN tunnel between the two
endpoints, allowing the VPN client to extend connectivity to the IBM Power Virtual Server
(on-premises) routers.
򐂰 VPN connectivity using IBM Cloud Classic Environment
You can deploy a Juniper vSRX Virtual Firewall in the classic environment of IBM Cloud.
This firewall can connect to the VPC containing the service broker via a transit gateway.
Alternatively, a similar VPN setup can be configured in your data center, linking through an
IPsec VPN tunnel to the IBM Power Virtual Server (on-premises) routers. It's advisable to
keep your data center infrastructure's connection to the pod routers minimal. You may
configure one or more virtual routers in your environment and establish a Border Gateway
Protocol (BGP) deployment using the IBM Power Virtual Server (on-premises) routers.

Data plane network

The data plane network becomes active when the Pods at your data center are linked to your
local IBM Power Virtual Server network. This allows you to access the virtual servers inside
the pod directly through your own network, not via IBM Cloud. Each pod includes essential
software components like HMC and PowerVC, as well as necessary storage and network
devices such as ACI and routers, enabling it to connect with IBM Cloud.

Important: When you create a network within a Pod, ensure that the network does not
overlap with other existing networks in the same workspace within the pod. If you create an
overlapping network, an error message is displayed.

As part of the network planning, you can review the following use cases and identify the use
cases that are applicable to you. You can communicate about such requirements before the
installation so that you do not have to open separate support tickets to implement the
use-cases and configurations.
1. Private network within a Pod
With this use case, you can establish a private network within a pod that allows
communication between the applications that are located in the pod. You can establish a
private network within the pod by using the IP address allocation method, Classless
Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR). CIDR allows network routers to route data packets to the
respective device based on the indicated subnet.
You can deploy virtual machines in a pod that has a default configuration by using one of
the following patterns:
• Affinity: In this pattern, virtual machines are deployed on the same physical host.
Therefore, the virtual machines can communicate with each other on the same host
through the attached Ethernet switch.
• Anti-affinity: In this pattern, virtual machines are deployed on different physical
hosts. A custom configuration is required on the externally connected Ethernet
switch to enable communication between virtual machines that are deployed on
different physical hosts.
As an example, if you have a database server and a web server that need to communicate
exclusively with each other. You can connect both servers to the same private network to
enable communication between them.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 83

 Figure 3-3 describes the private network within a pod type of network setup.

Figure 3-3 Private network within a cloud use case

2. Outbound-only
With this use case, you can establish a private network that allows communication
between applications within the pod and with external destination points. However, the
applications within the pod are not accessible from the destination points on the external
network. You can establish an outbound-only network connectivity through dynamic
Network Address Translation (NAT) gateway configuration, resembling a network
established by using routers. Figure 3-4 shows this use case.

Figure 3-4 Outbound-only use case

84 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3. Bidirectional external connectivity through BGP
With this use case, you can establish a network that allows communication between the
applications within the pod and with the destination points on the external network. By
setting up the Layer 3 Firewall rules, you can allow both inbound and outbound
connections. Configure the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) manually between the pod
router and the corporate network. By using the BGP configuration, establish a connection
between the private network and the corporate network. To configure BGP manually,
contact the Support Center.
As an example of this use case, there is a database server that is running inside the pod
that needs to connect to a database server from another application that resides outside
the Pod, but within your corporate network. Using Layer 3 inbound access, you can route
the traffic between the servers securely utilizing corporate firewalls or routing rules as the
corporate network can access the pod subnets through a BGP connection. Figure 3-5
describes the bidirectional external connectivity using BGP.

Figure 3-5 Bi-directional access with BGP protocol

4. Bidirectional external connectivity through static routes

This is a variation of option 3 “Bidirectional external connectivity through BGP” on page 85
but this case uses static routes instead of BGP. Routing still occurs at Layer 3, but a static
route is defined between the edge routers, one in the pod and the other in the corporate
network. The static route establishes a connection between the pod subnet and the
corporate network.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 85

 Figure 3-6 describes the bidirectional external connectivity with a static route type of
network setup.

Figure 3-6 Bi-directional connectivity through static routes

5. Bidirectional external connectivity - ACI Layer 2

This use case uses a Layer 2 network connection between applications within the pod and
with destination points on the external network. By connecting to one of your existing
corporate networks in this case you bypass the router and connect to the Cisco
Application Centric Infrastructure (Cisco ACI). You can establish this type of connectivity
when you want the same IP address space on both internal and external networks. All
other external network use cases involve two distinct subnets. Figure 3-7 describes the
bidirectional external connectivity by using ACI Layer 2 firewall type of network setup.

Figure 3-7 Bi-directional connectivity using ACI Layer 2

86 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

6. Network connectivity for full Linux subscription
With this use case, you can establish a network between a virtual machine in the pod and
the Red Hat Satellite server on IBM Cloud. The virtual machine has the stock image of
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) with full Linux subscription. Connect the virtual machine
in the pod to a proxy network in the corporate network environment and connect the proxy
network to the Red Hat Satellite server on IBM Cloud by using either Direct Link or VPN
connection. The virtual machine in the pod can access the Linux satellite server to retrieve
software fixes and other artifacts. Figure 3-8describes the network connectivity between a
virtual machine and a Red Hat Satellite server on IBM Cloud setup.

Figure 3-8 Connection to Red Hat Satellite server in IBM Cloud

7. DHCP network inside the Pod

This use case provides a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) protocol server
within the pod to dynamically assign an IP address to a virtual machine.

Restriction: The presence of the DHCP network within the pod is mandatory when you
are using the OpenShift Container Platform on the IBM Power Virtual Server
(On-premises) environment. The DHCP network is intended for use only in the
OpenShift Container Platform.

IBM Power Virtual Server Pods can be configured to include a private and
hardware-based DHCP network. The edge router within the pod is configured with the
DHCP pool and gateway. You can deploy virtual machines in the DHCP network. The
virtual machines are assigned IP addresses from the DHCP server. You can attach only
one DHCP network interface card (NIC) to a virtual machine. If you attach more than one
DHCP NIC to a virtual machine, only one NIC acquires the IP address from the DHCP
server that is assigned to the virtual machine.

Important: When creating a DHCP network, note that the first four IP addresses are
reserved. You must configure a network that has more than four IP addresses. For
example, if the subnet mask is 255.255.255.248, the total number of IP addresses is
eight. You cannot create a network with a subnet mask beyond 255.255.255.248 as it
has less than or equal to five IP addresses.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 87

 All of these network use cases can be set up initially when the pod is set up and defined. If
you need to add or modify one of these use case implementations, then you can do so at any
time by opening a service ticket.

For more information about setting up networking for your Power Virtual Server pod see
Networking overview.

3.6 Compliance
For customers evaluating Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, adherence to privacy regulations,
including those governing the placement and location of application data, is paramount.
Acknowledging the significance of data jurisdiction, Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
implements robust security principles and controls to guarantee that customer data remains
exclusively within their data center or premises.

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud infrastructure meets the minimum regulatory compliance
profiles necessary for operations across various regions and aligns with the IBM Secure
Engineering and SPbD processes. These standards encompass GDPR, NIS, LGPD (Brazil
privacy regulation), and CCPA (US State of California privacy law). If customers are interested in
seeking compliance with additional profiles applicable to Power Virtual Server (public)
infrastructure, such as SOC2, PCI-DSS, HIPAA, or IBM Cloud for financial services, they can
reach out to their representative to discuss the required steps. It is important to note that all these
regulatory profiles incorporate physical controls, thus relying on the implementation of controls
within the customer's data center. Figure 3-9 shows a current list of Power Virtual Server
certifications.

Figure 3-9 Power Virtual Server Compliance certifications

88 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3.7 Planning for integration
Integrating IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud into an organization’s existing IT
infrastructure requires careful planning and coordination. Effective integration ensures that
workloads, data, and applications can function seamlessly between on-premises systems
and cloud environments, while maintaining performance, security, and compliance standards.
Planning for integration involves considerations related to networking, data migration,
security, management, and application compatibility.

