Speaker 1: Hi everyone, I'm Emily Chang and this is Bloomberg Studio
Speaker 1: one point Oh. I remember when Jinny Rometti was named
Speaker 1: IBM CEO. So much was made of a fact that
Speaker 1: she was as she. Rometti herself, though rarely talked publicly
Speaker 1: about being a woman, and my interviews with her over
Speaker 1: the years were strictly business. But in this conversation, as
Speaker 1: she leaves the company where she devoted forty years of
Speaker 1: her life, Romedi got more personal about life, love and
Speaker 1: being one of the rare female CEOs in American business.
Speaker 1: She joined IBM as a systems engineer in Detroit in
Speaker 1: nineteen one and rose through the ranks in technical sales
Speaker 1: and then management jobs. In two thousand twelve, she got
Speaker 1: the company's top job and steered IBM through major technological
Speaker 1: transformations and ups and downs. On this edition of Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Studio one point Oh, former IBM CEO and Chair Jinny
Speaker 1: Remetti bids a fond fair well to one of the
Speaker 1: great loves of her life. This is her exit interview.
Speaker 1: You are leaving IBM after an eight year tenure as
Speaker 1: CEO and nearly forty years at the company. How does
Speaker 1: that feel? Uh, it's almost surreal in some ways. Obviously
Speaker 1: it's a company I loved her I wouldn't have stayed
Speaker 1: here for forty years. So it feels like it's a
Speaker 1: great moment because we've just really been through quite a transformation.
Speaker 1: So on one way, on one hand, it's bittersweet. On
Speaker 1: another hand, I leave with really great confidence for the company.
Speaker 1: What are you most nostalgic about and what are you
Speaker 1: most excited about? Uh, well, I'm certainly most nostalgic about. Um,
Speaker 1: the people in the platform of the company. I mean,
Speaker 1: I really do believe IBM stands for the gold standard
Speaker 1: of good tech and what we do most systems of
Speaker 1: the world wouldn't run without us. So it's the people
Speaker 1: that do that work I'll be most nostalgic about, and
Speaker 1: the clients who have been decades of relationships. Um. But
Speaker 1: as well, what I'm going to look forward to, because
Speaker 1: I think it's been one of the great things I've
Speaker 1: had a chance to work on, is a lot about
Speaker 1: making an inclusive workforce. So one of the things I'm
Speaker 1: going to do in my retirement is to lead up
Speaker 1: with Ken Fraser from murk an initiative called one ten
Speaker 1: to place a million black employees over the next ten
Speaker 1: years into our companies with one ten This organization of
Speaker 1: you know, three dozen or so companies is pledging to hire, train,
Speaker 1: and promote one million black workers over the course of
Speaker 1: ten years. How did you come to be involved in
Speaker 1: this initiative? As I worked on the digital economy and
Speaker 1: saw digital transformation, what was happening to me, it was
Speaker 1: really clear a large segment of of the population would
Speaker 1: be left behind. So we had started some work which
Speaker 1: we can talk about on bridging this education gap because
Speaker 1: we needed the employees too. But you know, they couldn't
Speaker 1: get college degrees fast enough or was there another way
Speaker 1: to hire a whole swath of of of people out
Speaker 1: there that could be prepared with a high school degree
Speaker 1: and maybe an associate degree. So pause there. But then
Speaker 1: as the pandemic happened, and then obviously with the killing
Speaker 1: of George Floyd and really coming back to the surface
Speaker 1: around systemic racism, uh Ken can Channel from American Express,
Speaker 1: Can Frasier of of MERK, as well as Charles Phillips
Speaker 1: and Kevin Sheer from am JEN came together and we
Speaker 1: all started saying what do we do best as companies?
Speaker 1: What we can do is hire people and economic opportunity
Speaker 1: is the best equalizer. That's just the beginning, because then
Speaker 1: it's the supply chains and very simply, it's just putting
Speaker 1: supply and demand together and all of the supply a
Speaker 1: subscale for black employees, and we're gonna help grow that.
