Big market eyed for ‘Itanium systems’

Some of the world’s leading computer technology companies are eyeing a multibillion-dollar opportunity for Itanium-based systems in the high-end computing market where servers range in price from as low as $25,000 to as high as $500,000.

According to Intel Phils. country manager Ricky Banaag, some of the target application systems for the just-launched Itanium 2 processor developed by Intel include those involving large databases such as business intelligence, security transaction, enterprise resource planning, supply chain management, high-performance computing, and computer-intensive, customized applications.

For his part, Hewlett-Packard Phils. managing director Nilo Cruz said in the future, more and more enterprise computing will use pervasive technology based on Itanium.

The revolutionary Intel Itanium processor family architecture was co-developed by Intel and HP to meet today’s computing that requires high performance.

Computer chipmaker Intel recently offered the Itanium 2 processor (3 MB, 0.18 micron), a year after it launched its first-generation Itanium processor (4MB cache, 0.18 micron). This early, Intel announced that by next year, it will offer the Madison/Deerfield processor (6 MB/3 MB, 0.13 micron) and by 2004, the Montecito which will be the industry’s first at 90 nanometers or 0.01 micron wafer technology.

Banaag said the Itanium 2 processor is estimated to deliver 1.5 to 2 times the performance of the previous generation.

This week, HP, which merged with Compaq Computer Corp. last May 3, announced the immediate availability of its high-performance technical computing servers and workstations based on the Intel Itanium 2 processor, the second generation of the Intel Itanium processor family.