ARMONK, NY: IBM has announced it plans to acquire Transitive Corporation, a privately held technology company headquartered in Los Gatos, California, with a research and development team in Manchester, United Kingdom.

Transitive is a leader in cross-platform virtualization and a pioneer in developing technologies that allow applications written for one type of microprocessor and operating system to run on multiple platforms -- with little or no modification.

As a result, the technology will enable customers to consolidate their Linux-based applications onto the IBM systems that make the most sense for their business needs.

Transitive technology is currently included as part of the IBM PowerVM software designed to help customers consolidate their x86 Linux workloads onto IBM Systems.

IBM is seeing a growing trend of customers migrating from under-utilized servers to IBM Systems, including onto mainframe and Power Systems. The company is committed to developing additional tools and solutions to make migrations even easier, while minimizing the risk and increasing the financial returns for clients as they consolidate and virtualize to achieve significant business benefit.