3.7.1 Network Connectivity

For businesses adopting a hybrid cloud strategy, ensuring seamless network connectivity
between on-premises infrastructure and Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is critical. Power
Virtual Server supports IBM Cloud Direct Link, a high-speed, low-latency connection that
provides secure, reliable access between on-premises environments and the IBM Cloud.

Power Virtual Server also supports integration with Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and
Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs), enabling secure communication between cloud-based and
on-premises resources. This ensures that sensitive data can be transferred securely across
locations without exposing it to the public internet.

Plan for bandwidth requirements, latency tolerance, and redundancy to ensure consistent
performance across hybrid environments. Additionally, organizations should ensure that their
internal network security policies align with cloud networking configurations.

3.7.2 Data Migration

Data migration is a key part of the integration process, particularly for businesses moving
large workloads to the cloud. Planning involves evaluating the size, type, and sensitivity of the
data to be migrated, as well as the bandwidth and time required for migration.

Data will need to be migrated to your Power Virtual Server instances using a network-based
transfer tool similar to what would be used for any on-premises migration. There are many
data migration strategies to choose from:
򐂰 For file-based migration, Cloud Object Storage can be used as an intermediary location to
store files from your on-premises environment. You can retrieve and send your files to the
Power Virtual Server environment from this location. You must create Cloud Object
Storage buckets to transfer data over the public internet or privately secured links. For
more information, see IBM Cloud Object Storage: FAQ.
򐂰 Using your current backup tools can create a backup copy of your data to Cloud Object
Storage. This backup is then used to build your Power Virtual Server instance.
򐂰 Power Virtual Server supports FalconStor Virtual Tape Library which can be used to
backup and restore your data.
򐂰 Databases can be migrated utilizing built-in replication capabilities provided by the
database vendor.
򐂰 IBM PowerHA can be used to mirror systems (AIX and IBM i) to Power Virtual Server. Red
Hat and SUSE provide a high availability clustering option utilizing Pacemaker. For IBM i,
there are multiple third-party solutions such as Mimix and Maxava.
򐂰 IBM Aspera is supported and provides fast, secure, and efficient data transfer to the cloud
which can reduce the amount of time required for your data migration.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 89

 Plan for potential challenges like downtime, data consistency, and application compatibility
during migration. Test the migration process in a sandbox environment to ensure smooth
execution.

As an example, a healthcare organization planning to migrate patient records from its

on-premises IBM i system to Power Virtual Server Private Cloud uses IBM Aspera to securely
transfer data, ensuring that the migration is completed quickly with no loss of data integrity.

3.7.3 Backup
In addition to being able to backup your virtual machines via the network into your
existing locally hosted backup solution, IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud also
offers a comprehensive suite of tools and services for backing up data to IBM Cloud Object
Storage (COS). These solutions are designed to extend existing backup strategies
seamlessly into IBM cloud, providing an efficient and secure method of protecting critical
business data.

For Cloud backups, utilizing your existing backup solution in Power Virtual Server is possible
assuming that the solution can backup to network attached solutions such as IBM Cloud
Object Storage. In addition, IBM Power Virtual Server supports the virtual tape library solution
from FalconStor which emulates tapes to the system for backups, while providing capabilities
for writing the data over the network to IBM COS.

Provided below are some solutions for backing up to IBM Cloud Object Storage based on the
type of operating system hosting the workloads.
򐂰 IBM i workloads:
For IBM i, Backup Recovery and Media Service (BRMS) in conjunction with IBM Cloud
Storage Solutions for i (ICC) can be leveraged for backing up data to the cloud (to IBM
Cloud Object Storage). This method could be adopted for smaller LPARs/VMs based on
bandwidth and other factors. However, a FalconStor StorSafe VTL solution (introduced in
below section) in conjunction with BRMS is recommended when there is moderate to
large amount of data to be backed up, many LPARs to be backed up, or when
backup/restore performance matters most. In addition, a VTL solution is an essential
capability for hybrid deployments.
򐂰 AIX and Linux workloads:
For AIX and Linux workloads, backup software such as Storage Protect can be configured
to have it's backup storage pool send and store backups to IBM Cloud Object Storage.

Appropriate network connectivity, preferably Direct Links with bandwidth that is adequately
sized, will be an essential factor to consider based on your backup and restore window
requirements.

Recommended Practices for Implementing Backup in IBM Power Virtual

Server
Consider the following guidelines for planning an efficient backup solution.
1. Define Retention Policies
Establish data retention policies that align with regulatory requirements and business
needs, ensuring compliance while managing storage costs effectively.
2. Optimize Backup Scheduling
Schedule backups during non-peak hours to avoid affecting production workloads.
Implement incremental backups to reduce bandwidth usage and optimize cloud storage.

90 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

3. Regular Testing of Backup and Restore Processes
Conduct regular tests of the backup and restore processes to ensure that data recovery is
swift and reliable, verifying that the backups work as expected under different scenarios.
4. Implement Encryption and Compliance Standards
Utilize IBM's encryption capabilities to protect sensitive data and ensure compliance with
relevant regulations such as GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI DSS.
5. Optimal connectivity for transferring backups to IBM Cloud Object Storage
Ensure that the network connectivity between the on-premises location hosting the
workloads to IBM cloud is sized and configured with adequate bandwidth for ensuring
backups can be sent and received within the expected backup/restore window.

Backup media options

There are three primary media options available for use in backing up your data.
򐂰 Block disk provided by the IBM FlashSystem storage in your pod.
򐂰 Cloud Object Storage which is network attached object storage.
򐂰 Virtual tape library solution that emulates a tape library which is network attached using
iSCSI connections

Local attached disk

Locally attached disk can be a good solution for backing up relatively small amounts of data.
If you backup up data on high IOP tiers to lower IOP tiers within your POD, this might be cost
effective for your requirements. However, for most environments, this is not an effective
solution.

Cloud Object Storage

IBM Cloud Object Storage is a highly available, durable, and secure platform for storing
unstructured data. Unstructured data (sometimes called binary or "blob" data) refers to data
that is not highly structured in the manner of a database. Object storage is the most efficient
way to store PDFs, media files, database backups, disk images, or even large structured
datasets.

The files that are uploaded into IBM Cloud Object Storage are called objects. Objects can be
anywhere from very small (a few bytes) [to very large] (up to 10TB). They are organized into
buckets that serve as containers for objects, and which can be configured independently from
one another in terms of locations, resiliency, billing rates, security, and object lifecycle.
Objects themselves have their own metadata in the form of user-defined tags, legal holds, or
archive status. All data stored in IBM Cloud Object Storage is encrypted, erasure-coded, and
dispersed across three locations (with the distance between locations ranging from within a
single data center, across a Multi-Zone Region or MZR, or even across multiple MZRs). This
geographic range of dispersal contributes to a bucket's resiliency. All requests and responses
are made over HTTPS. Figure 3-10 illustrates backing up your data to IBM Cloud.

Figure 3-10 Backing up to IBM Cloud

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 91

 FalconStor Virtual Tape Library
FalconStor Virtual Tape Library (VTL) is an optimized backup and deduplication solution that
provides tape library emulation, high-speed backup or restore, data archival to IBM Cloud
Object Storage for long-term storage, global data deduplication, enterprise-wide replication,
and long-term cloud-based container archive, without requiring changes to the existing
environment.

Here are some of the StorSafe VTL benefits

򐂰 Up to 95% data reduction. FalconStor reduces the storage capacity required by backup
data in the client-managed environment and in the cloud by up to 95%.
򐂰 Ransomware Protection. Recover data from any point in time with air-gapped, immutable
backups.
򐂰 Off-site Protection. For off-site protection, StorSafe VTL exports virtual tapes as physical
tapes, and keeps track of their location with a management dashboard. Virtual tapes can
remain in the library for fast restores or can be stubbed when exported to local object
storage.
򐂰 High Performance. Improve performance for both backup and recovery.
򐂰 Modernize. FalconStor is compatible with existing backup software, hardware, and
operational procedures.

Additional information on FalconStor can be found at the FalconStor StorSafe VTL site.

FalconStor VTL is offered through the IBM Cloud Catalog for both Power Virtual Server, both
IBM data center and client location. For more information see the FalconStor Deployment
Guide.

