IBM 2014 Annual Report Download - page 8

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than $100 million in 2014 and to maintain a services
backlog of $128 billion.
These core franchises also provide the foundation for
future innovation and growth. One example is our
partnership with Apple. Together, we are placing powerful
analytics capabilities in the hands of professionals.
These apps are integrated with critical business systems,
work flows and data sets. That’s what enables an airline
attendant to rebook a flight while en route; a financial
advisor to model a portfolio in the client’s living room;
an in-store sales assistant to act as a trusted fashion
advisor; or an emergency responder to have real-time
situation-risk awareness, including live video.
3. We believe open ecosystems and partnerships
are key to our future innovation. This is a significant
new element of our growth strategy. We will add to and
scale partnerships with companies like Apple, Twitter,
SAP, Tencent and now, SoftBank. Also, the IBM Watson
Ecosystem is rapidly expanding, with 4,000 companies
in the pipeline.
Together, these actions will make IBM an even higher-value
business. We expect our strategic imperatives of cloud,
analytics, mobile, social and security to continue growing by
double digits and to become a greater percentage of IBM.
We will remain the enterprise leader in these markets.
Finally, we will continue to return substantial value to you,
our owners, through dividends and gross share repurchases.
Last year, these were $4.3 billion and $13.7 billion, respectively.
In 2014 we marked our 19th consecutive year of raising our
dividend and our 99th year of paying one.
“IBM lives at the intersection
of technology and business.
This enables us to change the
way the world works, and in
so doing, to be essential to our
clients and to society.”
7A Letter from the Chairman