IBM Facing a 'Rocky Time' but Is Poised for Transformation: CEO

IBM Corp is facing a "rocky time," Chief Executive Virginia Rometty told the New York Times, but said she and the company now have a clear vision on how to pursue another generation of growth.

"We are transforming this company for the next decade," she said, sounding a theme she plans to use on Wednesday at the company's yearly meeting with investment analysts, the New York Times reported.

IBM, the world's biggest technology services company, last month reported its lowest quarterly revenue in five years, as Big Blue struggles with falling demand for its hardware and faces challenges in growth markets like China.

The company has jettisoned less profitable business and made major commitments in new fields - like technology to help customers find insights in today's flood of digital data, and cloud-style computing in which processing and software is delivered remotely over the Internet, the NYT reported Rometty as saying.

In late-April, IBM made an attempt at reviving demand for its hardware products, by launching high-end system servers that it said are 50 times faster than its closest competitor at analysing data.

The POWER8 servers, the product of a $2.4 billion, three-year investment, are part of the company's decade-long shift to higher-value hardware technology. IBM said the machines are 50 times faster than the low-end x86-based servers it sold to Chinese PC maker Lenovo Group Ltd in January.

The technology services provider said it hopes the servers, designed for large-scale computing, will appeal to clients looking to manage new types of social and mobile computing and mass amounts of data.

Edited by NDTV Staff from original story by Reuters.