General Backup Strategies

Virtual machines hosted in IBM Power Virtual Server private cloud could also be integrated
seamlessly with existing backup solutions such as IBM Storage Protect, allowing organizations
to extend their current backup strategies into Power Virtual Server Private Cloud without the
need for entirely new tools / backup softwares.

Backup strategies for IBM i

There are many products that can be used to backup your data in an IBM i environment.
However, IBM i has a built-in backup solution (Backup Recovery and Media Services or
BRMS) which is the choice of many clients.

Using IBM Backup, Recovery and Media Services

A common IBM i backup strategy is to use IBM Backup, Recovery, and Media Services
(BRMS) and IBM Cloud Storage Solutions (ICC). Together, these products automatically back
up your LPARs to IBM Cloud Object Storage. The ICC product can be integrated with BRMS
to move and retrieve objects from remote locations, including Cloud Object Storage. In most
cases, this process involves backing up to virtual tapes and image catalogs.

Note: You need extra storage for the LPAR to host the image catalogs until they are moved
to Cloud Object Storage.

The typical IBM i customer uses the following flow to back up LPARs and objects:
1. Use the 5733-ICC product to connect to Cloud Object Storage (~2 times the disk capacity
to hold the backup images).

92 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 2. Connect to IBM Cloud Object Storage by following the steps that are mentioned in Using
Cloud Object Storage.
3. Complete the back up to Cloud Object Storage by choosing the speed and resiliency that
is required.

Backup strategies for AIX and Linux

Your current backup software can continue to be used in Power Virtual Server Private Cloud,
to either perform backups locally over the LAN or alternatively, if supported, write the backup
data to IBM Cloud Object Storage. Another option is to use the FalconStor VTL solution as a
backup target for your existing backup solution. The FalconStor VTL solution provides tape
emulation for your backups.

Solution for Hybrid Cloud Backup Strategy

IBM Power Virtual Server facilitates a hybrid cloud backup strategy, where on-premises
systems could be backed up to the cloud or a copy of the backups replicated to IBM Cloud
leveraging Virtual tape library (VTL) replication or Backup replication technologies (E.g. IBM
Storage protect replication). This adds an extra layer of protection beyond local backups,
safeguarding data from physical disasters, theft, or hardware failure.

FalconStor StorSafe VTL Replication

By leveraging FalconStor StorSafe VTL, backup solutions can direct backups into the
FalconStor StorSafe VTL that is hosted in Power Virtual Server Private Cloud. Additionally, a
corresponding FalconStor StorSafe VTL can also be provisioned in Power Virtual Server
Public Cloud (in IBM cloud) with VTL replication configured between the two VTLs ensuring a
copy of all backups taken on-premises are replicated into the FalconStor StorSafe VTL in
Power Virtual server public cloud (IBM cloud). In addition to the below benefits, this method
provides you with the capability to render hybrid cloud deployment:
򐂰 Cost effective cold-site disaster recovery.
򐂰 Alternative solution to off-site physical tape vaulting.

Figure 3-11 shows a sample of a hybrid deployment leveraging FalconStor StorSafe VTL.

Figure 3-11

Conclusion
By leveraging IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, businesses can take advantage of a
scalable, secure, and flexible backup solution that aligns with modern IT requirements. IBM
Power Virtual Server ensures that data remains protected and readily recoverable, allowing

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 93

 organizations to focus on their operations without the risks associated with data loss or
system failures.

3.7.4 Disaster Recovery

Business Continuity is of utmost importance for enterprises that run mission-critical
workloads, and their resiliency depends on how quickly enterprises can recover (RTO) from a
disaster event and how much data they can recover (RPO) after the event. Disaster events
can be hardware, software failures or catastrophic incidents such as fires, storms,
earthquakes, etc. and a highly reliable, secured disaster recovery solution is a must.

Disaster recovery (DR) is a critical component of business continuity planning, focusing on

restoring services and minimizing downtime following an unexpected event such as system
failure, cyberattacks, or natural disaster. Disaster recovery addresses the loss of the ability to
run your business at its primary site due to any event or situation that causes the primary site
to become unavailable.

There are varying levels of disaster recovery with each offering different levels of recovery.
Advanced configurations involving continuous data replication can provide quick recovery
with a near-zero recovery point objective (RPO). RPO represents the amount of data
(generally expressed in a measure of time) that cannot be recovered and must be reentered
or recreated. Less advanced options that involve saving point in time copies which are then
restored. This provides an RPO equal to the time since the last save operation and recovery
also takes longer. In general, the cost of managing disaster recovery options is inversely
related to the RPO of the solution. In other words, the smaller the RPO, the greater the cost.

As you design your solution, you need to consider your availability requirements and how to
respond to potential interruptions in the service. One option is to use Power Virtual Server
instances in an IBM datacenter as disaster recovery location. Another option is to use a
second Power Virtual Server Private Cloud pod in a different location.

The disaster recovery solution must provide for replication of your appliction data to the
recovery location and allow the applications to be restarted in that location. You can restart
your workload on a different host in the cloud if a hardware failure occurs. The use of Power
Virtual Server, either on-premises or off-premises, for your DR location can reduce your
recovery costs as the cloud resources do not require an initial capital investment and you only
pay for the resources when they are used.

Recommended Practices for Implementing DR with IBM Power Virtual

Server
It is recommended that you take the following into account as you plan and implement your
Disaster Recovery solution for Power Virtual Server.
1. Regular Testing
Regularly test the failover and failback processes to ensure the DR setup works as
expected. IBM Power Virtual Server provides the tools to simulate disaster scenarios and
verify recovery procedures.
2. RPO and RTO Considerations
Define Recovery Point Objectives (RPO) and Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) based on
business needs. IBM Power Virtual Server can help organizations achieve low RPO and
RTO targets through continuous replication and fast failover mechanisms.
3. Compliance and Data Sovereignty

94 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Ensure that the chosen DR region complies with regulatory requirements, particularly for
industries like healthcare and finance. Power Virtual Server Private Cloud allows
businesses to select DR locations that meet GDPR, HIPAA, or other regional data
protection regulations.

Data Replication
Data replication is a critical component of your disaster recovery plan. There are multiple
methods of ensuring that you have a copy of your application data.

For applications with minimal data change it is possible that you cound use backup tools such
as IBM Storage Protect or BRMS to back up the data to either Cloud Object Storage or to a
virtual tape library solution such as FalconStor. However, the RPO and RTO of a backup and
restore solution is unlikely to meet the disaster recovery requirements of most systems.

There are two classes of data replication solutions that can be considered for continuous
replication of your data to the disaster recovery location:
򐂰 Software replication
򐂰 Storage replication

Software replication
Software replication solutions utilize either system level tools (generally described as
clustering tools) or application or database level replication tools.Power Virtual Server
supports many software replication tools:
򐂰 PowerHA SystemMirror for AIX
PowerHA SystemMirror for AIX can be used to manage disaster recovery solutions for AIX
instances utilizing Global Logical Volume Mirroring (GLVM). GLVM replicates or mirrors
data between different AIX instances at the logical volume layer. As data is written to a
mirrored logical volume the data is also sent over the network to the remote system and
GLVM maintains the data consistency. PowerHA is responsible for moving the applications
to the remote AIX instance in case of failures in the primary. Using PowerHA your system
administrators can synchronize your data back to the primary site when service is restored
and eventually move the applications back to the primary location. Reference Using
PowerHA System Mirror using GLVM on Power Virtual Server for more information.
򐂰 PowerHA SystemMirror for IBM i
Similar to the AIX solution, PowerHA SystemMirror provides support for IBM i replication
using Geo Mirroring. IBM PowerHA System Mirror for i provides end-to-end integrated
clustering solutions for high availability and disaster recovery. PowerHA is an integrated
extension of the IBM i operating system and offers environmental, application, and data
resiliency solutions for managing access and storage in the event of planned or unplanned
outages. Geographic Mirroring is integrated directly with the storage management
component in the IBM i operating system. As the system writes data from main memory to
disk, the same data is sent over TCP/IP to the target system to be written to disk, ensuring
identical data at the byte level replicated between both systems. Reference IBM i Disaster
Recovery with IBM Power Virtual Server.
򐂰 Application-specific replication
Applications might have replication mechanisms that can sync multiple environments.
These options are commonly used for application-specific replication:
– Db2 HADR
– Rocket iCluster HA/DR
– Maxava HA
– Migrate 23

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 95

 – MIMIX
– Oracle Data Guard
– Oracle GoldenGate
Work with the vendor for implementation guidance on Power Virtual Server for these
products.