Speaker 1: What do you think is broken about the way companies
Speaker 1: higher promote and train their workers. On one hand, you
Speaker 1: have an education system that you may have gotten a
Speaker 1: lot of debt for an education, yet you really don't
Speaker 1: have employable skills yet. So one is to work with
Speaker 1: the schools. And then on the employee side, it's really
Speaker 1: breaking down a barrier of a perception that, gee, if
Speaker 1: I bring people into my company that don't have a
Speaker 1: college degree, I'm in some form dumbing down the workforce.
Speaker 1: It's not true. I mean, now that I've been at
Speaker 1: it eight nine, ten years, what we've learned is that
Speaker 1: great aptitude just didn't have the same access as everyone else.
Speaker 1: At the same time, these are best employees. And by
Speaker 1: the way, as they've been around, lots of other people
Speaker 1: now have college degrees and we just had our first PhD.
Speaker 1: So the biggest thing we're going to work with all
Speaker 1: the employers on is you've got to change your job breath.
Speaker 1: It is a systemic barrier, meaning if every job you
Speaker 1: offer out there lists a whole set of college degrees required,
Speaker 1: you have completely blocked out large segments of the United
Speaker 1: States population. Sixty percent of Americans do not have a
Speaker 1: college degree. Eight percent of Black Americans do not have
Speaker 1: a college degree. So you've just completely taken them off
Speaker 1: your radar screen. Now, if you would change that and
Speaker 1: say higher skills first, a different paradigm, well then you're
Speaker 1: going to open your aperture to some great employees. And
Speaker 1: so so when you say what is broke, I think
Speaker 1: it's this view that it's a degree only versus skills first,
Speaker 1: not just a degree. Do you think that companies and
Speaker 1: the tech industry in particular, do they value differences in race,
Speaker 1: differences in gender, differences in age as much as they should? Well,
Speaker 1: look that the numbers don't lie about that, and so
Speaker 1: it'd be hard to answer that the system works. Right.
Speaker 1: But now, look, I do come from a company. I
Speaker 1: feel like I stand on the shoulders of giants on
Speaker 1: this topic. Right, it was one of our predecessor companies
Speaker 1: had their first woman in first black Right, so it
Speaker 1: was ninety five equal pay, nineteen fifty three equal opportunity.
Speaker 1: So I am used to that. All that said, all
Speaker 1: of us have to do better. I mean, I'm so proud,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. We had record record diversity
Speaker 1: and inclusion numbers in my last year and this year
Speaker 1: again at IBM, and so that takes though not one
Speaker 1: deed to me. It is like a million things that
Speaker 1: you have to be so consistent. And the word is authentic.
Speaker 1: You have got to authentically believe that this will make
Speaker 1: you a better company. It will make you better innovation,
Speaker 1: better products. And you know, in my heart I believe that,
Speaker 1: and I think as a company in its DNA, it
Speaker 1: believes that. And how much do you think it matters
Speaker 1: that the CEO of the leadership makes this a number
Speaker 1: one priority. I think it's imperative, point blank. And in fact,
Speaker 1: actually the one ten initiative I'm working on it is
Speaker 1: only CEOs allowed. And so and I don't mean that
Speaker 1: in a in an exclusionary sense. We mean it as
Speaker 1: if you're going to actually change paradigms, remove barriers, you've
Speaker 1: got to have someone at the top say no, no, no,
Speaker 1: this will be important. Diversity is a number. Inclusion is
Speaker 1: a choice and you have to show people you make
Speaker 1: that choice over and over. Absolutely, you joined DIBAN when
Speaker 1: Apple was in its infancy, Facebook, Google, Amazon didn't even
Speaker 1: exist yet. You have seen so many technological shifts, whether
Speaker 1: it was the rise of the PC or smartphone or
Speaker 1: more recently the cloud, AI, quantum computing um. Which of
Speaker 1: these shifts has surprised you most or you know, does
Speaker 1: anything even surprise you anymore? I'm not sure anything surprises
Speaker 1: me anymore, but I do think more current in this
Speaker 1: sort of last era, Uh, not a surprise, but it
Speaker 1: is absolutely the speed at which these have happened, and
Speaker 1: that there's been multiple shifts at one time, because you
Speaker 1: could say you saw cloud, you saw mobility, you see
Speaker 1: AI data, all this at one time. And I think
Speaker 1: that's actually been what's made this digital transformation era the
Speaker 1: one that has had the most impact and most impact
Speaker 1: on IBM. I mean clearly, when I took over, I
Speaker 1: had to refocus the company for cloud and data and
Speaker 1: it's the speed at which those were moving in and
Speaker 1: for us, that's that's been a journey, right, It's it's
Speaker 1: clearly to been our most historic transformation where we've had
Speaker 1: to divest businesses or almost over ten billion dollars of
Speaker 1: businesses to give you fuel. And then we did in
Speaker 1: my time billion of R and D. And then another
Speaker 1: sixty five was Asians. IBM reacted very quickly when the
Speaker 1: pandemic arrived in early March. How unexpected and unprecedented was
Speaker 1: that for you as a leader? Did that surprise you?
