InternetThe Mainframe Still Lives

If cats have nine lives, the mainframe beats them out handily.

Listen up, boys and girls, the mainframe is not dead; in fact, it's very much alive. Every few years, people predict that the mainframe is on its last legs and will be taken over by the technology du jour. That replacement technology has ranged over the years from client-server computing to Web-based computing, and, now, it's cheap, commodity x86-based servers. Don't believe a word of it -- mainframe sales have begun climbing again. IDC analyst Steve Josselyn told InternetNews.comthat he expects IBM's worldwide mainframe revenues to grow four percent this year. That doesn't sound like much until you realize Big Blue reaped $4.6 billion from mainframe sales worldwide last year. Admittedly, that was somewhat shy of the $5.2 billion IBM chalked up for 2006, but that was because, first, the z10 was rolled out only in early 2008, 24 months after the previous mainframe product instead of the 12 to 18 months IBM normally takes. RELATED ARTICLES Will IBM's z10 Bring Big Iron Back in Vogue? As Energy Costs Rise, IBM Revamps Mainframe Buy a Mainframe, Save Energy? The Mainframe is No Dodo Bird For more stories on this topic: Savvy customers who could hang on instead of upgrading sent IBM mainframe sales falling in the second half of 2007 because they decided to wait until the new product was released, Josselyn said. "Nobody wants to buy at the end of a product cycle and have the residual value tank when the new... [ Read more on www.internetnews.com ]

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