IBM to purchase Mac's for Employees

IBM to Purchase Up to 200,000 Macs Annually, With 50-75% of Employees Ultimately Switching From Lenovo - Mac Rumors

I find it very interesting that IBM - who was one of the PC originators and first adopter of DOS is moving to Apple computers. The video says about 50%-75% will get them but I wonder how long that will last.

When I was helping my school district integrate computers into our curriculum in the late '80's, I remember the IBM suits telling us they were the future and how they were going to, "roll up their sleeves and help us get started." Right...the PC's were delivered - at $3600 each - and we never saw them again. We had some Apple II's in the elementary, but I am not sure what they cost us.

Anyway, IBM later sold off their PC division and Apple is still thriving in the market. Now IBM is at Apple's door.

Lisa

Saw this yesterday and agree with you Lisa! Quite interesting for sure.

I agree Lisa. When I graduated from high school in the early '80s few of our classrooms had computers. The ones that did were Apple IIs. Although they were not cheap I doubt they were as expensive as the IBM systems.

Gradually we had more and more of the PC clones which was a different nightmare Never thought I'd see IBM buying Macs for employees though. What does that say for Lenovo system? Doesn't engender a lot of confidence does it?

Big Blue sold off their PC division a long time ago. Today's Lenovo in no way resembles the "Thinkpad" that we all came to love. Although for a few years at least the Lenovo version of the Thinkpad was popular. Not any more. And, it doesn't surprise me that IBM is buying Macs given their dislike for anything Microsoft after the big fiasco with OS/2 and Windows 3.0.

chscag said:

... And, it doesn't surprise me that IBM is buying Macs given their dislike for anything Microsoft after the big fiasco with OS/2 and Windows 3.0.

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Yes, but OS/2 and Windows 3.0 was a while back - took them long enough to make the shift. I also found it interesting that IBM wanted a price break from Apple. I wonder if they got it. The article suggests ... maybe?

Lisa

Big Blue and Apple have cooperated over the years, so it's a good bet that they received a nice discount.

I was with IBM when they sold off ThinkPads to Lenovo. At first the quality was pretty good, but the second gen Lenovo's were getting flimsy and had problems. And despite the changes in IT over the past few decades, IBM is still listened to in boardrooms. So it's a win for Apple to have an IBM consultant walk into a fortune 100 company and take out a Mac as his work machine. If Apple does this right, they could make that break thru into the C-suite that they haven't been able to accomplish despite making a quality machine. It's going to be interesting to see how MS responds. I wouldn't be surprised to see them start to abandon OS X like they have before, just to make sure that the tools the C-suite wants (Word, Excel, PP) aren't as good on OS X as under Windows. It could be ugly.

I doubt MS gives Apple the "cold" treatment again. MS Office for the Mac and iOS is too big a cash cow for Microsoft to abandon. Besides, their new CEO (Satya Nadella) is a lot smarter than Steve Ballmer who is now the owner of the L.A. Clippers. (after he paid 2 Billion bucks for them)

@Jake I hope you aren't holding your breath waiting for this to impact perceptions in the boardroom. This is not the first time that something at Apple was supposed to affect decisions in the boardroom but didn't. Here are just a few that come to mind:

1. Shift to Intel architecture.
2. Ability to run Windows natively if necessary
3. Consistently superior Apple customer service rankings, etc.

All those executives in the boardrooms -- have iPads.

Apple is already in enterprise, in a very big way. This is just the cherry on that cake.

Nice fantasy world, there, chas_m. I was a consultant who actually spent lots of time in the C-suite and boardroom and nobody took Apple seriously except for the graphics department. The PC architecture made popular by IBM is the "standard" by which everything else is compared. Hence the challenges Sly mentioned. What's different with this deal is that if the consultants come in carrying laptops by Apple, that will have a perception impact. Maybe Apple can move in better than it has. It all depends on how productive the MBPs are in practice. Companies march to the bottom line, so buying an expensive Apple, no matter how sexy, gets overcome by the cost. What a business has to see (and have proven to it) is that total cost of ownership is lower for Apple than the generic PC. And with the prices of PCs these days, that's a tough sell. Maybe if the CFO can be convinced he can reduce the size of IT support staff (Labor is always the highest expense) for an all Apple shop, the 5-10x increase in initial outlay might be offset.

Other issues will be the support staff's adoption. My job is a combination of IT and video/graphics. When I started integrating Mac's in to my work flow, I had a learning curve that I was willing to accept because I love to try new things. Since I am an independent contractor, I purchase my own computers. While the others in my office acknowledge my Mac's kick booty when it comes to cranking out the work, they are not willing to suffer the initial cost or the learning curve. I can build a new desktop for them for less than $500 that does what they need which means I will never convince them to spend two to three times that for something with a different OS.

