Tim Bray says that of \\(96B in gross revenue, IBM's consulting services earned \\)46B.
This is one of those datapoints that could fit into a couple of preconceived notions: supporting the OS business model (“The money's in consulting / support, not software sales!“), damning the OS business model (“If they used Windows, their TCO would be lower!“), supporting the OS technology model (“If only they used JBoss, it would be better!“), damning the OS technology model (“Linux is hard to deploy!“), etc.
I agree with Bray: What it mostly proves is that our industry is woefully inadequate in providing what is asked of it.