IBM has reported a decline in hardware sales for the first quarter of 2015 compared to the first quarter of 2014, a shift that is due to the company's transition of focusing on software services instead of hardware services, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
In Q1 2014, IBM reported hardware sales totaling $2.4 billion. In Q1 2015, the company reported hardware sales totaling $1.7 billion, according to the report. The WSJ indicates a significant portion of the drop of sales may be due to the company selling its commodity server business last year to Lenovo Group.
Additionally, IBM's revenue fell from $22.24 billion to $19.59 billion, a shift impacted by the higher value of the U.S. dollar and lower hardware sales, according to the WSJ.
However, IBM plans to make up for this revenue by a renewed focus on its cloud and software services. According to the report, software and services delivered in the cloud accounted for 27 percent of the company's annual revenue, or $25 billion. By 2018, IBM wants such services to account for 40 percent of revenue, or $40 billion, according to the report.
At HIMSS15, IBM demonstrated its intent to move more firmly into the cloud and software services sphere when it announced partnerships with a handful of big IT names, as well as healthcare-specific developments related to IBM Watson, the company's famous supercomputer.
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