Storage Replication using Global Replication Services

The GRS enablement in IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud enables asynchronous
replication of data between the primary location infrastructure and the secondary location
infrastructure. The two infrastructure locations have the identical set of capabilities that IBM
Power Virtual Server in IBM data center provides.

The infrastructure in the IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud in which your workspace is
located, has the primary volumes of the replication pairs. The infrastructure in the secondary
location has the auxiliary volumes. IBM Cloud infrastructure internally uses IBM
FlashSystems Global Mirror Change Volume (GMCV) as storage technology that provides
asynchronous replication.

Each time a replicated volume is created, four copies of volumes are created across the
infrastructure:
򐂰 Primary volume in the primary infrastructure
򐂰 Primary change volume in the primary infrastructure to store the delta changes
򐂰 Auxiliary volume in the secondary infrastructure
򐂰 Auxiliary change volume in the secondary infrastructure to update the delta changes

You must provide the required network configuration between the primary location and the
secondary location for replication, which includes the following prerequisites:
򐂰 The network bandwidth must be greater than or equal to 10 Gbps.
򐂰 The network latency must be less than or equal to 200 ms.

During the first sync, the entire data from primary volumes is copied to the auxiliary volumes.
For subsequent syncs, only the delta changes are copied. The effective Recovery Point
Objective (RPO) depends on the capability of the underlying network throughput and the
application characteristics. If the network throughput is insufficient to reach the defined RPO,
then the time duration between the synchronization increases.

3.7.5 Application Compatibility

Power Virtual Server supports a wide range of operating systems, including AIX, IBM i, and
Linux, making it easier to migrate legacy applications to the cloud without requiring
refactoring. However, it is crucial to evaluate each application's compatibility with the Power
Virtual Server environment before migration.

For cloud-native or containerized applications, Power Virtual Server integrates seamlessly

with DevOps tools and CI/CD pipelines, enabling smooth deployment and testing in hybrid
environments.

Businesses must assess application dependencies, performance requirements, and any

potential adjustments required for cloud deployment. Additionally, ensure that licensing for
any proprietary software is aligned with cloud deployment models.

For example, a manufacturing company moves its legacy AIX-based supply chain
management system to Power Virtual Server Private Cloud, ensuring that the application’s

96 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 dependencies are compatible with the cloud environment and that the performance remains
consistent post-migration.

3.7.6 Security and Compliance

Security is paramount when integrating cloud environments with on-premises systems. Power
Virtual Server provides robust security features, including data encryption (at rest and in
transit), access controls, and firewall configurations to protect sensitive data.

Businesses in regulated industries such as healthcare, finance, and government must ensure
that their cloud integration complies with industry standards like GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI DSS.
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud supports compliance by providing tools to manage data
residency, audit trails, and secure data handling practices.

Power Virtual Server integrates with IBM Cloud Identity and Access Management to provide
granular control over who can access specific resources. Role-based access controls (RBAC)
ensure that users only have access to the data and systems they are authorized to interact
with.

A financial institution integrates its core banking applications with Power Virtual Server while
ensuring compliance with SOX and PCI DSS regulations. Data encryption and secure access
controls are implemented to protect sensitive customer information throughout the integration
process.

3.7.7 Management and Monitoring

Unified Management Power Virtual Server Private Cloud offers tools like IBM Cloud
Monitoring, and IBM Cloud Automation Manager for managing cloud resources and
monitoring performance. These tools help businesses maintain visibility into their cloud
environments, optimize resource usage, and automate routine management tasks.

By centralizing monitoring and management, businesses can track resource utilization,

performance metrics, and security incidents across both on-premises and cloud
environments. This ensures that any issues can be quickly identified and addressed,
minimizing disruptions.

Ensure that IT teams are trained in using cloud management tools and that clear processes
are in place for monitoring, troubleshooting, and scaling cloud resources as needed.

A retail business integrates its Power Virtual Server cloud infrastructure with its on-premises
ERP system. Using IBM Cloud Monitoring, the IT team monitors both environments from a
single dashboard, ensuring real-time insights into system performance and resource
allocation.

3.7.8 Steps for Effective Integration Planning

The following steps should be taken to ensure an effective integration.
1. Assess Current Infrastructure
Conduct a thorough assessment of the existing on-premises infrastructure, including
applications, workloads, network configurations, and security policies. Identify areas that
may need to be adjusted or updated to ensure compatibility with the cloud environment.
2. Define Integration Objectives

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 97

 Clearly define the objectives for the integration, such as improving performance,
enhancing scalability, or optimizing costs. These objectives will help guide decisions
around cloud configurations, data migration strategies, and workload allocation between
on-premises and cloud environments.
3. Develop a Migration and Integration Plan
Create a detailed migration plan that outlines the steps, tools, and timelines for moving
data and workloads to the cloud. Include contingency plans for potential issues like
downtime or data migration failures.
4. Test the Integration
Before fully deploying workloads to the cloud, test the integration in a pilot environment.
This allows businesses to identify and resolve any issues related to network connectivity,
data migration, or application compatibility before going live.
5. Monitor and Optimize Post-Integration
After the integration is complete, continuously monitor the cloud environment to ensure
that performance, security, and compliance objectives are being met. Use monitoring tools
to track resource utilization and make adjustments as needed to optimize costs and
performance.

Example of Integration Planning in Action

A multinational corporation is planning to integrate its existing on-premises ERP system with
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud to improve scalability and performance. The IT team
begins by assessing the current infrastructure and identifying key applications that can be
migrated to the cloud. After defining the goals of the integration, they establish secure
network connectivity and migrate their data. The team tests the integration in a pilot
environment before migrating the full workload, ensuring that the process runs smoothly and
without disruption to business operations.

3.7.9 Conclusion
Planning for integration with IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is essential for ensuring
a smooth transition from on-premises infrastructure to a hybrid cloud environment. By
addressing key areas such as network connectivity, data migration, application compatibility,
security, and management, businesses can fully leverage the benefits of cloud computing
while maintaining control over their IT operations. With proper planning and execution, Power
Virtual Server Private Cloud can provide the scalability, flexibility, and security needed to meet
the demands of modern enterprises.

3.8 Management
With Power Virtual Server, IBM manages the complex setup of servers, storage, and
networking, adhering to best practices for a reliable, high-performance infrastructure. You
retain control of your applications and data, while IBM and our partners continue to introduce
enhanced options to increase value.

IBM also ensures the firmware and platform (from the virtualization layer down) are kept up to
date, providing timely security and resilience updates, along with integrated Live Partition
Mobility (LPM) technology to minimize downtime.

98 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 3-12 shows the responsibility assignment matrix for Power Virtual Server.

Figure 3-12 Responsibility matrix for Power Virtual Server

IBM site reliability engineering (SREs) focus on several key areas to ensure a robust and
optimized Power Virtual Server experience, including:
– Monitoring and Alerting
– Incident Management
– Analysis (Improvement Cycle)
– Firmware and supporting code currency
– Security
– Compliance
– Deployment and Provisioning

Availability and serviceability

Call Home is enabled for the Power server HMCs and FlashSystems storage. While software
subsystem and infrastructure logs remain within the pod, diagnostic data is shared with IBM
support as needed. All data flows are encrypted across the restricted Power Virtual Server
Private Cloud Control Plane Network (PCCN).

Note: Client data is never accessible or transmitted over this network.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 99

 Client operations
Table 3-2 lists optional 'Day 2' operational technologies that enhance the IBM Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud solution.

