I had been wondering this lately, and so have been asking people: who are IBM's software customers? My company sells into a wide range of Global 2000 companies, but we almost never bump into IBM databases or application servers (or hardware, for that matter). I can count the number of times on two hands, yet we often run into Oracle, Microsoft, BEA Weblogic, even Sybase. Rarely IBM.
IBM is doing a ton of revenue in software sales. But to whom does it sell its software?
I asked an analyst friend, and she had the same question (and had heard the same thing from other vendors). I asked a friend at a large competitor of IBM's, and she suggested that IBM's software business is mostly mainframe-based (where we would not compete).
What do you think? Do you see customers using IBM's software with your solution? Please let me know. I'm genuinely curious (and continue to be very surprised).
Savio?