SAP inaugurates business grid SAP research centre in Belfast

It’s the first of its kind in Northern Ireland, and is part of SAP’s global technology research division, working on emerging technologies with leading international universities and partners. Specifically, it will offer advanced research community for business grid computing in Europe – sharing computing power and data storage capacity over the Internet. It is already working with the University of Ulster and Queen’s University in this area. Speaking at the inauguration in Queen’s University, which was attended by guests from industry, academia and government, Prof Dr Lutz Heuser, vice president of SAP Research, said: “The joint work aims at strengthening SAP’s leadership by conducting applied technology research and by exploring research results from academia in an industrial context at an early stage. The Centre’s location in Northern Ireland assures SAP of access to the most advanced research community with respect to grid computing in Europe.” “Grid Computing, particularly in the form of business grids, continues to evolve from a niche technology associated with scientific and technical computing, into a business-innovating technology that is driving increased commercial adoption,” added Dr Wolfgang Gerteis, director of the SAP Research CEC Belfast. “Grid deployments optimise the resiliency of the IT infrastructure, improve productivity and collaboration, and accelerate application performance. Business Grids are anticipated to become the ICT backbone of the future for enterprise solutions, and the hosting infrastructure to provide enterprise solutions to small and medium sized enterprises.” SAP’s first significant results with business grids have been achieved with HP Labs in Bristol. Both parties jointly developed an initial model for an adaptive SAP service utility.