Speaker 1: You know, I'll have to say at a personal level
Speaker 1: to some degree yes, intellectually no, And and I'll give
Speaker 1: you this example so here, because we're global hundred seventy countries,
Speaker 1: we were obviously participating with this with our Chinese workforce,
Speaker 1: some Japanese workforce, we see, Italy were everywhere. And I
Speaker 1: am proud by the way every country we were able
Speaker 1: in days IBM r s we're working remotely. So UM,
Speaker 1: I'm very proud of what this says about the infrastructure,
Speaker 1: how we do our work, our customers. That said, UM,
Speaker 1: I kind of remember it was middle of March, I've
Speaker 1: done some TV interviews and that it was my wedding anniversary,
Speaker 1: and I was going to fly to meet my husband
Speaker 1: for a weekend. UH. And as I left, I only
Speaker 1: packed for four days UH to go down to that
Speaker 1: house to see him, and never did I really sort
Speaker 1: of realized, nope, I might not actually come back after
Speaker 1: this and stay at home, right, And and so that's
Speaker 1: why miss so intellectually, I think we all saw it.
Speaker 1: Everyone I know right that I've talked to sort of
Speaker 1: has a similar story about um the speed at which
Speaker 1: it then moved that we really did need to stay
Speaker 1: in place. The first thing is, okay, how do you
Speaker 1: help people? Right, So of course your own employees, obviously
Speaker 1: we all worked on that first. So put that his
Speaker 1: job number one. We do own the weather Channel, and
Speaker 1: we had a site immediately put up that you could
Speaker 1: see in your zip code. You know, what were the cases,
Speaker 1: how many deaths, the cases growing, check on your parents,
Speaker 1: your kids, whatever it was, but one source, truthful data
Speaker 1: that was out there. We did that. The second immediately
Speaker 1: in parallel, and this is still going now, is work
Speaker 1: on the cure. What could we do? That's us, you know,
Speaker 1: like authentically us. And it was we sponsored for the
Speaker 1: government and put together a high performance computing consortium which
Speaker 1: now has uh forty people who donated their high performance computing.
Speaker 1: We do have the top super comput years in the world.
Speaker 1: Think of it as if you could overnight buy a
Speaker 1: billion dollar computer. That's what it is. That we've put
Speaker 1: together six hundred pedo flops and there's a hundred world
Speaker 1: class scientific teams that are running all of their analyzes
Speaker 1: on this, so they've contributed to the cure. Um. We
Speaker 1: took Watson and AI twenty five countries, asking questions everything
Speaker 1: you can. You can remember those days, like how much
Speaker 1: misinformation was out there about COVID and so all that
Speaker 1: got underway. Then we had a quickly moved to another phase.
Speaker 1: Not quickly, it was months. But how do you return
Speaker 1: to work safely? Other CEOs have used the words terror
Speaker 1: and fear and felt like we got hit by a torpedo?
