| Type | Division of IBM |
|---|---|
| Industry | IT services, IT consulting |
| Founded | 1991 |
| Headquarters | Armonk, New York, USA Over 300 offices in 170 countries |
| Key people | Jim Bramante, Mike Daniels |
| Services | IT, business consulting and outsourcing services |
| Revenue | US$56.4 billion (2010) |
| Employees | 190,000 |
| Parent | IBM |
| Website | http://www.ibm.com/services/us/ |
IBM Global Services is the world's largest business and technology services provider. It has over 190,000 workers across more than 160 countries. IBM Global Services started in the spring of 1991, with the aim towards helping companies manage their IT operations and resources.
Global Services has two major divisions: Global Business Services (GBS) and Global Technology Services (GTS).
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IBM Global Business Services (GBS) is the professional services arm of Global Services, including management consulting, systems integration, and application management services. It is the world's largest IT consultancy service firm. GBS is also the highest revenue earning division of IBM.
The beginning of IBM’s involvement in IT services can be traced back at least to 1989 when Eastman Kodak Company and IBM completed an agreement by which IBM designed, built and managed a new state-of-the-art data center for Kodak in Rochester, New York.
Also in 1989, IBM introduced Business Recovery Services, an offering that enables a business to continue operations in the event of an unplanned outage or disaster.
In 2002, IBM Global Services acquired the management consulting and technology services arm of PricewaterhouseCoopers, around the same time the other Big Four accounting firms were selling off their consulting arms (this was from intense pressure to avoid conflicts of interest in light of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act). PwC's consultancy business was sold to IBM for approximately US$3.9 billion in cash and stock. This nearly doubled the number of consultants within IBM Global Services, adding 30,000 consultants in 52 countries.
IBM Global Business Services is organized into six service lines:
IBM Global Technology Services (GTS) primarily reflects infrastructure services. It includes outsourcing services, business continuity and resilience, Integrated Technology Services, and Maintenance.
GTS is the leading e-business on demand and hosting services provider, according to IDC, Forrester Research, Gartner/Dataquest and Meta Group; the leader in providing high-availability services, networking services and storage services, according to Gartner Group and IDC; the leader in the emerging wireless services market, according to IDC.
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