IBM Unveils $150 Billion Investment in America to Accelerate Technology Opportunity

[Daniel Nenni]

Apr 28, 2025

ARMONK, N.Y., April 28, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Today IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced plans to invest $150 billion in America over the next five years to fuel the economy and to accelerate its role as the global leader in computing. This includes an investment of more than $30 billion in research and development to advance and continue IBM's American manufacturing of mainframe and quantum computers.

"Technology doesn't just build the future — it defines it," said Arvind Krishna, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer. "We have been focused on American jobs and manufacturing since our founding 114 years ago, and with this investment and manufacturing commitment we are ensuring that IBM remains the epicenter of the world's most advanced computing and AI capabilities."

IBM is one of the nation's largest technology employers and has ushered in innovations that include the data processing systems that enabled the U.S. social security system, the Apollo Program that put a man on the moon, and power businesses in every industry.

That legacy continues in Poughkeepsie, New York, where we manufacture the cutting-edge mainframes that are the technology backbone of the American and global economies. More than 70% of the entire world's transactions by value run through the IBM mainframes that are manufactured right here in America.

IBM also operates the world's largest fleet of quantum computer systems, and will continue to design, build and assemble quantum computers in America. Quantum computing represents one of the biggest technology platform shifts and economic opportunities in decades and will solve problems that today's conventional computers cannot solve. Enabling these solutions will not only help us better understand the fundamentals of how the world works but are projected to transform American competitiveness, jobs, and national security. IBM's Quantum Network provides access to IBM's quantum systems for nearly 300 Fortune 500 companies, academic institutions, national laboratories, and startups and is accessed by over 600,000 active users.

Today's announcement reaffirms IBM's unwavering commitment to the future of American innovation, igniting new economic opportunity in the United States and around the world.

About IBM
IBM is a leading provider of global hybrid cloud and AI, and consulting expertise. We help clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs, and gain a competitive edge in their industries. Thousands of governments and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM's hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to affect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently, and securely. IBM's breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and consulting deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM's long-standing commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity, and service. Visit www.ibm.com for more information.

Media Contact:
Ashley Bright
IBM
brighta@us.ibm.com
SOURCE IBM

• IBM-Quantum-System-Two
• New-IBM-z17-Mainframe

 

[hist78]

Apr 28, 2025

ARMONK, N.Y., April 28, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Today IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced plans to invest $150 billion in America over the next five years to fuel the economy and to accelerate its role as the global leader in computing. This includes an investment of more than $30 billion in research and development to advance and continue IBM's American manufacturing of mainframe and quantum computers.

"Technology doesn't just build the future — it defines it," said Arvind Krishna, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer. "We have been focused on American jobs and manufacturing since our founding 114 years ago, and with this investment and manufacturing commitment we are ensuring that IBM remains the epicenter of the world's most advanced computing and AI capabilities."

IBM is one of the nation's largest technology employers and has ushered in innovations that include the data processing systems that enabled the U.S. social security system, the Apollo Program that put a man on the moon, and power businesses in every industry.

That legacy continues in Poughkeepsie, New York, where we manufacture the cutting-edge mainframes that are the technology backbone of the American and global economies. More than 70% of the entire world's transactions by value run through the IBM mainframes that are manufactured right here in America.

IBM also operates the world's largest fleet of quantum computer systems, and will continue to design, build and assemble quantum computers in America. Quantum computing represents one of the biggest technology platform shifts and economic opportunities in decades and will solve problems that today's conventional computers cannot solve. Enabling these solutions will not only help us better understand the fundamentals of how the world works but are projected to transform American competitiveness, jobs, and national security. IBM's Quantum Network provides access to IBM's quantum systems for nearly 300 Fortune 500 companies, academic institutions, national laboratories, and startups and is accessed by over 600,000 active users.

Today's announcement reaffirms IBM's unwavering commitment to the future of American innovation, igniting new economic opportunity in the United States and around the world.

About IBM
IBM is a leading provider of global hybrid cloud and AI, and consulting expertise. We help clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs, and gain a competitive edge in their industries. Thousands of governments and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM's hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to affect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently, and securely. IBM's breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and consulting deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM's long-standing commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity, and service. Visit www.ibm.com for more information.