Speaker 1: Was there any amount of fear for you as as
Speaker 1: a leader, as somebody who's in charge of these tens
Speaker 1: of thousands of people, and you know, no, those are
Speaker 1: not words in my vocabulary basically, And I think because
Speaker 1: we do mission critical work, I've always felt that when
Speaker 1: things got the most tense, I'd become the most calm um.
Speaker 1: And it is in those moments that people look to
Speaker 1: you to steer them through something. So it is a
Speaker 1: determined calm, is how I would describe it. Where does
Speaker 1: that come from in you? You know, I guess I've
Speaker 1: I've I've often thought about that, and I think it
Speaker 1: comes from my you know, my early time i've talked
Speaker 1: with you. I think before about my mother and single
Speaker 1: mom found herself raising four children. Suddenly she didn't have
Speaker 1: an education. We spent time on food stamps. My mother
Speaker 1: was determined not to let that be the end of
Speaker 1: the story, found her way out with an education. Out
Speaker 1: of that. The rest of us all turned out well
Speaker 1: by watching her, and in that moment, it taught us,
Speaker 1: you know, never lets something define you. Only you define
Speaker 1: who you are, so you take control of that. And
Speaker 1: I think that that is what has stayed with me
Speaker 1: through all this time, and whether it's a crisis or
Speaker 1: whether it is actually the reinvention of a company or myself,
Speaker 1: the idea that only you define who you are, not
Speaker 1: someone else. This is the exit interview with former IBM
Speaker 1: CEO and chair Jenny Remetti. Up next, how did she
Speaker 1: feel about being a quote woman CEO? And we go
Speaker 1: back almost forty years to Rometti's first day at IBM
Speaker 1: and what it took to rise to the top. I'm
Speaker 1: Emily Chang. This is Bloomberg studio one point. Oh, you've
Speaker 1: seen so much innovation, so much evolution in your time
Speaker 1: at IBM. How do you think IBM is a different
Speaker 1: company today than when you took over a CEO. We
Speaker 1: now have our next enduring technology platform. That's what the
Speaker 1: team has built, hybrid cloud in AI. IBM does its
Speaker 1: best when it has a physical technology platform, so things
Speaker 1: like the main frame was there for decades, still will
Speaker 1: be there for decades, modernized, modernized, it's on z and
Speaker 1: and to me, hyperd cloud AI is this company's next platform.
Speaker 1: And because there's a very serious set of work we
Speaker 1: do that requires the ability to run work wherever you
Speaker 1: need to run it, whether it's a private cloud, multiple
Speaker 1: public clouds. Build something once, run it anywhere, get a
Speaker 1: scale advantage from that, not be locked in. Get open innovation.
Speaker 1: This was all behind our open hybrid cloud. I would
Speaker 1: love it if you would humor us and and go
Speaker 1: back a bit more in time and paint the picture
Speaker 1: for us of a young, genuine meddy walking through the
Speaker 1: doors of IBM as a systems engineer in Detroit in
Speaker 1: I came from a single mom who to get us
Speaker 1: off of food stamps, found her way back to get
Speaker 1: an associate degree so she could get a job, so
Speaker 1: we could all go to school. So I start there. Um,
Speaker 1: I've had a scholarship from General Motors blessed them through
Speaker 1: Northwestern University, so I first did work there. Um so
Speaker 1: before that, then I went to IBM, so I worked
Speaker 1: their year. But as as I've told Mary Barra, I
Speaker 1: love what she does and she is passionate about cars.
Speaker 1: I wanted to apply technology a lot of things. So
Speaker 1: when IBM, and here's what I'll remember that first day.
Speaker 1: Of course, I did not have a blue suit, all right,
Speaker 1: had not had one. I'm not sure I had any
Speaker 1: suits actually, Um, but this is this is back in time, right,
Speaker 1: so this is out of blue suit. I can remember
Speaker 1: coming home from work, taking my jacket off, putting on
Speaker 1: the couch, and my husband saying, do you realize the
Speaker 1: price tags are still on your suit? And that's how
Speaker 1: I remember my first day. And I thought, how gracious
Speaker 1: There wasn't a single person who said anything about that.
