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Growing the install base: IBM acquires application porting services
By Sarah Kimmel
Monday, October 27, 2003
Big Blue has acquired the application
porting services business from Sector7, a privately held software
application services company that helps customers migrate software
applications to IBM platforms.
This acquisition is particularly
timely for both IBM and customers of the Hewlett-Packard HP3000
server line, which will no longer be sold or enhanced after October
31, 2003. HP plans to end support for the HP3000 platform in January
of 2007.
“What appears to be a quiet
little announcement about IBM’s acquisition of an application/database
migration company is actually far more than that. It masks a major
IBM effort to attack HP’s install base at a vulnerable time,”
states a research brief by Clabby Analytics, a Massachusetts-based
research and analysis firm.
At PartnerWorld 2002, IBM announced
an agreement with Sector7 to create offerings based around the HP3000-to-iSeries
migration, including a free assessment program to determine the
cost of moving from one platform to the other (IW 2/25/2002).
The HP3000, which has been on the
market for over 30 years, has a current install base of 11,500 in
the United States and 22,400 worldwide, according to IDC.
“The HP3000 install base
experienced a significant decline from 2001 to 2002. Going forward,
HP expects an annual 10% decline,” says Lloyd Cohen, director
of worldwide market analysis, IDC, Framingham, MA.
As part of the acquisition, IBM
has purchased a majority of Sector7’s assets and intellectual
property. It will also hire Sector7 employees to work in IBM Global
Services on projects that include On Demand services offerings to
reduce the time and cost associated with migrating to Linux, and
the related consolidation of servers and databases. Financial terms
of the agreement were not disclosed.
As of press time, IBM was not available
for comment. Look in future issues for more on how IBM expects this
acquisition to affect the iSeries.
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