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IBM Faces DOJ Antitrust Inquiry On Mainframes

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the goliath-syndrome dept.

Several sources are reporting that IBM is facing an antitrust inquiry from the US Department of Justice due to a supposed refusal to issue mainframe OS licenses to competitors. "Part of CCIA's complaint stems from the tech giant's treatment of former competitor Platform Solutions. IBM had little competition in the mainframe market when Platform Solutions, early this decade, began work on servers that could mimic the behavior of more expensive IBM mainframes, CCIA said. Platform Solutions, based on past mainframe agreements between IBM and the DOJ, requested copies of IBM's OS and technical information under a licensing agreement. IBM declined to grant Platform Solutions a license and prohibited customers from transferring IBM software licenses to Platform Solutions machines, said CCIA, which has members that are potential competitors of IBM."

5 of 190 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Bad news for Apple? by Trepidity · · Score: 2, Informative

    Mainframes aren't really some insulated-from-competition class by themselves anymore, though. For almost all jobs where a zSeries is an option, there are other options as well. In the modern market, I'd see a zSeries as just one product offering in a competitive market, not a product class on its own.

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  2. Re:Here we go again by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 2, Informative

    Hmmm, look at who was running the government when abusive monopolies are formed and re-formed, and who is running the government when the DOJ issues antitrust tickets?

    Hmm, the previous IBM antitrust case was started under the Republicans, and dismissed under the Republicans. The behaviour that caused the previous case would have been happening under the Democrats (and presumably the Republicans, since it wouldn't have come to a trial if the behaviour had been stopped a year or so earlier).

    The current case will be (if it is started t all) started under the Democrats, and the behaviour happened under the Republicans (and, presumably the Democrats, since they wouldn't bring charges if the behaviour had stopped last year).

    No comment on who will be in charge when this is dropped, though at least part of it was dropped already, under the Democrats.

    Your point was?

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  3. Hercules is part of it, too by Jay+Maynard · · Score: 3, Informative

    The NYTimes story on the inquiry mentions that they're also looking at IBM's refusal to license their software to run on the Hercules open source IBM mainframe emulator. It ill be interesting to see if this goes anywhere.

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  4. Re:What? Apple can do this but IBM can't? by int69h · · Score: 2, Informative

    Personal Computer companies: Many
    Mainframe companies: IBM

    I know the difference is subtle, but look hard and you'll spot it.

  5. check out the spokesperson's history by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    I don't know about the CCIA, but the quoted spokesperson does has published negative statements about IBM before -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Black#Nazi_Nexus
      among such.