It's next to impossible to disprove or prove anything IBM says. The company keeps its numbers way too private to make any sense to ordinary people or most financial analysts. It just feels contrived that IBM is claiming revenue of $1 billion on Linux. After all, just a little more than a year ago, IBM claimed it would invest $1 billion in Linux development. Certainly, IBM sells a lot of products and services, but claiming $1 billion of investment and then getting all that back a year later seems like a CFO dream at best and artificial at worst. If it's true, then IBM has managed to generate an ROI that most companies would die for.
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