IBM is going global with its economic stimulus funding initiative, boosting to $5 billion the total amount of money IBM is making available worldwide to help customers finance IT projects.
IBM's latest move, offering $3 billion in financing for customers in Europe and Asia-Pacific, follows IBM's offer last month of $2 billion to U.S. business and government customers with IT projects that may be covered by the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) stimulus bill.
As with the U.S. funding, the financing for IT projects in Europe and Asia-Pacific likely will provide a boost to solution providers serving customers in those regions. The funds target such IT initiatives as health-care technology and electronic medical record software implementations, "smart" electric grids and broadband Internet access.
The idea behind IBM's U.S. initiative was that while many such projects may be available for government funding under the ARRA bill, that money is unlikely to make its way through government pipelines until later this year or even 2010. The $2 billion IBM offered in the form of flexible and deferred payment plans and low-interest financing was intended to help customers get started on those IT projects while awaiting the stimulus funds.
As in the U.S., a number of countries in Europe and Asia-Pacific are developing or have launched economic stimulus programs designed to create jobs and help pull them out of the global recession. IBM cited Australia, China and Germany as examples of countries with such programs and where the vendor is already involved with so-called smart technology projects such as traffic management systems, improved electricity grids and health-care IT.
As with the U.S. funding, IBM said the new global stimulus funding will be offered through its IBM Global Financing arm and could take the form of deferred payment plans, flexible financing options and low-interest-rate loans, structured lines of credit, and specialized financing packages for aligning payments to revenue streams generated by IT projects.
IBM said the financing would target larger companies and municipalities with IT projects "consisting of a majority portion of IBM hardware, software and technology services components," although the company said financing could be applied to non-IBM technology that's part of a larger IBM system.
Up to $2 billion of the new financing will be offered in Europe and up to approximately $1 billion in Asia-Pacific. IBM also said it would extend the $2 billion in the U.S. to customers in Canada with smart IT projects.