Table 3-2 Client Operational Capability

Client Operational Capability Reference Technology

Backup and Restore 򐂰 IBM Storage Protect (formerly IBM Spectrum Protect)
򐂰 IBM i: BRMS -> COS (recommended <3TB); BYO Falconstor VTL
over iSCSI

High Availability 򐂰 AIX: PowerHA for AIX Enterprise Edition

򐂰 IBM i: PowerHA Geographic Mirroring; all 3rd party logical replication
technologies such as MIMIX, iCluster, and others
򐂰 RHEL: Red Hat Enterprise Linux High Availability
򐂰 SUSE: SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability
򐂰 IaaS: Automated remote restart provided by the underlying IaaS
management layer

Disaster Recovery 򐂰 AIX: PowerHA for AIX Enterprise Edition with GLVM mirroring
򐂰 IBM i: PowerHA Geographic Mirroring; all 3rd party logical replication
technologies such as MIMIX, iCluster, and others
򐂰 RHEL: Red Hat Enterprise Linux High Availability
򐂰 SUSE: SUSE Linux Enterprise Clustered Disaster Recovery

Observability and Monitoring (for IBM Instana™ Observability:

both virtual machines and contain- 򐂰 Provides operating system agents for AIX, Linux and IBM i
ers) 򐂰 Provides ability to monitor Red Hat OpenShift clusters

Security and Compliance IBM PowerSC:

򐂰 Provides security and compliance capabilities for AIX, Linux and
IBM i

3.8.1 IBM services

Should you need assistance with any aspect of your IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
installation or operation, IBM Cloud Support team members are available to assist you in
resolving the issues.

IBM Cloud Support plans

The IBM Cloud Services team is responsible for working with clients to resolve any issues
that they have in accessing or using IBM Power Virtual Server, either off-premises or
on-premises. The support team is available 24 x 7 and can be accessed in a number of ways.
Clients can choose to open cases online, through online chats, or via the phone.

Clients can choose an Advanced or Premium support plan to customize your IBM Cloud
support experience for your business needs. The Advanced plan is the default. The level of
support that you select determines the severity that you can assign to support cases and your
level of access to the tools available in the Support Center. Table 3-3 differentiates the two
different offerings.

Table 3-3 IBM Cloud support plan offerings

Advanced Premium

Description For environments with a limited number For mission-critical environments with a
of business-critical applications. strategic dependency on IBM Cloud.

100 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Advanced Premium

Case management Prioritized case handling and support Client engagement that is aligned with
experience that is aligned with your your business outcomes to accelerate
business needs. time-to-value

Availability 24 x 7 access to the IBM Cloud 24 x 7 access to the IBM Cloud

technical support team through cases, technical support team through cases,
phone, and chat phone, and chat

Initial response time Severity 1 — 1 hour Severity 1 — 15 minutes

objectives Severity 2 — 2 hours Severity 2 — 1 hour
Severity 3 — 4 hours Severity 3 — 2 hours
Severity 4 — 8 hours Severity 4 — 4 hours

Additional Support N/A Technical Account Manager

IBM Technical Account Manager

Premium clients are assigned a Technical Account Manager that provides a personalized
experience, advising on processes, policies, and operation related to on-premises services.
The Technical Account Manager provides the following services to enhance your IBM Power
Virtual Server Private Cloud experience:
򐂰 Personalized Client Advocacy for private cloud services
– The Technical Account Manager conducts a Welcome Call tailored for the clients'
services.
– Delivers a customized IBM Support Plan ensuring IBM Support engagement
processes are understood.
– Key interface into Support, SRE Operations & Experts.
򐂰 Acceleration Issue Resolution
– Technical Account Manager coordinates across the IBM SRE Operations & IBM
Support teams to reduce case resolution time.
򐂰 Personal Onboarding Assistance
– Helps with onboarding services and serves as client advocate, aligning IBM resources
to meet client needs.
– Ensures that roles and responsibilities are understood.
򐂰 Advocate for on-premises Infrastructure Maintenance
– Coordinates with IBM SRE to provide personalize client communication about planned
maintenance events.
– Ensures that any maintenance activity is known and understood.
– Highlights key dates and times for actions.
򐂰 Expert Coordination
– Can help coordinate experts for client-initiated events, including architectural support
on maintenance events, to review required critical functions & services.
򐂰 Quarterly Review Meetings
– Hosts periodic reviews of on-premises services, focused on business outcomes and
future planning activities.
– Reviews case activity and planned maintenance.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 101

 Opening a support case
To open a support case for Power Systems Virtual Server Private Cloud, complete the
following steps:
1. Log in to the IBM Cloud with your IBM Cloud account credentials as shown in Figure 3-13.

Figure 3-13 Login screen for IBM Cloud

2. In the menu bar, click the question mark with a circle, and select Support Center as
shown in Figure 3-14.

Figure 3-14 Select support center

3. From the Contact support section, click Create a case as shown in Figure 3-15.

102 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 3-15 Create a case

4. In the category section, select the topic “Workspace for Power Systems Virtual Server”.
5. Select the subtopic that is most closely related to your issue. E.g.: Power VS On Premises
Related.
6. Complete the description details and other required fields.
7. Optional steps:
– Attach files and resources to provide more details about the issue you are
experiencing.
– If you would like a user in your account to be updated about the case, add them by
using the Contact watchlist.
– Select Email me updates about this case to receive support case notifications.
8. Click Next, review your case summary, and click Submit case. After you receive email
verification for the case, follow the instructions for further communication on the issue.

Important: To maintain security, do not include any personal information, sensitive data, or
device or service credentials in case responses. For example, do not include passwords,
API keys, secrets, or credit card information.

For more details see Using the Support Center. After your support case is created, you can
view its progress on the Manage Cases Page.

Chapter 3. Planning Considerations 103

3.8.2 Unplanned network disconnection of management control plane
In case there is an unplanned network outage for the management network connecting the
IBM Cloud-resident Service Broker instance and the pod infrastructure, the VMs will continue
to run within the pod.

Table 3-4 describes the implications of a pod that is running in an unexpected, disconnected
mode which is due to an unplanned network outage where both the primary and secondary
management connections (Direct Link or site-to-site VPN) to IBM are lost.

Table 3-4 Impact of disconnected mode

Impact of
Capability disconnected mode Comment

Your workload and Client workload remains fully operational,

No impact
data and data remains fully available.

GUI remains operational and leverages

last-known cached data. Incoming updates
GUI / API
Minimal impact for data, such as storage consumption,
(for read operations)
remains fixed until control plane
connectivity is re-established

For example, VM or volume creation.

GUI / API Resource write operations are unavailable
Unavailable
(for write operations) until control plane connectivity is
re-established.

Read operations remain operational and

Command-line
Minimal impact write operations are unavailable until
interface (CLI)
connectivity is re-established

Metering uses last-known cached data (if

Billing and metering No impact the pod gets disconnected, no write
operations can occur in the interim)

In-pod telemetry data is unavailable until

control plane connectivity is reestablished
Telemetry Unavailable
(one exception is that IBM Storage Insights
caches information for a selected period)

DHCP services are provided by the

DHCP service (for pod-resident network infrastructure and
No impact
client data networks) does not require a connection to IBM
Cloud.

IBM Operations staff would not be able to

IBM remote support Unavailable remotely connect to the pod until
communication is re-established.

104 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 4

Chapter 4. Ordering and Installation

Once you have determined that IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is the appropriate
solution for your enterprise infrastructure and have completed the planning process to
determine the appropriate Pod configuration for your requirements, the next step is to work
with IBM or your IBM Business Partner to order the Pod and have IBM install it in your data
center location. This chapter describes the ordering and installation process for IBM Power
Virtual Server Private Cloud.

The following topics are included in this chapter:

򐂰 4.1, “Process overview” on page 106
򐂰 4.2, “Finalizing configuration” on page 107
򐂰 4.3, “Customer responsibilities” on page 109
򐂰 4.4, “IBM installation and decommission services” on page 112

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. 105

4.1 Process overview
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is listed in the IBM Cloud Catalog, it is available
under IBM Power Virtual Server tile. Clients can use the Estimator1 located in the GUI to
define the desired configuration and see an estimated monthly list price.

IBM is responsible for offering content, price and billing – metered hourly and billed monthly.
The offering is designed as a Business Partner friendly go-to-market offering. The services
Infrastructure will reside in clients' data centers. Whereas the client is responsible for physical
site location (e.g., space, energy and network connectivity). IBM is responsible for installation
and configuration of the infrastructure. IBM will own and operate the Power infrastructure. The
client (or partner) provisions the virtual machines. IBM operates the infrastructure up through
the hypervisor layer, including all hardware and software maintenance operations. Client (or
partner) is responsible for the OS, middleware and applications. IBM will provide support (for
all IBM managed components).

