IBM and Computer Sciences Corp. (CSC) are to expand an existing partnership by making the former’s mainframe capabilities and cloud infrastructure available to CSC and its customers.

The deal will see IBM deliver its Cloud Managed Services offering for its z Systems mainframe platform – called IBM Cloud for z – to CSC’s customers. Under the new agreement, IBM will be responsible for providing the cloud infrastructure, hardware, software and services to CSC’s customers, helping them to take advantage of the cloud with reduced startup costs.

The expanded partnership further advances CSC’s vision of a “Service-Enabled Enterprise”, while IBM gets to sell its “as-a-Service” strategy to more customers. Both strategies are designed to bolster innovation in, and adoption of new emerging technologies while increasing client’s choices. The as-a-service strategy allows customers to take advantage of IBM’s z Systems environment on a pay-as-you-go model, affording them much greater flexibility, the companies said.

IBM and CSC sealed a deal earlier this year to make the IBM Cloud available to CSC customers via the latter’s next-generation IT services. The idea behind that partnership was to help enterprises accelerate their transitoon to the cloud, and is a big part of IBM’s strategy to tap systems integrators to help expand the reach of the IBM Cloud platform. The initiative included the modernization and development of key applications that support mobile, analytics and cognitive intelligence across hybrid cloud deployments.

The integration of CSC’s Agility Platform with IBM’s cloud enables clients across multiple industries, including healthcare, finance and insurance customers, to leverage the benefits of the hybrid cloud and deploy thousands of applications to deliver greater value.

Today’s expanded partnership is a much bigger deal than the original agreement between the two IT vendors, said Pund-IT analyst Charles King in an interview with eWeek. According to him, the last deal simply allowed CSC’s customers to use IBM Cloud assets, but today’s deal will be a lot more appealing to mainframe users that wish to develop hybrid cloud usage models. In addition, businesses that don’t have mainframe experience can also enjoy flexible and affordable access to what King called IBM’s “preeminent” enterprise computing platform.

“The end result should increase satisfaction among existing mainframe clients and open the door to new client engagements,” King said. “Those points are certainly positive for IBM and the mainframe but they will also be beneficial to CSC’s business customers.”

IBM’s mainframe could certainly do with a boost. In the company’s most recent financial quarter, it revealed revenues for its z Systems mainframe were down by almost 40 percent year-on-year.

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