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IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

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Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#21

Post by sjm-lbm »

tssva wrote: post #11
bluedevil2k wrote: post #4

It’ll be interesting to see where the new CEO takes IBM and what his strategy is to make IBM relevant again. The last decade has been stagnant (if you’re being nice) and abysmal (if you’re being honest) for IBM, missing out on all the forecasted tech growth categories. Cloud services, they’re never even in the discussion. Mobile - forget it. AI...maybe. They need to find a niche they can excel in, 1 least, in order t…

I'm not going to argue that IBM is currently healthy and performing as they should but they did have over $22 billion in cloud revenue for 2019 so they are evidently in the discussion somewhere.

They have a single-digit share of the market, though (lots of sources say that, but here's one: https://www.canalys.com/newsroom/cloud-market-share-q4-2018-... ).

As someone who was using them until recently, I think that they really bungled the Softlayer acquisition. They didn't invest in their product offerings for years while AWS pulled ahead - and while they have been investing pretty heavily more recently, they are so far behind it's a little sad.

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#22

Post by krn »

Another Indian-born tech CEO? It's incredible. IBM joins Microsoft, Google, Adobe, Nokia, and Harman in this regard. Also, MasterCard and PepsiCo (until 2018). I wonder how much it's a cultural thing.

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#23

Post by rurp »

H8crilA wrote: post #14
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #8

From the CNBC article covering this: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/30/ibm-ceo-ginni-rometty-steps-... >In a release, Rometty described Krishna as a “brilliant technologist who has played a significant role in developing our key technologies such as artificial intelligence, cloud, quantum computing and blockchain” Sounds like IBM's strategy is going all in on buzzwords.

IBM is a consulting company that tries to sell some of their cloud to their clients and some of their buzzwords to their investors. Normal silicon valley stuff, except that IBM manages to show up with some positive cash flow at the end of the day, unlike modern VC darlings.

> except that IBM manages to show up with some positive cash flow at the end of the day, unlike modern VC darlings

Comparing IBM to a VC funded startup doesn't make any sense to me. Big old tech companies (like IBM) in Silicon Valley mostly do turn a profit, some quite a bit more than IBM.

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#24

Post by Androider »

cpitman wrote: post #5

So, not working with any insider knowledge (I work for Red Hat, but reading the news like everyone else), but the other news is that Jim Whitehurst is going to be the IBM President. Hopefully a big push in keeping Red Hat's culture relevant and influencing IBM to transform.

I remember thinking when the RH deal was first announced, IBM should pull a NeXT/Apple and just let the Red Hat executives take over the new company.

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#26

Post by bonzini »

Lutzb wrote: post #7

My bet was on Jim Whitehurst.

That was surely most Red Hatters' dream, but Arvind Krishna as CEO is probably the best possible outcome for Red Hat among the realistic ones (not counting that Whitehurst will be President, while Ginny Rometty was President and CEO).

Arvind Krishna was "Jim Whitehurst's boss" until now (Red Hat is under the IBM cloud division), and back when the acquisition was announced in 2018 he visited one of the Red Hat offices for a sort of "town hall" meeting. He almost unanimously made a very good impression, and he won over quite a few employees that at the time were skeptical about the acquisition.

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#27

Post by [deleted] »

cpitman wrote: post #5

So, not working with any insider knowledge (I work for Red Hat, but reading the news like everyone else), but the other news is that Jim Whitehurst is going to be the IBM President. Hopefully a big push in keeping Red Hat's culture relevant and influencing IBM to transform.

[deleted]

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#29

Post by pmart123 »

tssva wrote: post #11
bluedevil2k wrote: post #4

It’ll be interesting to see where the new CEO takes IBM and what his strategy is to make IBM relevant again. The last decade has been stagnant (if you’re being nice) and abysmal (if you’re being honest) for IBM, missing out on all the forecasted tech growth categories. Cloud services, they’re never even in the discussion. Mobile - forget it. AI...maybe. They need to find a niche they can excel in, 1 least, in order t…

I'm not going to argue that IBM is currently healthy and performing as they should but they did have over $22 billion in cloud revenue for 2019 so they are evidently in the discussion somewhere.

They are moving whatever they can to count as cloud and bought RedHat to continue to “grow” cloud as they probably ran out of things to move.

Re: IBM Names Arvind Krishna CEO

#30

Post by H8crilA »

rurp wrote: post #23
H8crilA wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IBM is a consulting company that tries to sell some of their cloud to their clients and some of their buzzwords to their investors. Normal silicon valley stuff, except that IBM manages to show up with some positive cash flow at the end of the day, unlike modern VC darlings.

> except that IBM manages to show up with some positive cash flow at the end of the day, unlike modern VC darlings Comparing IBM to a VC funded startup doesn't make any sense to me. Big old tech companies (like IBM) in Silicon Valley mostly do turn a profit, some quite a bit more than IBM.

True. A fun fact: most also turned profit pre-IPO. Look up old S-1's.

I was just joking about the buzzword mumbo jumbo. I want someone to take me for an AI ride in a self driving cloud. I already had so many social network and Uber-for-X rides, those days were cool.

Does your mom do fintech, too? That's sooo cool!

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