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud requires a specific ordering and installation process which
we describe in this section.

Figure 4-1 provides an overview of the planning and installation lifecycle for a Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud instance.

Figure 4-1 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Planning and installation lifecycle

Table 4-1 presents sample scenario to illustrate the process and the people that would be
involved in the planning, installation and operation of a Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
instance.

Table 4-1 Sample installation planning scenario

Persons involved Activity

Wade, the CTO at ABC Company, is looking to optimize IT

operational cost and improve efficiency for the next year. He's
looking to maintain data locally and to offload the operations to
vendors, so they can focus on innovation.

Bruno, their business partner, recommends Power Virtual

Server Private Cloud as a solution that can reduce costs,
address IT skills, improve IT operations and allow them to
focus on their applications. Additionally, Bruno shares that
despite being on-premises, IBM ships and configures the
necessary hardware and is responsible for maintaining it in a
full as-a-service model.

1 See the IBM Cloud estimator website. https://cloud.ibm.com/estimator

106 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Persons involved Activity

Bruno connects with his IBM seller to get a more detailed

quote that includes any possible discounts and to prepare for
an order.

IBM manufacturing team receives the BOM with all the details
to assemble ABC Company's Power Virtual Server Private
Cloud.

IBM TLS connects with ABC Company to discuss floorspace

planning, networking planning, and other items in preparation
for the Power Virtual Server Private Cloud delivery and setup.

TLS SREs setup and configure the infrastructure and then

register the Power Virtual Server Private Cloud infrastructure
with IBM Cloud.

The Power Virtual Server Private Cloud instance appears as a

new IBM Cloud Satellite Location in the client's account and is
ready toy to run client applications

4.2 Finalizing configuration

During the initial planning as discussed in Chapter 3, “Planning Considerations” on page 71,
you have done an analysis of the workloads that you plan on deploying to IBM Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud and have determined the appropriate Pod configuration to support that
workload. Working with your IBM representative, you will have received initial pricing, based
on your estimated configuration. Now it is time to finalize the configuration and submit the
order for the Pods that IBM will install in your data center.

To ensure that your experience with IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is successful,
IBM – and your IBM business partner, if one in involved – will work with you to validate the
order and will schedule a technical review. Once the technical delivery assessment is
completed and your configuration is finalized, the configuration will be turned over to IBM
manufacturing to build and ship your IBM Power Virtual Server Pod to your location.

4.2.1 Technical delivery assessment

As part of the process to ensure that the proper configuration is being proposed and
delivered, IBM (and any associated IBM business partner) work with the client to do a
technical delivery assessment (TDA). The IBM sales team and the client meet with a group of

Chapter 4. Ordering and Installation 107

 IBM Cloud experts to review the client’s requirements and goals and assess whether the
proposed solution will meet expectations. The TDA process looks at the client’s current
environment:
򐂰 What existing IBM Power hardware is being replaced by the solution?
– How many LPARs?
– What are the processor and memory requirements?
– What are the storage requirements?
򐂰 What applications will be migrated to the new Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Pod?
– What Operating Systems are currently being used?
– What databases are involved?
– Are there any high availability or disaster recovery requirements?
– Are there integration requirements with other applications and environments?
򐂰 What are the network requirements?

The TDA then ensures that specific prerequisites for the installation and management of the
Pod are met. Such as:
򐂰 Base prerequisites
– Is the proposed installation in one of our currently supported countries?
– Is the client location able to have continuous connectivity to IBM Cloud for
management, provisioning, Call Home, and support? (Direct Link Connect or
Site-to-Site VPN)
– Does the client REQUIRE external direct SAN Access to local storage or can the
storage be accessed via the TCP/IP network?
– Is the management network latency able to meet the 200 msec maximum delay?
򐂰 Physical Planning
– Can the facility support the 60 amp single or three phase power drops required for the
Racks
– Is the facility able to support the cooling requirements of the racks?
– Are sufficient network drops available to connect to the racks and can TCP/IP Network
addresses be allocated?
򐂰 Sizing
– Does the Client expect their workload on Power to Grow?
– Does the proposed sizing of the configuration provide room for anticipated growth?
– Does the proposed sizing meet the sizing for minimum commit?
– Is the Power Virtual Server Private storage being proposed sufficient for client?
򐂰 Installation and service
– Can IBM get access to the facility for maintenance and support of hardware?
– Is the client location able to accept delivery of full IBM 42U racks of equipment? (for
example: loading docks, elevators)?
򐂰 Compliance and Security
– Are there any compliance standards required (for example:FFIEC, PCI, HIPAA, PII,
ISO)
– Are there any data residency or data protection regulation (GDPR) requirements for
the Power servers and Storage?

After any issues found in the TDA are addressed, the system can be ordered and scheduled
for delivery to the customer data center. Once the Pods are delivered, IBM is responsible for
setting them up and connecting them to the IBM Cloud to enable management of the
environment as discussed in section 4.4, “IBM installation and decommission services” on
page 112.

108 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

4.3 Customer responsibilities
This section describes the different tasks that need to be completed throughout the ordering
and installation process and assigns the responsibility for those steps to the customer or to
IBM.

4.3.1 Prerequisites for installing the Pod

There are several prerequisites that must be met in order to complete the installation of an
IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud pod. IBM will work with the client to ensure that all
requirements have been satisfied.

Preorder Steps
This group of requirements need to be satisfied prior to the order being accepted.

Customer Responsibilities
1. Identify the closest IBM Cloud region to minimize network latency. To be successful, the
round-trip time (RTT) for a data packet needs to be less than 200 milliseconds. For more
information on determining the RTT from your location to the chosen IBM Cloud region
see Power IaaS Network Latency.
2. Confirm that site and environmental conditions are suitable for Pod installation. Validate
that you have floor space available, have the power capacity required, have the
appropriated heat and air conditioning capacity, and have the appropriate security controls
in place. For more information work with your IBM representative and consult the Power
IaaS Preinstallation Checklist.

IBM Responsibilities
1. Provide information and resources to assist in site planning and environmental
requirements.

Order and Preinstallation

After the order has been placed an prior to the installation, the following tasks need to be
completed.

Customer Responsibilities
1. Complete preinstallation checklist provided by IBM.
2. Prepare data center site according to the checklist requirements, including space for 4/2U
racks, floor load capacity, HVAC setup, and power source readiness
3. Ensure security measures and access control are in place.
4. Route power and network cables to the installation site.

IBM Responsibilities
1. Provide a preinstallation checklist.
2. Conduct an installation readiness review

Chapter 4. Ordering and Installation 109

 Networking Setup
Prior to installation, the following network setup tasks need to be completed.

Customer Responsibilities
1. Provide network-specific information such as ASN and service key. For more information
see Power IaaS Network Requirements.
2. Establish connections using IBM Direct Link or VPN.
3. Work with a service provider for last mile connectivity.

IBM Responsibilities
1. Assist with network use case identification and requirements communication.

Installation and Activation

These tasks need to be completed during the installation and activation stage, after the Pod
has arrived at the customer data center.

Customer Responsibilities
1. Work with IBM SRE team for physical cabling and initial configuration of the data plane
network.

IBM Responsibilities
1. Install, upgrade, and update hardware and software for the Pod infrastructure.
2. Configure the network for validation testing.
3. Conduct provisioning tests over the control plane.
4. Activate the account post-testing, marking the start of billing.
5. Ensure visibility of the Pod Satellite location in the customer's IBM Power Virtual Server
(On-premises) account.

Post-Installation Testing
After the installation, the following tasks and tests must be completed.

Customer Responsibilities:
1. Perform provisioning tests using the service broker to ensure functionality (VM
provisioning, IP address assignment, basic command operations).

IBM Responsibilities:
1. Support through IBM Support Center for any connectivity or installation issues post-setup.

4.3.2 Additional customer requirements

This section addresses some additional areas that need to be considered before the IBM
Power Virtual Server Private Cloud Pod can be installed.

