In Venezuela, Banco Fondo Comun (BFC), a universal bank offering its customers leading customer service through its more than 170 national branches, signed a five-year agreement with IBM.

As the summer blockbuster movie season enters full swing, IBM (NYSE: IBM) explores the "Future of Movies," a podcast with Yair Landau, former President of Sony Pictures Digital and Saul Berman, Global Strategy Leader for IBM's Media & Entertainment Practice, hosted by Tim Washer.

Virgin Mobile USA, Inc. (NYSE: VM), a leading national provider of prepaid and hybrid wireless plans, signed a services agreement for Information Technology (IT) operations and new applications development with IBM (NYSE: IBM).

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced the deployment of Canada's fastest research supercomputer at the Ontario Cancer Institute, University Health Network. The new system will aid in the search for more effective cancer treatments.

Storebaelt Ltd., the company managing the toll bridge connecting central parts of Denmark, has signed a three year agreement with IBM for IBM to manage Storebaelt's information technology (IT) infrastructure and services.

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced that Microsoft is among the first clients to implement IBM's iDataPlex system -- a new category of server developed by IBM for Internet-scale computing. IBM also introduced today a new high performance computing (HPC) option for iDataPlex, to bring supercomputing power to Cloud environments.

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced the opening of new "cloud computing" centers in South Africa and China. Cloud computing enables the delivery of personal and business services from remote, centralized servers (the "cloud") that share computing resources and bandwidth -- to any device, anywhere.

IBM (NYSE:IBM) today announced an expansion and extension of its current service agreement to manage Manulife Financial's (TSX:MFC)(NYSE:MFC)(PSE:MFC)(SEHK:0945) information technology operations.

Today IBM (NYSE: IBM) and utility based services provider iTricity announced that iTricity will open a brand new Cloud Computing Hosting Center for Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxembourg. Based on IBM "Blue Cloud" technology, iTricity will use the center to host computing services for its customers.

IBM and Umeå University announced today that the most powerful Windows-based computer in Europe is being installed at the supercomputer center known as HPC2N. Scientists at HPC2N will use the powerful system – running on a beta version of Windows HPC Server 2008® – for basic as well as applied research.

Cognos, an IBM company and world leader in business intelligence and performance management solutions, today announced that Hess Corporation has chosen IBM Cognos BI to deliver a full range of business intelligence capabilities across its Marketing and Refining organization.

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced the results of a client survey that concludes that businesses around the world are quickly moving from the adoption phase of a service oriented architecture (SOA) strategy to the actual deployment of SOA technologies and services.