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IBM Suspended From US Federal Contracts

Posted by Zonk on Tue Apr 01, 2008 02:18 AM
from the shouldn't-aught-to-have-done-that dept.
IBM Government United States News
theodp writes "IBM has been temporarily banned from receiving future contracts with federal agencies, the Environmental Protection Agency confirmed on Monday. The suspension went into effect last Thursday due to 'concerns raised about potential activities involving an EPA procurement,' the agency said in an e-mailed statement. Under a reciprocal agreement among federal agencies, when one issues a ban, the others follow it. The EPA said it will not comment further on the matter. An IBM spokesman said he had no immediate comment. 'You don't see this very often, particularly for large companies,' commented a stunned industry analyst, mentioning a bankrupt MCI as a notable exception. IBM earned an estimated $1.5 billion in revenue from federal prime contracts in fiscal 2007."
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Submission: IBM Suspended from Federal Contracts by theodp (442580)
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  • I don't get it.
    • My guess is: 04/01

      Except that there are a lot of supporting links. Hmmm. Sucks bigtime if It's true though. Hopefully the "temporary" is as "temporary" as it can be.
      • Why does it suck?

        For IBM, sure. For taxpayers ... not so much. IBM is an expensive trainwreck-for-hire when it comes to actually delivering on its contracts.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward
          I work for the professional services arm of one of IBM's direct competitors.

          Trust me - they are all trainwrecks-for-hire.

    • Re:Hmmm (Score:4, Funny)

      by dgatwood (11270) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @02:32AM (#22928660) Journal

      Apparently, Slashdot is skipping April Fools this year, along with the rest of the U.S. Details later today, hopefully.

    • If I were IBM I'd have a very good look at _how_ this decision came to be. The timing is just so _perfect_, and the impact will resonate in the IT press the next weeks. And we'll wonder what happened to that other story of the big IT player who is so good at influencing official decision making. Microsoft will have ammunition for years to come to spin any story it's own way by comparing itself to IBM. Also, what kind of organization is the EPA under Bush? Chock full of people who only think of the environme

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by jgalun (8930)
        That's absurd - this has nothing to do with Microsoft, because Microsoft is not a player in federal government IT consulting. The major players are IBM, Accenture, Booz Allen Hamilton, etc. Microsoft has nothing to do with this.

        What I suspect is that EPA blew a whistle without realizing that - due to this agreement in place between federal agencies - it would cut IBM out of new federal work altogether. That's almost certainly overkill - no one wants to take one of the major players out of the game just beca

    • Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 01 2008, @07:03AM (#22929554)
      So, what appallingly illegal and unconstitutional thing did the government ask IBM to do?

  • No Joke? (Score:5, Informative)

    by EyeMyke (683581) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @02:33AM (#22928664)
    I don't think this is a Apr 1 joke... http://www.epls.gov/epls/search.do?debar_recid=98050&status=current&vindex=0&xref=true [epls.gov] Unless it's a really elaborate .gov joke...

  • Tags (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DTemp (1086779) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @02:37AM (#22928674)
    Lots of slashdotters bitch about tags. But today, tags are your friend. Today, I'm looking for the tags omgponies and aprilfools to know if stories are hoaxes, and !omgponies and !aprilfools to know if they are real.

    Now, this story was just tagged !omgponies, but that tag is gone now. Ugh.

  • This story is legit (AFAIK) (Score:3, Informative)

    by tekrat (242117) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @02:40AM (#22928686) Homepage Journal
    Just do a search in Google news for IBM and you'll find the story. Looks legit to me, although the Register clearly has an April Fools story that Robert Scobe is an IBM construction with 1TB of memory.

    • Looks legit to me, although the Register clearly has an April Fools story that Robert Scobe is an IBM construction with 1TB of memory.


      I wouldn't be so... nah. Too easy.

    • Just do a search in Google news for IBM and you'll find the story. Looks legit to me, although the Register clearly has an April Fools story that Robert Scobe is an IBM construction with 1TB of memory.

      Just think what you could do with a beowulf cluster of those...

  • Hrm.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Misanthrope (49269) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @03:21AM (#22928808)
    Nobody ever got fired for......
    Well crap.

  • Mentioned on NYSE site so presumably not a hoax (Score:4, Informative)

    by pdcull (469825) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @03:33AM (#22928840) Homepage
    I suspect that this isn't an April Fool's joke as it is mentioned on the NYSE site here [nyse.com]

  • Someone's gonna get sued if it's a joke (Score:3, Insightful)

    by sn00ker (172521) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @03:38AM (#22928860) Homepage
    And that's the least of their worries.

    Posting a story like that would be a sure-fire way to make Big Blue's stock drop like a hot rock, and you'd have shareholders on your arse faster than GNAA members at an orgy.

    If the SEC thought it had been done with the intent of manipulating the market for gain, though, you'd be wishing that it was just shareholders and the GNAA after your arse. Coz there'd be a strong likelihood that your arse would become property of Bubba.

  • Not a hoax, not a joke. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 01 2008, @05:34AM (#22929264)
    /.ers:

    The timing is curious but I can assure you this is not a joke. I work as a contractor for DHS and the word came down yesterday. We said the same thing - you're kidding, right? - but it turned out to be a very real order.

    I don't know how IBM is about delivering on contracts themselves, but we as a contractor (in conjunction with the government program managers) use IBM commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software extensively. Since the DHS reciprocal ban includes purchase orders, this really throws a wrench in our works. We are looking at the possibility of switching a 500+ head software development shop from IBM-Rational to...something else, by the end of the year when our maintenance runs out. Another project I work with was just evaluating and beginning development with WebSphere, and they are going to completely lose momentum.

    I am sure other agencies are doing the same as far as the extent of implementation of the ban. This might be good for the taxpayers in the long run, but right now it is causing a lot of billable hours to be spent scrambling, so I sure hope it's worth it, EPA.
  • And they invented a reason to ban them from government contracts. Well, thats unheard of, especially for bush administration (!)

  • Haliburton (Score:4, Interesting)

    by misanthrope101 (253915) on Tuesday April 01 2008, @07:30AM (#22929706)
    Considering what Haliburton has done (and been caught/fined for) and yet is still chugging along without a hitch, what did IBM have to do to get suspended altogether?

    • Anyone want to offer me a new job?
      Find me new confusing April 1st stories.

      Or if you're a haxxor, fix slashdot. I want my pink ponies!

      OMG.

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