Site Readiness
򐂰 Ensure that the IBM Power Virtual Server Pod is protected with restricted access that is
consistent with your company data protection and physical access control policies.
򐂰 Ensure that electric power and communication facilities are available in adequate
quantities for operation. If these facilities are inadequate, contact the utility company to
determine whether additional services can be made available.

110 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Site Access Requirements
򐂰 Define an access route from your loading dock to your data processing area before
delivery of your server. A preliminary check of the building is required to determine if
adequate access for the normal delivery of supplies and servers exists. A small alley, a
narrow door opening, or limited access to the delivery area can become inhibitive to
installation. The loading dock, passageways, and elevators must be able to accommodate
heavy, oversized data processing support equipment such as air conditioning equipment.
For more information see Planning Access.

Power requirements
򐂰 Your On-premises site for IBM Power Virtual Server must be provisioned with A-side and
B-side power redundancy that meets the Power Virtual Server rack connector and load
requirements. See Power Requirements to determine the rack connector and load
requirements.

Network Requirements
򐂰 The data center site must provide network cables to connect the IBM Power Virtual Server
(On-premises) network infrastructure and the data network at the site.
򐂰 The site must provide two uplink cables to connect the IBM Power Virtual Server
(On-premises) network infrastructure to the IBM Cloud region through IBM Direct Link
connections or through VPN connections.
򐂰 Contract with a service provider to:
– Provide redundant connections to the IBM Direct Link connection or VPN connection.
– Provide the last mile connection from the point-of-presence (PoP) of your service
provider to the customer data center.

IBM provides networking connection between the components within the Pod, but the client
needs to provide connections between the Pod and their internal data network at the site. In
addition, the customer is responsible for providing connections from the Pod to the IBM Cloud
region. This is shown in Figure 4-2.

Figure 4-2 Networking architecture

Chapter 4. Ordering and Installation 111

 Networking requirements are discussed in section 3.5, “Network connectivity” on page 80.
For additional information see Network Requirements.

4.4 IBM installation and decommission services

IBM is responsible for deploying and managing IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud
installations and is responsible for removing the equipment when the contract expires.

4.4.1 Deployment services

Deployment services include:
– Physical infrastructure installation
– Configuration into IBM Cloud
– Service activation.

The client is responsible for providing and maintaining the physical facilities, including the
floor space, power, and HVAC components to allow the equipment to operate. The client is
also responsible to ensure that the equipment racks can be delivered and ensure that the
racks can be moved to and placed properly in the data center. This includes ensuring that the
racks have a clear delivery path from the dock to the computer room floor and providing any
ramps and floor support as necessary.

When the equipment is in place, IBM service technicians will come to the client data center
and will complete the final installation steps to ensure that the racks are in the correct location
and if there are multiple racks, will install the interconnecting cables.

After the racks are installed and the equipment is powered on, the IBM technicians will work
with the IBM Cloud support team to connect the Pod to the cloud and activate the IBM Cloud
services.

4.4.2 End of services

At the end of the contract, IBM is responsible for deactivating the IBM Cloud connections and
remove the equipment from the client data center. IBM is responsible for:
– IBM data disposal,
– Services disconnect
– Hardware tear down and packaging
– Return to IBM

The client is responsible for migrating all client data from the Pod storage and deactivating all
applications, prior to IBM coming to deactivate the pod.

112 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 5

Chapter 5. Setup and operation examples

for Power Virtual Server Private
Cloud
This chapter is designed to show examples of setting up and operating the IBM Power Virtual
Server Private Cloud. As described earlier, managing IBM Power Virtual Server whether in
the public cloud or in your data center is, by design, done using the same interfaces. This
synergy and ease of management allows you to choose the appropriate location for your IBM
Power Virtual Server workloads and easily migrate workloads between on-premises and
public cloud locations.

The following topics are included in this chapter:

򐂰 5.1, “Introduction” on page 114
򐂰 5.2, “Setting up your workspace” on page 115
򐂰 5.3, “Setting up a virtual server instance” on page 117

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. 113

5.1 Introduction
With IBM Power Virtual Server you can run IBM Power based workloads in the cloud or on
your data center floor with the same management tools. The only difference between running
on IBM Power Virtual Server or IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is the amount of time
it takes to provision your first resources as you need to work with IBM to order and install the
infrastructure for your IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud pod.

IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud provides businesses with a flexible, scalable cloud
infrastructure tailored specifically for running IBM Power Systems workloads. Power Virtual
Server Private allows enterprises to leverage cloud computing benefits while maintaining
control over critical workloads that require high security, performance, or compliance with
regulatory requirements. It is designed to run mission-critical workloads, such as AIX, IBM i,
and Linux environments, enabling businesses to extend or replace their on-premises
infrastructure with cloud-based resources.

Power Virtual Server Private offers robust security features, including data encryption (both at
rest and in transit), firewalls, and role-based access controls. It also complies with a range of
industry regulations such as HIPAA, PCI DSS, and GDPR, making it suitable for industries
like healthcare, finance, and government. By hosting sensitive workloads in a dedicated
environment, businesses can ensure compliance with stringent data protection laws and
maintain control over where their data is stored and processed.

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud provides on-demand scalability, allowing businesses to
provision additional resources such as compute, memory, and storage when needed. This
ensures that organizations can easily scale their infrastructure to meet changing business
demands without the need for additional capital investment. Resources can be scaled up or
down depending on workload requirements, making it highly adaptable to both predictable
and unexpected changes in demand.

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is designed to support high availability for mission-critical
applications. It provides disaster recovery options, allowing businesses to replicate workloads
and data across multiple data centers for redundancy. This ensures minimal downtime and
business continuity in the event of failures or disasters.

Power Virtual Server Private Cloud is ideal for businesses pursuing a hybrid cloud strategy. It
integrates seamlessly with public clouds, allowing businesses to extend their infrastructure to
the cloud while keeping critical workloads on-premises or in a private environment.
Workloads can be moved easily between on-premises and cloud environments, providing the
flexibility to manage workloads where they are most efficient and cost-effective.

By adopting a pay-as-you-go model, Power Virtual Server Private allows businesses to

manage costs effectively by only paying for the resources they consume. This avoids the
need for over-provisioning resources and ensures that IT budgets align with actual
infrastructure usage. Power Virtual Server Private Cloud reduces the need for upfront capital
expenditures and allows organizations to scale resources based on business needs.

This section introduces how businesses can get started with Power Virtual Server Private
Cloud, including the features, capabilities, and core benefits it offers. By leveraging Power
Virtual Server Private, organizations can enjoy cloud-like flexibility without compromising on
control, security, or performance, making it an ideal solution for hybrid cloud strategies.

114 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

5.2 Setting up your workspace
A workspace in IBM Cloud is a logical container to group a set of cloud resources. It can be
used to group resources for specific projects and to simplify management of your cloud
resources.

All of the resources defined in a workspace are located in a single cloud datacenter or
location. The location is specified when you create the workspace. You can define multiple
workspaces within a single datacenter or you can specify multiple workspaces across
different data centers. Resources cannot be moved or shared across workspaces.

With the availability of Power Virtual Server Private cloud, the Create Workspace has a new
parameter to define the location, the Location type field allows you to select:
򐂰 IBM data center to select from one of the IBM datacenter locations
򐂰 Client location which allow you to select a satellite location registered to your enterprise.

Figure 5-1 shows the Create Workspace screen with Client location selected.

Figure 5-1 Selecting IBM data center or Client location

After choosing from IBM data center or Client location, the Location field on the page is
populated with the options available for your IBM Cloud account. Figure 5-2 on page 116
shows the client locations list. Choose the location that contains the resources that you want
to include in your workspace.

Chapter 5. Setup and operation examples for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 115
 Figure 5-2 Choosing a client location

Once you select your location type satellite location, select Continue to fill in additional data
about your workspace as shown in Figure 5-3.

Figure 5-3 Additional information for workspace definition

116 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

 Required fields are the Name and Resource group fields. The name is defined by you and
should be used to differentiate this workspace for others you have in your environment. The
User tags and Access management tags fields are designed to help you manage your IBM
Cloud resources.

