
IBM Wants to Make Mainframes Next Platform for Machine Learning - jonbaer
https://www.nextplatform.com/2017/02/15/ibm-wants-make-mainframes-next-platform-machine-learning/
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tbrowbdidnso
I'll file this under "never going to happen".

IBM seems increasingly a flailing giant in its death throes. They produce
"products" you can't buy without millions like Watson where their competitors
are putting machine learning into APIs I can call for fractions of a cent.

Their MO seems to have become all hype and no substance. A company that once
sold innovatives products now sells itself in the form of consulting services
because they can't figure out how to make products people will buy anymore.

The internet runs rampant with stories of former IBMers leaving in droves,
replaced by cheap outsourced labor. The magic smoke has left IBM.

The only good thing they sell that I'm aware of is softlayer. They should spin
that off before it's consumed in IBM's race to the bottom... They should sell
their naming rights to Accenture and get it overwith.

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mrep
> IBM seems increasingly a flailing giant in its death throes.

IBM made almost 12 Billion dollars in net income in 2016 [1]. That's far from
being on death row.

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM)

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slededit
IBM peaked in 2012 and has had declining profits since then. Death throes is
perhaps an exaggeration, but even IBM uses the term "turn around" when talking
to investors.

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shepardrtc
While I don't think mainframes will bring anything to the table that hasn't
been seen before, there are many companies that like the guaranteed
performance and upfront cost that mainframes provide. One thing that I didn't
really understand until recently is that you're not buying hardware, you're
buying very specific SLA for whatever software you're running.