Media Contact:
Ashley Bright
IBM
brighta@us.ibm.com
SOURCE IBM

• IBM-Quantum-System-Two
• New-IBM-z17-Mainframe

"cutting-edge mainframes" ?

 

[Daniel Nenni]

"cutting-edge mainframes" ?

My fingers are crossed here. I grew up with IBM mainframes, IBM mini computers, and IBM PCs. Quantum computing in the cloud! Maybe they will use Rapidus for 2nm chips.

 

[blueone]

Quantum computing makes me a little dizzy. It depends on entanglement, and that QC works essentially proves that entanglement actually exists, yet physicists don't know how entanglement works. When I asked a few physicists we had Thanksgiving dinner with last November what they thought about entanglement, one said "Quantum physics and relativistic physics are incomplete". The rest nodded in agreement. Thanks, guys.

 

[BruceA]

Everyone in a race to spend more to drive America technology leadership, in the USA, of course, LOL

 

[Brady]

"cutting-edge mainframes" ?

IBM’s “big iron” mainframes actually are cutting edge from a semiconductor perspective: https://www.nextplatform.com/2024/0...gen-ai-acceleration-on-chip-dpu-for-big-iron/

 

[MKWVentures]

Where does IBM build motherboards for computers? In Poughkeepsie?

 

[Mooredaddy]

Since when does IBM have this kind of money?

 

[hist78]

IBM’s “big iron” mainframes actually are cutting edge from a semiconductor perspective: https://www.nextplatform.com/2024/0...gen-ai-acceleration-on-chip-dpu-for-big-iron/

Yes, they are cutting edge, especially for IBM itself. But does that really matter?

I felt a bit sad when this IBM news announcement mentioned the US Social Security Administration and the famed Apollo space program as examples of IBM mainframe users. The reality is, IBM’s mainframe customer list is no longer growing — most (if not all) of the customers are existing ones.

As for the Apollo program, it was completed more than 50 years ago!

 

[blueone]

Where does IBM build motherboards for computers? In Poughkeepsie?

About 20 years ago I remember IBM selling / giving its circuit board operation in Japan to Kyocera. I've always assumed that was the team that did mainframe boards back then. I suspect Kyocera is still an IBM subcontractor.

 

[MKWVentures]

I found updated documentation from 2024 on what IBM Is doing in Poughkeepsie. I had no idea

https://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2017/11/102672516-05-01-acc.pdf

 

[IMakeICsAtHomeJK]

"Technology doesn't just build the future — it defines it," said Arvind Krishna, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer.

I have heard the opposite: technology is defined by, and a response to, society—it is downstream of culture.

"We have been focused on American jobs and manufacturing since our founding 114 years ago, and with this investment and manufacturing commitment we are ensuring that IBM remains the epicenter of the world's most advanced computing and AI capabilities."

The operative key-words here are "have been". A fifth (20%) of the $150 billion is "$30 billion in research and development to advance and continue IBM's American manufacturing". (IBM) Domestic production capabilities hardly seem a "focus", in my opinion.

My fingers are crossed here. I grew up with IBM mainframes, IBM mini computers, and IBM PCs. Quantum computing in the cloud! Maybe they will use Rapidus for 2nm chips.

I am concurrently pessimistic and hopeful. At least once a week I am reminded of American computing as it used to be and think of its domestic glory. The thought invariably terminates with deep disappointment—not with the questions of "How?", "Why?" The answers to such questions are self-evident: short–term profit–margins, out–sourcing, et cetera.

. . . QC works essentially proves that entanglement actually exists, yet physicists don't know how entanglement works.

There was a physicist whose name I have forgotten, but his point of contention was that physics as theory has not progressed/advanced/evolved/and so on since (roughly, I forget the exact timing) Einstein (~70 years ago). Of course, the engineering aspect, the technology has. But as he himself pointed out upon receiving push–back, these are mere applications.
The feeling I get is that the level of expertise amassed by TSMC cannot be replicated except through painstaking iteration upon experiments wherein parameters are adjusted to enhance the fabrication process. The development of this expertise would ostensibly take decades.
Quantum Computing genuinely seems the sole path through which the USA could leapfrog past foreign manufacturing supremacy in conventional, classical computing. As you point out, however, how is one to engineer an application out of an undeveloped theory?

