Which divisions do you think will be impacted by the next RA in 2021? GTS will probably see most of the layoffs, but not all of them.
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I see IBM commercials on TV and they make no sense. IBM is purely B2B but they run ads to consumers about products they don't understand, need, or want. Total waste.
IBM has to reform itself Bob has seen what to do, but will AK? If IBM is to save itself it has to quit viewing the world as to how great it was, and transform into something focused, profitable, and efficient. That means a VERY large shrink. The outcome is already determined Shrink and live, or stay the same and shrink by getting broke apart. Either way AK you need to shrink You are out of time
https://cloudwars.co/ibm/why-does-ibm-have-4-huge-zero-growth-businesses-in-todays-market/
“AOL guy” is Bob Lord. He’s another useless one that has done nothing except let VPs of engineering blow a ton of money on sub par SWEs to create tools for digital sales and marketing that are amateur at best.
Not exactly true about Peluso comments. Unfortunately she did much more than just television ads or corporate "image".
She actually ran entire programs that were suppose to help drive new revenues but did not. And she was the head of "Digital Sales" after the other guy whom worked at Aol.com and ran another website with no real industry experience.
Don't get it why someone without any industry experiencesuppose to be Marketing head also be in charge of "Sales"? Not even a small mom and pop business would do that.
AK doesn’t care about the brands. He cares about the revenue/profit. The 4th q earnings call made that abundantly apparent. IBM only chatted about Mainframe and it’s product cycle. Power and Storage were not even mentioned. SW was mentioned, but only as it related to Redhat
"Good. Marketing is an abject failure."
yea, but it was a "revolution in cancer care" according to the Watson Health marketing team.
@2gve+195Y0gy4 Arvind has caught on to the waste within the “brands” like these internal marketing teams.
I think they're talking about the fact that IBM has turned more into a marketing machine and is focused on selling p–p, than about getting rid of the p–p and producing something good that gets IBM on the radar for consideration for companies/technologies to use. If it's actually something good, they don't have to market so hard.
Clearly you're getting Marketing and MARKETING confused.
There is corporate marketing. You know, the one in Armonk formally run by Peluso. She was responsible for the inane IBM corporate image. The type of ad's you see in WSJ, or during the Masters. That type of thing.
The "other" marketing is in the brands. In reality they have very little budget and certainly don't get to work on large image building campaigns.
So when you say "good" they're being laid-off (if they are), remember these are fellow IBMers who again, like so many others, will lose their livelihood.
Shame on you for wishing this on others.
Good, glad they’re cutting the fat in overhead teams like marketing. They should be engaging a real ad agency to triage IBM’s horribly tarnished image. My clients tell me daily they don’t even know what IBM is trying to be. That’s pathetic, disgusting, and sad.
Good. Marketing is an abject failure.
Peluso helped further IBM from a technology company to a marketing co. Hopefully AK changes it back to tech. co.
Marketing for sure. They are on the chopping block this week.
Mhl The numbers till work even factoring in Europe/Canada work rules. One thing to keep your eye on is the overfunding of the pension plans and their continued growth. IBM will not let those pots of money sit for long. The exec’s did not anticipate the transaction processing portion of the business turning down as hard as it did. That will be addressed in 1st q
@tpg+195Y0gy4 - thanks for the historical perspective and analysis. One thing I'd like to add, though... Today's sh—y severance packages you refer to applies mostly to U.S., where employees are considered "at will". Countries like Germany, Canada, etc have labor laws to protect its workers from scumbag employers like IBM. While severance packages in these countries are not as good as they were in the Gerstner era, they are certainly better than "90 days pay regardless of service".
"Cognitive is reducing headcount as the Redhat offerings replace legacy IBM offerings"
Give me the names of IBM products that Red Hat can really replaced?
"restructuring". That sure is a nice euphemism for severance pay.
GTS has to get down to approx 90k head count. NOTE not all of GTS will get impacted as GTS does approx 26 billion today, but IBM has said Newco will have revenue of approx 19 billion.
GBS has to downsize for the partnerships that are making folks redundant This I believe is fairly substantial. In addition IBM is withdrawing from some non-strategic markets
Cognitive is reducing headcount as the Redhat offerings replace legacy IBM offerings
Systems have abandoned almost all investment in Power, some investment in storage, and most investment in sales/marketing in the channel.
Starting in Jan of 2020, IBM had to downsize approx by 75-100k heads to become competitive vs all of their competitors. When Gerstner came on board, he took a 8.9 billion charge and reduced headcount by 60k (35k layoffs, and 25k retirements) Almost all 1st world employees. NOTE in those days your parting gifts were 2 weeks pay for every year served min of 8 weeks, and max of 52. Almost all of the retired folks and 1/2 of the 35k got 52 weeks. In addition 1 year of medical, and 2500 for retraining. Today’s parting gifts are 90 days pay, and 6 months - 1 year of medical. Estimating less than 100% of headcounts impacted are 1st world, and a 1.5-2x of salary today vs then, and only a 90 day payment today vs then, you net a higher yield of layoffs per billion spent today vs then. Since 8.9 billion then got you 60k, 8.5 billion today most likely nets you close to the 75k - 100k number needed. Again all speculation, but the numbers seem to add up on a rough basis.