Speaker 1: Your mom, how influential was she over the years, And
Speaker 1: she showed us that nobody defined your future, you do it.
Speaker 1: And we watched that and learned that by by just
Speaker 1: looking at what she did. I remember when you took
Speaker 1: this job. In two thousand eleven, The New York Times
Speaker 1: wrote this big piece about your husband and how he
Speaker 1: was your support system and as all husbands should be,
Speaker 1: and it had a big impact on me because I
Speaker 1: think we often think our support systems should be invisible, um,
Speaker 1: but then we don't learn how other people do it.
Speaker 1: And I'd love to know more about how that partnership
Speaker 1: evolved over the years, especially as you were CEO. I
Speaker 1: just had my four wedding anniversary and so forty years
Speaker 1: and you know what I say about Mark, uh, he
Speaker 1: is he's my biggest fan and that, you know, I
Speaker 1: think that makes all the difference in the world. And
Speaker 1: so that it's a partnership, and I know not everyone
Speaker 1: has been blessed like I have to have that kind
Speaker 1: of relationship, um where not only you know, I said,
Speaker 1: when you become CEO, it's a family job. It isn't
Speaker 1: as if it's just one person. So it's impact on
Speaker 1: time my whole life. I traveled from my position as
Speaker 1: an example, and we always had a rule that never
Speaker 1: be more than two weeks apart from each other, and
Speaker 1: we oh, we never broke that rule. And forty years
Speaker 1: of my traveling, and so those are the kinds of
Speaker 1: things that I think, Um, you know, they keep you together,
Speaker 1: build it stronger. And I have been really blessed and
Speaker 1: lucky to have someone like that by my side who
Speaker 1: took as much pride and was you tried to learn
Speaker 1: as much about IBM and be it's his ambassador, right.
Speaker 1: I feel he was IBM s a ambassador, uh, and
Speaker 1: took as much interest in my clients as I did.
Speaker 1: So it was a real partnership. And clearly I did
Speaker 1: nothing else but work, So I have such great empathy
Speaker 1: for women that you know, have children and all these
Speaker 1: other responsibilities. I worked, and Mark really did take care
Speaker 1: of everything else while well, I did work. So I
Speaker 1: was lucky from that sense. Well, I'm sure you're selling
Speaker 1: yourself a little bit short, and he is very lucky
Speaker 1: to have you as well. UM, I will just say that. UM,
Speaker 1: you've said you've never thought about yourself as being a
Speaker 1: woman CEO, but that is how others have often thought
Speaker 1: of you. Did you find that frustrating over the years
Speaker 1: or unfair in any way? So that that's an interesting
Speaker 1: question from two perspectives, because I've often felt when I
Speaker 1: first became CEO, I really did not want to be
Speaker 1: labeled that. I wanted to be recognized for what I
Speaker 1: could accomplish. I think many women feel that way. I
Speaker 1: think many people feel that way. Um, but I will
Speaker 1: tell you a different side of that story that as
Speaker 1: time went on, I did begin to realize this obligation
Speaker 1: to be a role model. And you could see so
Speaker 1: many people that would react to not just what I
Speaker 1: did or what I said, but that it was you
Speaker 1: were a role model for their children, their daughter, someone themselves,
Speaker 1: and this idea that you cannot be which you cannot see.
Speaker 1: I began to internalize that and did feel it was
Speaker 1: an obligation, and I've changed my view about that, and
Speaker 1: as my tenure went on, you saw me become, you know,
Speaker 1: more vocal about that and more involved in things because
Speaker 1: I realized, in whether it's a woman or any group,
Speaker 1: people have got to have role models to see what's possible,
Speaker 1: and and that is, in a positive way, an obligation there.
Speaker 1: Now with it becomes I've said to other women as
Speaker 1: they've taken on their CEO roles, I said, get ready,
Speaker 1: because everything you do is magnified, everything you do is personalized.
Speaker 1: I can't tell you that that's fair, but it's what happens.
