Platform Computing is aiming to help financial analysts with the latest version of its grid software, Symphony 3.

The Toronto company's software enables users to decouple their applications from their hardware environments. Symphony runs on Platform EGO (Enterprise Grid Orchestrator), which enables users to virtualize their hardware and share all the IT resources for applications.

The result is a more flexible and dynamic computing environment that can automatically shift resources to the applications.

"It boils down to, 'How fast can you execute?'" said Reena Davis, product marketing manager at Platform. "It boils down to, 'Can you do it faster than your competition?'"

With Symphony 3, introduced June 20, businesses can run multiple applications across the grid and upgrade one application without affecting others.

In addition, Platform is rolling out Symphony Developer Edition, which is designed to help software makers create applications for grids and SOA (service-oriented architecture) environments.

The developer edition makes it easier to interface with Symphony APIs, as it enables developers to build and test applications on systems independent of the underlying grid.

"You can quickly grid-enable applications without a lot of IT involvement," Davis said.

The result is that businesses can get their applications onto the grid faster by building them for grid computing rather than having to grid-enable them afterward.

This article was originally published on eWEEK.com.