The best and brightest of Ibm Power are moving to Ibm south which is fast growing awesome company
Others try but are getting denied by Ibm south due to lack of skills
The remaining are either trying to find a job somewhere else, waiting to retire or have so few skills lost and not sure what to do
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Your 20 billion in 5 years is most likely way too pessimistic. The better estimate given a pandemic (think what else could go wrong) year is 48 billion. ( 16.2 cognitive, 25.8 GBS, 3 systems, and 3 TSS). The above makes the assumption that cognitive continues to grow 2%, GBS stays flat, IBM moves Z (which grew 1%) and Z’z TSS parts into Hybrid IBM. That means Power (-23% for all of 2020), and storage ( -7% for all of 2020) go. It also assumes cognitive fixes TPP and GBS fixes application modernization (both being quasi joined at the hip) That’s seems to be a reasonable assumption. NOTE IBM will go to 2 divisions With Cognitive and GBS absorbing Systems Z workload, and IBM spinning off GTS. That should also promote some efficiency. IBM’s biggest problem right now is complacency. The marketplace is transitioning at warp speed due to innovation, and IBM is standing on the corner watching the parade with no sense of urgency. This is the old joke about IBM on their wedding night sitting on the end of the bed telling their bride “how great it’s going to be”
In 5 years from now IBM will be a $20B company.
Where do you think Systems fits into this model of IBM? I would say they are under performing
https://www.fool.com/investing/2021/03/04/where-will-ibm-be-in-5-years/
No one is interested in buying power, don't you get it?
Startups can make Arm based server chips from ground up faster than 1 iteration of power. Qcom already bought one such company, look it up.
What can hr do? Leadership has to shut it down but then how would they get paid huge bonuses?
Obviously people are looking to leave power because march end is always a bloodbath.
If you're working for power in Austin it means you got no marketable skills, you don't mind being retired if it goes south, you're the chosen one (still no skills though) or all of above.
Power10 will be so buggy, I'd be surprised if it runs lol
If someone knows something about what is going on seriously please share. IBM just lost some additional critical skills just before the next power10 bringup, other critical skills are aggressively looking for jobs, it’s blowing up fast unless something happens to fix this issue. Austin has so many options better then Ibm and critical young skills are working to land jobs. I hope hr is looking at this so they know how bad it is. IBM either needs to spend money to keep talent, sell off power or shut it down.
It seems like people in power are sleep walking thru p10 waiting for the big shoe to drop, every year for the last six years power has had layoffs and with the big changes at ibm taking place everyone is expecting something big and ugly. The only reason to keep power is to help with the chip development of Z chips where power is a test vehicle for Z silicon. Power development is primarily in Austin, a red hot tech market, no idea why anybody in Power Austin Is not actively looking. I guess the older crowd which is a large part of the chip designers are hanging around to retire vs trying to start over. The younger ones might just see power as a place to learn some chip design skills and then jump which is common in that age group. No idea why anyone in their 30s and 40s would stay since power will be gone before they hit 50, unless they can not find a job outside Ibm due to lack of skills.
IBM a will look for private equity money, and cut a deal for at least Power and Storage. The private equity company will then pursue non-IBM customers (Cisco, Lenovo, and HPE)
https://seekingalpha.com/news/3666517-blank-check-companies-sets-eyes-on-corporate-spinouts-or-vice-versa
Either way this is a three for for IBM Raises revenue, cuts headcount, and farms Legacy IP.
Unfortunately system has no future. POWER10 is not going to compete with AMD/Intel. Mainframe is milking the last customers and storage does not have a cohesive line of products
I would be surprised if systems survives 2021 as they currently look. Systems is a boom and bust 36 month sales cycle mostly centered around mainframe. Power and storage are good products, but there is way too much competition for them to remain standing. Power hasn’t posted a growing quarter in the last 2 years (they average 20-25% negative growth). Storage has posted up and down growth, but they have averaged -10% over the last two years. There is just not enough innovation coming from those two product lines to support their continued investment vs just farming the IP and selling them off. If they did that, you can value those products at 70-90% of one years sales. (approx 3 billion) That’s all in, BUT IBM may decide to keep parts of them
@auc -
I've also been reading tech articles about how all the smartest engineers have now become
bygones. As a result, companies are struggling to maintain it's current products, let alone it's
innovations.
Any links you can share?
Good point, The ones that stay are usually the senior fellows who don't have much time left. If you have a lot of gas left in the tank then you should be high tailing it out of IBM. I will say that I've noticed IBM's products for the last 5 years or so have been very bad. I'm talking from a strictly hardware and software engineering standpoint. The bugs, glitches and awful designs are just astronomical compared to the stuff released only 10 years ago. I've also been reading tech articles about how all the smartest engineers have now become bygones. As a result, companies are struggling to maintain it's current products, let alone it's innovations. Maybe there's something to this?
Generally speaking, systems storage makes some good product,, albeit overly complex. Poor marketing over the years alongside late to market and poor sales management & direction (compare to EMC, Pure, NetApp), has allowed IBM storage products to flounder in no mans land - it is neither the best, nor the worst. It's a lost puppy looking for a new home.
There are some loyal troupers in the division, that won't let go. Unfortunately IBM doesn't care so much nowadays about individual loyalty, and ironically that blind loyalty to IBM is detrimental when looking for another job. 7+ years at IBM on a resume leads to being asked why you stayed so long!
"no offense but any people with any sort of skills in systems are leaving IBM"
I would say "should be leaving". For some reason I see a lot staying, especially those who have been at IBM for a while. Which may be telling in that maybe the skills they have acquired at IBM don't transfer well outside of IBM. Or, as has been discussed before, they are the "chosen ones" and because of their tenure, are being protected by the crony management, may/may not themselves be protected. Which in turn is part of the reason why Systems consistently posts awful numbers every quarter.
no offense but any people with any sort of skills in systems are leaving IBM. IBM is the lowest pay and worst managed company. Why would you want to stay?
In my experience Systems have always been hit in conjunction with the yearly (or now quarterly?) RA - but to varying degrees. Recently Systems have not seen much RA. As to this time around I have no clue. As to Systems currently having the necessary skills locally needed in the marketplace I will say the answer is a definite no - and this applies anywhere in the world. This is certainly true for Mainframe skills, so laying off more Systems people will not really mean anything from that perspective as it can almost not get any worse.
Systems is no longer fiduciary they always chase current quarter closings with little or no interest in clients need. This is very sad and it has not always been so. I have been in this business for 30+ years, so I know.
Maybe Bill McNabb onboarding the IBM board may bring changes to this problem. When he managed Vanguard as CEO he always prioritized the profitability of the CLIENTS!
One can always hope.