IBM has already announced a 500-700 million dollar charge for 2019 layoffs. IBM pay third world vs first world tends to run at 25 cents on the dollar. Using first world numbers of 10,000 heads per billion, we extrapolate down into a lay-off of approx 20-28k. We can back into the number another way. It’s an industry standard to adjust head count to revenue. IBM’s 1st q revenue went down approx 5% over the corporation, with services going down 7%. Backing into a number says 5% worldwide head count cut, or 7% head count cut in services. So 350k x .05 = 17.5k to 24.5k if we use the 7% number. So expect restructuring somewhere in that range.
If IBM wanted to get ahead of that number instead of constantly chasing constantly declining revenues, they may error closer to the 7% number. Either way IBM’s long term goal is to trim to 225-250k as that is where their historical optimum employee head count vs revenue has always run.
There are large parts of IBM who’s business plan has run its course, and IBM doesn’t value anymore. The market has matured and moved on, and IBM is doing the same