Authorized users can add tags to resources or service IDs in the account. By tagging your
resources, you can better organize, track, and manage costs associated with related assets.
Using a consistent tagging schema to link resources to specific teams allows you to group
and filter by those tags when analyzing costs in your exported usage report.

Access management tags help control access to resources. These tags can be predefined for
use in access policies that grant permissions to the resources they are attached to. Only the
account administrator has the ability to create these tags and can delete them only if they are
not linked to any resources.

The last option displayed as you create your workspace is whether you want to enable IBM
Cloud Monitoring for your workspace.

5.3 Setting up a virtual server instance

The next step in setting up your Power Virtual Server Private Cloud resources is to define a virtual
server instance – this is machine LPAR which will be used to run your business applications or
databases. This process is exactly the same for resources in your private Pod or on the public
cloud. We have documented many of the steps involved here. For additional information, see
Creating an IBM Power Virtual Server.

Note: Before you can create a Virtual Server Instance, you need to select the workspace
that will contain the VSI. Select the workspace from the left screen panel by selecting
“Select workspace” and then selecting the workspace you want to contain your new VSI.

Figure 5-4 shows the initial screen used to define a virtual server instance. On this screen you
provide a name for your instance and define how many you want to create with these
specifications (Number of instances). You also select the boot image to be used for the
instance, choosing from standard boot images provided by IBM or from boot images you have
uploaded to the IBM Cloud.

Figure 5-4 Creating a virtual server instance

Chapter 5. Setup and operation examples for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 117
 Additional screens are presented as you continue, allowing you to define the compute,
memory, storage, and network resources to be used by your instance.

In the General tab, the required fields are Instance name and Number of instances. The name
is a user defined label that should help you identify the instance and its workloads. Only
alphanumeric characters, underscores and dashes are allowed in the name. This would be
the equivalent to the LPAR name in your existing Power VM environment. If you want to
create multiple VSI instances with the same parameters, select the number you want to
create.

Additional options available for selection are:

򐂰 Add to a server placement group.
Server placement groups provide you control over the host or server on which a new
virtual machine (VM) is placed. By using server placement groups, you can build high
availability within a data center. You can apply an affinity or anti-affinity policy to each VM
within a server placement group. After you create a placement group, you can provision a
new VM in the placement group. When you set a placement group with an affinity policy,
all VMs in that placement group are provisioned on the same server. When you set a
placement group with an anti-affinity policy, all VMs in that placement group are
provisioned on different servers. More information can be found in Managing server
placement groups. When the check box is checked, a selection panel drops down to select
the server placement group.
򐂰 Add to a shared processor pool.
Shared processor pools within an IBM PowerVM environment allow more efficient sharing
of processor cores across multiple LPARs. This can provide better efficiency and reduce
software licensing charges. For more information see Managing the shared processor
pool. When the check box is checked, a selection panel drops down to select the shared
processor pool.
򐂰 Virtual server pinning
VM pinning allows you to control the movement of VMs during disasters and other restart
events. Hard pinning is recommended for applications with serial number-based licenses.
You can choose a pinning policy: soft pin or hard pin, to pin a VM to the host where it is
running. When you soft pin a VM for high availability, PowerVC automatically migrates the
VM to the original host. The PowerVC is migrated when the host is back to its operating
state. When you hard pin a VM, the movement of the VM is restricted if the VM has a
licensing restriction with the host. The VM movement is restricted during remote restart,
automated remote restart, DRO, and live partition migration. The default pinning policy is
none.
򐂰 Select SSH key
Select an SSH key to use to access the VSI after provisioning. For more details see
Generating and using an SSH key.

When you are finished with this section, press Continue. You can come back and make
changes by selecting Edit in the upper right corner of the General tab. Figure 5-5 on
page 119 is an example of the next screen displayed. This screen allows you to enter
information about the operating system to be run in the VSI.

118 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Figure 5-5 Boot image selection screen

In this example we have selected IBM i as the operating system. Other available options are:
AIX, and Linux.

There are also options to provide your own license for Linux implementations. If you bring
your own image, you must obtain the subscription for Linux directly from the vendor. After you
deploy your Linux VM, you must log in to the VM and register it with the Linux vendor's
satellite server. To reach the Linux vendor satellite servers (where you can register and obtain
packages and fixes), you must attach a public network to your VM. To learn more about the
registration process, see Registering and subscribing to SLES or Registering and subscribing
to RHEL.

Once you have selected your operating system, you must select an image. You need to
choose from a range of IBM supplied options, or if you chose to bring your own license, an
image with a BYOL suffix.

There are additional options to choose to help customize your installation depending on the
operating system.

Figure 5-6 shows the Boot image section filled in for our IBM i example.

Figure 5-6 Boot image selection screen with entries

Chapter 5. Setup and operation examples for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 119
 After selecting your image, you are then provided options for the storage tier that will be
provisioned for your boot volume. The storage tier options were discussed in “Storage tiers”
on page 55. For each operating system, there may be additional selections, for example in
our IBM i instance, we can add additional IBM product licenses.

At the bottom of the screen, as shown in Figure 5-7 are some advanced configuration options
that can be selected.

Figure 5-7 Additional configuration options

The Specify cloud init user data allows you to specify a script to be run at initialization to
further customize your image. The Boot volume replication allows you to set up replication of
your boot image for high availability.

Pressing Continue takes you to the next section where you define the hardware profile of
your virtual server. This is shown in Figure 5-8.

Figure 5-8 Machine profile selection screen

120 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

For most operating systems, you are free to customize your machine configuration as
needed.

Hitting Continue takes you to the next section where you define storage for your instance.
This is shown in Figure 5-9. If you do not want to define the storage configuration at this time,
you can come back later and add the appropriate storage resources to the virtual server.

Figure 5-9 Define storage for virtual server

The last section allows you to define the network resources that are available to your virtual
server. This is shown in Figure 5-10. Just like the storage configuration, you can initially turn
on the Public networks option and then later come back to add additional network interfaces
as needed.

Figure 5-10 Define networking for your virtual server\

Chapter 5. Setup and operation examples for Power Virtual Server Private Cloud 121
 If you would like to make any changes before initiating the provisioning of the virtual server
you can select Edit on any of the sections. Once the virtual server instance is defined, you
can select Create in the lower right corner. The screen also provides you a pricing summary
for the virtual server as it is configured. It may take several minutes for the instance to be
provisioned.

122 Power Virtual Server Private Cloud

Related publications

The publications listed in this section are considered particularly suitable for a more detailed
discussion of the topics covered in this paper.

IBM Redbooks
The following IBM Redbooks publications provide additional information about the topic in this
document. Note that some publications referenced in this list might be available in softcopy
only.
򐂰 IBM Power Systems Virtual Server Guide for IBM i, SG24-8513
򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server Guide for IBM AIX and Linux, SG24-8512
򐂰 IBM Power Systems Cloud Security Guide: Protect IT Infrastructure In All Layers,
REDP-5659
򐂰 SAP HANA on IBM Power Systems Virtual Servers: Hybrid Cloud Solution, REDP-5693
򐂰 IBM Power Systems Private Cloud with Shared Utility Capacity: Featuring Power
Enterprise Pools 2.0, SG24-8478
򐂰 IBM Power E1080 Technical Overview and Introduction, REDP-5649
򐂰 IBM Power E1050 IBM Power E1050 Technical Overview and Introduction, REDP-5684
򐂰 IBM Power 10 Scale Out Servers Technical Overview S1012, S1014, S1022s, S1022 and
S1024, REDP-5675
򐂰 IBM Storage FlashSystem 9500 Product Guide: Updated for IBM Storage Virtualize 8.7,
REDP-5742
򐂰 IBM Storage FlashSystem 5200 Product Guide for IBM Storage Virtualize 8.6,
REDP-5617

You can search for, view, download or order these documents and other Redbooks,
Redpapers, Web Docs, draft and additional materials, at the following website:
ibm.com/redbooks

Online resources
These websites are also relevant as further information sources:
򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud: Solution overview
https://www.ibm.com/downloads/cas/NNP2JPDA
򐂰 IBM Power Virtual Server Private Cloud: Security overview
https://www.ibm.com/downloads/cas/6RP3MPL9

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2025. 123

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