Here is an example of what I get. Recently, I was asked to find a new laptop for my boss that has excellent battery life, 13" screen size, light weight, touch screen (perceived to be needed for Windows 10) will last for five or more years, and under $600 (would prefer under $500). A Mac Air is too expensive and she is not sure she could learn OS X. In her defense - and having worked with her for the last 7 years - she is probably right. ;D

One of our secretaries - still uses Printshop to make postcards for mailings and the occasional insert - despite having InDesign and Photoshop with many training sessions provided.

We have an iMac for our audio department. After the initial setup and training I found myself using tough love to get them to figure stuff out that I had already gone over.... and over.

Point is people do not like change and going from a Windows environment to OS X is a big - and expensive - change.

While IBM can probably afford the cost most of the corporate world will still cling to their cheaper options.

Lisa

You've explained what I was thinking better than I did Lisa.

Not only are end users reluctant to make the switch but in some cases the IT department can't be much help because they are not comfortable using / supporting Macs. We've seen numerous posts on the forum where users were given outdated / inaccurate information by either IT departments or salespeople. I'm willing to concede that some of those statements were misunderstood by the user but I don't think all of them are.

chas_m said:

Apple is already in enterprise, in a very big way. This is just the cherry on that cake.

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I doubt that. Having worked in corporate IT, I can safely say that IT departments are pretty hostile to Macs especially when everything under the sun supports Windows (and IT departments aren't really all that keen on wasting time trying to contrive solutions). While I have no problem believing that iPads dominate tablet usage in corporations, that's a small drop in the bucket.

MacInWin said:

It all depends on how productive the MBPs are in practice. Companies march to the bottom line, so buying an expensive Apple, no matter how sexy, gets overcome by the cost.

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These two, and I'd argue a lack of concern over compatibility and support expertise (there are a lot more Windows support options), drive Windows in the enterprise. If Apple is going to make serious in-roads in a corporate environment, it needs a cheap machine that's easy to roll out en masse.

Slydude said:

Not only are end users reluctant to make the switch but in some cases the IT department can't be much help because they are not comfortable using / supporting Macs.

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I've seen this first hand - Windows IT support teams not wanting to waste time learning because time is already precious.

As recently as about 5 years ago I heard an IT guy talking about the excess network "chatter" created by Macs. AFAIK this hasn't been true since the AppleTalk days but he was still spouting this as if it were gospel.

Old habits die hard.

Honestly though, since most networks in corporate environments are built on standards best served by Windows (I'm looking at your Active Directory, Exchange and SMB), why would you not use Windows especially when the machine are so much cheaper and better supported? The one thing that might ease any incorporation of Macs however is what appears to be a shift for many companies to web based services which work, well, everywhere.

I think one of the reasons employees would be reluctant to switch to mac is because they would be that much more productive during the day actually getting work done, instead of trying to figure out what issue the pc has for today and then finally getting some work done, they would be expected to actually finish work every day…. as for people not willing to even try to learn os x… either they are totally brain dead or just don't want to learn how simple and pleasurable a mac is to use.

pitbullrescuer said:

I think one of the reasons employees would be reluctant to switch to mac is because they would be that much more productive during the day actually getting work done, instead of trying to figure out what issue the pc has for today and then finally getting some work done, they would be expected to actually finish work every day…. as for people not willing to even try to learn os x… either they are totally brain dead or just don't want to learn how simple and pleasurable a mac is to use.

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That's a little short sighted if I'm being honest. Many people don't run into any issues with their Windows install and given that most use a very limited subset of features, won't run into issues on a daily basis. As for being "brain dead," that's a huge generalization and relatively inconsiderate given that most people either don't care or are happy with Windows in a corporate environment. Just because you prefer a Mac doesn't mean that everyone has to.

I had issues with windows almost on a daily basis and I only used it for pretty much mild internet and Facebook, plus running weather radar applications when the need arises and almost every day windows would have something it was not happy about and act up. my mac's so far have no issues and although my macbook pro is from early 2007 and cannot run anything higher than lion…. it works far better than the windows machines i have now sitting around especially since i recentelly got a 2010 mac mini to replace my windows desktop. the only issue i had was finding a reputable weather radar program but i met another storm chaser who only uses apple and he led me to barons threat net online radar application… it is a little pricey since it is subscription based but runs just fine on my older macbook pro and on my mac mini.

I don't know what kind of storm chasing program you were running in Windows, but I ran several Tropical Storm - Hurricane tracker programs for years on my Windows machines. Never had a problem with either the machines or the programs. I also ran a TS Hurricane Tracker program on the Mac which was inferior to the Windows program.

I think we would all agree we like our Macs better, but you can not categorize all Windows users or all Windows machines the same way. Many of our forum members successfully run both platforms. Several are even in the business of maintaining a large number of Windows machines in a corporate environment.