Speaker 1: And so just power through and do what it is
Speaker 1: you think must be done. So what is your advice
Speaker 1: to young women out there who want to be you,
Speaker 1: who want to be leaders. It's probably the one piece
Speaker 1: of advice I am best known for Emily around the world,
Speaker 1: and it is my husband that taught me the lesson.
Speaker 1: It was early in my career. I had interviewed for
Speaker 1: a job, was offered it, and I was very nervous
Speaker 1: about taking it. I didn't think I was ready. I
Speaker 1: thought I needed a few more years. And Market said
Speaker 1: to me when I came home, he said, because I
Speaker 1: told the person, let me think about this. And I'd
Speaker 1: come home and Mark said to me, Jenny, do you
Speaker 1: think a man would have answered the question that way?
Speaker 1: And in those moments, what I remember is that growth
Speaker 1: and comfort will never coexist, And so everyone I talked
Speaker 1: to I say, look, you just get really comfortable with
Speaker 1: being uncomfortable, and that when you're uncomfortable, that means you're
Speaker 1: learning and growing. And so to your earlier question about fear,
Speaker 1: I view those moments as like wonderful learning opportunities, and
Speaker 1: that's my biggest advice. So have you replayed that story
Speaker 1: to yourself over the years as you've had moments where
Speaker 1: you're saying, man would not do this. Well, what I've
Speaker 1: replayed to myself more is go yourself at risk. Don't
Speaker 1: worry if you're nervous about something fantastic, or if you're
Speaker 1: not nervous, equally a concern, be sure you take on
Speaker 1: something different and go learn something new. You're listening to
Speaker 1: my conversation with Jenny Remetti, former IBM CEO and chair
Speaker 1: coming up. Remetti leaves IBM at a crossroads and facing
Speaker 1: ever more powerful competition. What does the future look like
Speaker 1: and what does she think of her successor that's next.
Speaker 1: I'm Emily Chang and this is Bloomberg Studio. What point
Speaker 1: out stay with us? Ibm S shares declined during your
Speaker 1: tenure as CEO, and I wonder if that was frustrating
Speaker 1: to watch? I oh, you're you know. CEOs always tell
Speaker 1: us they don't pay attention to the share price, but
Speaker 1: but it has to be distracting. And I wonder is
Speaker 1: there something you think investors just didn't get? Well, Look,
Speaker 1: we did return forty three billion dollars to shareholders during
Speaker 1: my time frame with with dividend and actually the dividing
Speaker 1: group by a hundred percent. But but clearly obviously you
Speaker 1: would want your share price to grow, so of course
Speaker 1: to that. And I think the piece in what we
Speaker 1: had to undertake was the hard work to reinvent IBM
Speaker 1: for the long term. And that's what we went about
Speaker 1: and did. We had it to all ordered it to us.
Speaker 1: We did it, and so I'm really looking forward to
Speaker 1: now this next chapter for the company. IBM is hanging
Speaker 1: a lot of its future on hybrid. How will the
Speaker 1: company and how should the company differentiate itself from rivals
Speaker 1: in hybrid like Microsoft? Okay, well, we're clearly the one
Speaker 1: that defined hybrid and we are clearly the one I
Speaker 1: would say the others have joined us now in this conversation, um,
Speaker 1: and so how we're clearly distinguished. We are the only
Speaker 1: one with the open hybrid cloud. So think of it
Speaker 1: real simple for a client, this means if it's open technologies,
Speaker 1: open source, open technologies, you can get access to innovation anywhere.
Speaker 1: Oh so A, I get more innovation. B. I can
Speaker 1: write something once and it can run anywhere. It can
Speaker 1: run on another cloud as long as you have that
Speaker 1: hybrid open layer there, and that means it could run
Speaker 1: on any number of public clouds. It could run on
Speaker 1: your own cloud, it can run on your private cloud.
Speaker 1: You're on premise, okay, perfect. So when a pandemic hits
Speaker 1: and I worry about things where things are operating and
Speaker 1: need to move them, I am fit for purpose ready.
