System z Leads IBM First-Quarter 2011 Sales
IBM announced it had a stellar first quarter for this year, and that mainframe systems sales were through the roof.
Overall, IBM's first-quarter net income was up 10% over the year before, up from $2.6 million to $2.9 billion. Total revenue for the first quarter of 2011 of $24.6 billion increased 8% from the first quarter of 2010.
The company also reported that revenue from its systems and technology segment totaled $4 billion for the quarter, up 19% from the same quarter a year ago. Leading the way was revenue from System z mainframe server products, which increased 41% compared with the year-ago period. Total delivery of System z computing power, as measured in MIPS (millions of instructions per second), increased 34%. Revenue from Power Systems increased 19% compared with the 2010 period. Revenue from System x increased 13%. Revenue from System Storage increased 10%, and revenue from Retail Store Solutions increased 18% year over year.
Revenue from IBM's key middleware products, which include WebSphere, Information Management, Tivoli, Lotus and Rational products, was $3.3 billion, an increase of 16% over the first quarter of 2010. WebSphere sales were up 51% from the first quarter a year ago. Information Management software revenue increased 13%. Revenue from Tivoli software increased 8%. Revenue from Lotus software increased 1%, and Rational software increased 5%.
Revenue from the company's business analytics operations across services and software segments increased 20%. Total Global Services revenue increased 6%, and the estimated services backlog at March 31 was $142 billion, up $8 billion year over year at actual rates. Revenue from the software segment was $5.3 billion, an increase of 6%.
"We delivered a strong first quarter with revenue growth across hardware, software and services and with more than 40 countries growing in double digits. We continued to see excellent momentum in our growth initiatives - smarter planet, cloud, business analytics, and growth markets," says Samuel Palmisano, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer.
Information is available at the IBM website.