The market did not take too kindly to Louis Gerstner’s downbeat report on his plans and the prospects for IBM Corp, and the shares were off $1.375 at $55 even on Friday: underlining just how hard it will be for IBM to make a quick impact with its new strategies, one of its high hopes rides on the so-called information superhighway – but where IBM is still largely preparing its plans, Electronic Data Systems Corp, which has an equally buttoned-down image, has come under Wall Street Journal scrutiny, and the paper notes that the Dallas company, which increasingly looks like IBM’s nemesis, is already up and running with a home-shopping business with Apple Computer Inc, that hotel-movie venture with Spectradyne Inc and gambling venture with Video Lottery Technologies Inc; the company is also showing IBM a clean pair of heels in another sector marked out for growth – facilities management, which analysts expect to fuel the General Motors Corp subsidiary to sales of $9,500m this year, and profits up 16% at $840m.