Speaker 1: And then once I do that, there's a skills battle
Speaker 1: out there. Well, all better that I can only have
Speaker 1: one set of skills no matter what I do. And
Speaker 1: then of course you would guess it's two and a
Speaker 1: half times less operating costs. So we are the only
Speaker 1: short answer. We are the true open hybrid cloud. The
Speaker 1: tech industry more broadly is under fire for stifling innovation. Apple, Google, Amazon, Facebook, um.
Speaker 1: Having seen so many generations of technology, do you believe
Speaker 1: we're in a different phase. Do you believe these companies
Speaker 1: are stifling innovation? Do you believe that legislation or a
Speaker 1: breakup is in order? Yeah? I don't think it's that
Speaker 1: simple of a question. And I don't know about stifle
Speaker 1: innovation because I take it back a few layers from that.
Speaker 1: I can remember early on defining we don't believe we
Speaker 1: own a customer's data. They do, we will only use
Speaker 1: it with their permission. Data belongs to the creator we.
Speaker 1: In fact, even the algorithms, the a either it comes
Speaker 1: and drives out of it, it belongs to them. So
Speaker 1: you make your choices and then you hold yourself to
Speaker 1: be audited against them. I think this is more about
Speaker 1: companies being clear what they believe and then standing up
Speaker 1: to those things outside your competition, and IBM competition is formidable.
Speaker 1: What do you think are the biggest challenges that your
Speaker 1: successor Arvin Krishna will have to deal with. Well, look,
Speaker 1: I have extreme confidence in Arvin. He is exactly the man.
Speaker 1: He's a brilliant technologist, architect, sees exactly what this means
Speaker 1: to be an open hybrid cloud. And so now Urban's
Speaker 1: transition will be as we first spin off the manage
Speaker 1: infrastructure business and then reposition IBM into growth. I mean
Speaker 1: we're positioned. And now, as he said to everyone, this
Speaker 1: is about a growth mindset and a culture of radical candor.
Speaker 1: And because he now takes it to that step of growth,
Speaker 1: when you look back, is there anything that you would
Speaker 1: have done differently? I don't think about life that way,
Speaker 1: right because I always believe in that moment you make
Speaker 1: the very best decisions you can with everything that's happened. Then,
Speaker 1: IBM has a hand in so many futuristic technologies, whether
Speaker 1: it is quantum computing or AI. It's often so hard
Speaker 1: to imagine how these technologies are going to actually change
Speaker 1: our lives in concrete ways. And given what you've seen
Speaker 1: over the last forty years, I'm wondering, if you would
Speaker 1: take us forty years ahead, how will our lives be
Speaker 1: different in because of technology? Mm hmm. Well, first off,
Speaker 1: there'll be lots of technologies you won't even know yet.
Speaker 1: They have not yet been invented, So I will tell
Speaker 1: you that all right, So on one hand, you should
Speaker 1: expect a lot of things you didn't know today. But
Speaker 1: I do believe that we're going to solve some really
Speaker 1: tough problems for humanity over these next decades. Look, AI
Speaker 1: is in its really early stages still of deployment, and
Speaker 1: so you've yet to see the real benefits of AI
Speaker 1: to come in front of us. And in that time frame,
Speaker 1: quantum will be flourishing, and so you know quantum. The
Speaker 1: great sides of quantum are things like drug discovery, materials
Speaker 1: discovery that will be out there drugs. You know the
Speaker 1: speed of how it's done, and so you will see
Speaker 1: a technologies you never saw before. You'll actually see AI
Speaker 1: used to reinvent businesses, and you'll see quantum come into
Speaker 1: real commercialization in that timeframe. Alright, Jenny REMTDI, outgoing IBM
Speaker 1: executive chair and former CEO, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: joining us on this edition of Studio. At one point, Oh,
Speaker 1: it has been wonderful to have you. Thank you, bloom
Speaker 1: Brook Studio. At one point, Oh is produce Usten, edited
Speaker 1: by Kevin Hines. Our executive producer is Alison Weiss. Our
Speaker 1: managing editor is Daniel Culbertson, with production assistants from Malory Abelhausen.
Speaker 1: I'm Emily Chang, your host and executive producer. This is
Speaker 1: Bloomberg