FUDBusters: IBM's Mainframe Java Module

FUDBust: Many experts predicted a decline in mainframe sales last year. Yet Big Blue continues to spit in their collective eye. Last year, the 39th year since the introduction of the System/ 360 in 1964, IBM sold some 2,700 mainframes and brought in more than $4.3 billion--more than a third of its server revenue--from the old iron. That's up, not down, from the 2,300 mainframes--and $4 billion--that Big Blue sold the year before.

Now IBM has a new module that lets users dedicate hardware to Java apps, and a new low-end model that sells for less than $200,000. And despite the even greater processing power of networked Unix machines, those legacy CICS apps are not going away. Let's put away the book of last rites. This thing is about as dead as Jason in a Friday the 13th movie.