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October 12, 2006
Is China the future of the service business?
IBM apparently thinks so.
From the Wall Street Journal - IBM to Transfer Key Unit's Base To China From New York State. Note the last paragraph:
IBM is to announce today that it will relocate the head office of its global procurement arm to the southern city of Shenzhen from Somers, N.Y. The division maintains relationships between suppliers and IBM's businesses around the globe.
The move signals a growing outward shift for IBM, one of the U.S.'s leading technology companies and the second-largest software provider in the world in terms of sales after Microsoft Corp.
China is increasingly a key market for many tech companies. In 2004, the country overtook the U.S. as the world's largest exporter of high-tech goods such as laptop computers, mobile phones and digital cameras, exporting $180 billion in products compared with the U.S.'s $149 billion, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Last year, IBM sold its struggling personal-computer business to Chinese PC maker Lenovo Group Ltd.
Although IBM has been buying resources in Asia for more than 50 years, most of its purchases have supplied the hardware-manufacturing side of its business; the company now aims to expand its supply base for software products, as well as the service division, which is the largest in the world.
Now, explain to me why improving US competitiveness isn't the number one topic of discussion in Washington (or at least number two behind Iraqi)? Oh - sorry. "Stay the course" is the watch word of the day - everything is just getting better and better.
Posted by Ken Jarboe at October 12, 2006 11:05 AM
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