Everyone in a race to spend more to drive America technology leadership, in the USA, of course, LOL

I would appreciate extrapolation on your vague sentiment.

I felt a bit sad when this IBM news announcement mentioned the US Social Security Administration and the famed Apollo space program as examples of IBM mainframe users. The reality is, IBM’s mainframe customer list is no longer growing — most (if not all) of the customers are existing ones.

As for the Apollo program, it was completed more than 50 years ago!

I feel beyond "sad".

About 20 years ago I remember IBM selling / giving its circuit board operation in Japan to Kyocera.

Great move for the company. Really allows them to focus on their other offerings; vis-à-vis, their Acquisition of Red Hat The trend of American computing is an exodus out of hardware to software. Really tracks the American economy as a whole having less manufacturing, more design.

Long-term analysis of the USA economy is emotionally exhausting for me personally.

Spoiler: Staff inspect components installed in a new Z16 mainframe at the IBM manufacturing plant in Poughkeepsie on March 30, 2022.

[Patrick Oehler/Poughkeepsie Journal]

I don't even know what this "plant" manufactures—Central Processing Units? Motherboards? Hard Disk Drives? Graphical Processing Units? Solid State Drives? Tensor Processing Units? Is this place just assembling server racks and calling them mainframes?

Spoiler: The entirety of the Albany NanoTech Complex.

[IBM Research]

"In the early 2000s, researchers began demonstrating 7nm level MOSFETs , with an IBM team including Bruce Doris, Omer Dokumaci, Meikei Ieong, and Anda Mocuta successfully fabricating a 6nm silicon-on-insulator (SOI) MOSFET." [Wikipedia]
"In July 2015, IBM announced that they had built the first functional transistors with "7nm" technology, using a silicon-germanium process." [Wikipedia]

"In the last few years, researchers from IBM’s Albany lab have hit a string of breakthroughs. In 2015, they unveiled the world’s first 7 nanometer (nm) transistor, at a time when the state of the art was 14 nm. They also coined the term “nanosheet” and unveiled this new device architecture to help continue shrinking the size of transistors. The 5 nm transistor followed, and by 2021, IBM unveiled the world’s first 2nm transistor." [International Business Machines]

IBM does good research, I just don't get what their incentive is if they lack the ability to capitalize off it to the fullest. My assumption is the technology would have been developed regardless, so IBM invested in good publicity. But again, even in the case this assumption is false, it just seems like a free-rider problem.

 

[FAengineer]

New here, first post. I was looking for something on the current state of the CHIPS Act, but stumbled upon this thread.

As a former Poughkeepsie (Systems) and East Fishkill (Microelectronics) employee, I'm thrilled to see this kind of announcement. And yet I wonder how a corporation that struggled to find the cash to keep investing in microchip manufacturing (yes, we got gifted to GFS) now has the money to make this kind of investment pledge. With the spinoff of Kyndryl, IBM gross revenue is way down. IIRC, at it's peak we were a $115B company. According to the Annual Report on my desk, that figure was $62.8B for 2024. $6B went to us shareholders (thank you!), $7B went to R&D. They bought a few more companies, there was free cash, and the rest paid the bills. Exactly how will they pony up an average of $30B per year going forward, even if that $30B includes the current $7B R&D budget? I'd love to see the math.

Keeping this semiconductor-centric per the comments above. The work done at Albany Nano is breathtaking. But gone are the days when that research benefited our internal Fabs, and for a time GFS. So why continue the research at Almaden, Yorktown & Albany, when it costs billions to keep that innovation train running? Answer: You don't have to make sub 7nm mainframe processors yourself to benefit from the investment in advanced research. A simple google search for chip making partners tells the story reasonably well: "Who manufactures the IBM Mainframe Telum and Quantum Spyre chips?" Answer: Samsung. Change the wording, and you'll also find TEL, Rapidus, Intel, Micron and others. You want world-class silicon to keep your machines out front? Do the multi-core circuit design in-house (typical Fab-less model), do intense world-class process development in conjunction with partners that help pay the bills, and then find someone else to partner with that will give you first dibs at a great price to mass produce it.