DATAMAT and Grid: a (hopefully!) long-lasting marriage Stefano Beco Grid R&D Group Manager EGEE Industry Forum – 2 nd EGEE Conference Den Haag, Nov 23, 2004

2 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 DATAMAT Profile and Mission A top player in Italian ICT market with 30+ years experience: ~1,600 young and highly qualified employees at March 31, M€ Sales, 23.5 M€ EBITDA (FY2003) Supply ICT solutions for end users in specific segments of our vertical reference markets: Bank, Insurance and Finance; Public Administration and Healthcare; Telecommunications and Utilities; Defence, Space & Environment; Industry. through the delivery of: products, systems and integrated services based on specific functional and/or context requirements Leveraging on: Strong application expertise (knowledge of client primary processes) Strong technical and technological competencies (“state-of-the-art”) Management and organizational capabilities in managing complex and high economic value contractual responsibilities

3 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 One of our key success factor: continuous R&D investments More than 32,000 hours dedicated to R&D in 1Q04 (125,000 in 2003), approximately 5% of total hours Development Continuous launch of new products and upgrades Only a small part of development costs are capitalised, €2.1m in FY03 Capitalized costs (net of amortization) for €1.9m in balance sheet at Research Continuous participation with leadership roles in national and international research projects financed by public and private bodies (European Commission, NATO, Ministry of Scientific and Technologic Research, Ministry of Defence) Return in term of revenues and grants for €3.7m in FY03 Strong combination of technological and process expertise

4 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 Why DATAMAT in Grid? Our traditional focus is on innovation, with a long record of international R&D projects followed by successful commercial exploitation. We perceived Grid as one of the most promising novelties for the ICT market, representing a fundamental gap in how computing is intended. To acquire a specific knowledge of the technology, to understand its potential business return in terms of application and services deployment, also by applying technology transfer across our reference markets, we decided to participate in 2000 in the first large Grid Project in Europe … … and in the following years to other European outstanding initiatives:

5 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 Which way forward? DATAMAT is expecting a significant exploitation potential in the B2B market for: distributed supercomputing applications mainly in the research field (public and private) collaborative applications dealing with distributed instruments and resources for the human community in fields such as medical, environmental, media, transport, industrial design (e.g. aerospace) on-demand applications mainly targeted to meet peak needs in terms of computational resources (e.g. in the financial sector)

6 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 Which perspectives on Grid Business? DATAMAT looks forward to three potentially inclusive business models: Provide expertise to end-users to grid-enable their applications (Grid Consultancy) Develop grid-enabled applications, also providing access to needed infrastructure and services to exploit them (Grid Application Service Provider) Provide Grid services to end-users (Grid Service Provider)

7 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 Which are the risks? Two are the main risks perceived today that would make the above perspectives not achievable on a short time scale: the technology, the related standards and its available implementations are not yet mature enough to have a kind of “grid-out-of-the-box” to be easily demonstrated to potential industrial customer the market itself is not mature enough, or better not yet ready to endorse Grid-based solutions

8 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 How to achieve these objectives mitigating the risks? DATAMAT position, from an industrial viewpoint, is that it is now important to foster new initiatives more focused to achieve stability and continuity, the two main factors to actually bridge research and industry for a possible commercial exploitation of the Grid. This can be achieved undertaking and securing initiatives at all levels (National, European, Global) in terms of: Infrastructure deployment Middleware standardisation Application development.

9 EGEE Industry Forum – Den Haag, 23/11/2004 Conclusions Initial expectations on Grid are going to be fulfilled, that’s why industrial solution providers are deciding to invest on it: DATAMAT “love at first sight” is becoming rewarding… Initial enthusiasm is now being replaced by consciousness of the actual potential and risks, in terms of business and ROI: an “aware marriage” From an industrial viewpoint, to make profit out of technology, it is fundamental to achieve the needed stability and continuity, focusing new initiatives on bridging research and industry for a commercial exploitation of Grid: “don’t let the love end!” DATAMAT, while confirming its commitment in on-going and future innovation activities, believes that Grid community should push stakeholders to: Put in action a long-living global Grid infrastructures deployment plan Promote the set-up and federation of national / continental Open Middleware Initiative Institutes Ensure the support to the technological convergence of middleware on Grid for business Widen Grid culture diffusion to favour technology uptake and improve its integration capability for a new generation of Grid enabled applications.