GridEcon - A Market Place for Computing Resources

This paper discusses the rationales for a Grid market and, in particular, the introduction of a market place for trading commoditized computing resources. The market place proposed makes computing resources from different providers substitutable through virtualization. This includes the definition of a spot and future market as well as the parameters that a market mechanism for computing resources should consider. The above market place is complemented by a set of value-added services (e.g. insurance against resource failures, capacity planning, resource quality assurance, stable price offering) that ensure quality for Grid users over time. The market place technology for all of the above services has been designed by the GridEcon project, contributing to a broader adoption of Grid technology and enabling a service-oriented knowledge utility environment.This work has been funded by the European Commission within the context of the FP6 Project GridEcon, Grid Economics and Business Models, (FP6-2005-IST5-033634)