IBM: Fiscal 3Q18 Financial Results
Storage hardware back to decline by 6% Y/Y, lack of innovation
By Jean Jacques Maleval | October 18, 2018 at 2:21 pmIBM Corp. reports 3Q18 financial results ended September 30 with global revenue of $18.8 billion, down 2% Y/Y.
Once more the company reveals only one figure for the quarter on its storage business: -6% Y/Y in revenue for storage hardware (corresponding to quarterly sales of $456 million according to our calculation or a mere 2% of total sales) after a small increase (2%) in the last three-month period and down as much as -15% in 1FQ18.
IBM will probably finish fiscal year at less that $2 billion compared to $2.3 billion in 2017 and behind all its storage giant competitors.
As them, Big Blue records strong growth in AFAs, with declines in mid-range and high-end systems based on old architecture.
That’s why the company stated: “Storage is an increasingly competitive environment with continued pricing pressures. So to differentiate in this environment requires additional investment in innovation.”
Note that cloud revenue represents $19.0 billion over last 12 months, up 20%.
Revenue Growth of IBM Storage Products
Fiscal period |
Y/Y growth |
4Q11 | -1% |
1Q12 | -4% |
2Q12 |
-4% |
3Q12 | -10% |
4Q12 | -5% |
1Q13 | -11% |
2Q13 | -7% |
3Q13 | -11% |
4Q13 | -13% |
1Q14 | -23% |
2Q14 | -12% |
3Q14 | -6% |
4Q14 | -8% |
1Q15 | -4% |
2Q15 | -10% |
3Q15 | -19% |
4Q15 | -11% |
1Q16 | -6% |
2Q16 | -13% |
3Q16 | -9% |
4Q16 | -10% |
1Q17 | 7% |
2Q17 | 8% |
3Q17 | 4% |
4Q17 | 8% |
1Q18 | -15% |
2Q18 |
2% |
3Q18 |
-6% |