Lou Gerstner wrote, "People truly do what you inspect, not what you expect." … Lest we forget, these "inspection pages" exist because chief executives are "people" too.
Arvind Krishna: 2020-24 Revenue and Profit Growth
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Date Published: April 11, 2022
Date Modified: September 18, 2025 |
Arvind Krishna's 2020-24 Revenue and Profit Growth Performance
- The Importance of Revenue and Profit Growth
- Arvind Krishna: IBM's 2020-24 Revenue Growth Numbers
- Arvind Krishna: IBM's 2020-24 Profit Growth Numbers
The Importance of Revenue and Profit Growth
Although the previous revenue and profitability charts documented Arvind Krishna's two critical revenue and profitability metrics, the following charts analyze their respective year-over-year growth rates. They present a case that a corporation can pad short-term profitability numbers through financial engineering or aggressive bookkeeping, but that sales performance is much harder to game.
These charts show revenue growth is a serious problem, and that profit growth has been propped up with some serious financial engineering—following short-term, financially expedient paths at the expense of the long-term health of the business. These charts challenge the perspective that IBM has been divesting and investing to move into higher-value, more-profitable markets, because if it was, IBM's customers would be buying into the corporation's newest solutions as the products return ever-higher value to their businesses.
These charts show revenue growth is a serious problem, and that profit growth has been propped up with some serious financial engineering—following short-term, financially expedient paths at the expense of the long-term health of the business. These charts challenge the perspective that IBM has been divesting and investing to move into higher-value, more-profitable markets, because if it was, IBM's customers would be buying into the corporation's newest solutions as the products return ever-higher value to their businesses.
The 1999-2024 profit growth chart below documents a few of the financial engineering “projects” the corner office implemented through their financial and human resource divisions: workforce rebalancing, resource actions, divestiture of critical assets, and employee benefit reductions. This is critical to highlight because these are unsustainable processes that can provide one-time, short-term profit spikes but can also drive long-term negative consequences for a corporation.
As can be seen in the profit growth charts below, some of these activities—like the divestiture of the x86 Server Division—had an almost immediate negative growth consequence which has never been highlighted in the press. Many of these highlighted activities to prop up short-term profits are causing a long-term downward trend in employee revenue and profit productivity
Employee productivity metrics are covered in the next key metrics category, which also seems to need more discussion within the press and more in-depth, long-term research by the analyst communities.
As can be seen in the profit growth charts below, some of these activities—like the divestiture of the x86 Server Division—had an almost immediate negative growth consequence which has never been highlighted in the press. Many of these highlighted activities to prop up short-term profits are causing a long-term downward trend in employee revenue and profit productivity
Employee productivity metrics are covered in the next key metrics category, which also seems to need more discussion within the press and more in-depth, long-term research by the analyst communities.
Evaluating IBM's 2020-24 Revenue and Profit Growth Numbers
What were Arvind Krishna's fifth-year 2020-24 revenue and profit growth performance numbers?
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Unfortunately, even considering the Kyndryl divestiture in the numbers below, IBM's revenue growth has been lower than the inflation rate in all five years of Arvind Krishna’s leadership of the corporation:
Only one word can be applied to IBM's profit growth of the last five year's leadership under Arvind Krishna: unpredictable. In his defense, as the 1999-2024 charts below show, this is a trademark of IBM's 21st Century Chief Executive Officers. Nothing new here!
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Inflation is a concern
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Arvind Krishna: IBM's 2020-24 Revenue Growth Numbers
- Krishna 2020-24 Revenue Growth
- IBM’s 2024 Revenue Growth under Arvind Krishna’s leadership was up 1.4% in 2024, up 2.2% in 2023, up 5.5% in 2022, up 3.9% in 2021; and down -4.6% in 2020 (allowing for the Kyndryl divestiture in 2020 and 2021).
- Unfortunately, inflation has been higher than the corporation’s revenue growth in all four years of positive revenue growth: inflation was 4.7% in 2021 vs. revenue growth of 3.9%; inflation was 8.0% in 2022 vs. revenue growth of 5.5%; inflation was 4.1% in 2023 vs. revenue growth of 2.2%; and inflation was 2.9% in 2024 vs. revenue growth of 1.4%.
- IBM’s 2024 Revenue Growth under Arvind Krishna’s leadership was up 1.4% in 2024, up 2.2% in 2023, up 5.5% in 2022, up 3.9% in 2021; and down -4.6% in 2020 (allowing for the Kyndryl divestiture in 2020 and 2021).
- Krishna & Rometty 2011–24 Revenue Growth
- IBM Revenue Growth in this decade-long, revenue-growth, bar chart is not a pretty picture. IBM's annual revenue growth was only positive five out of thirteen years, and in each of the last four years (2021-24) inflation outperformed IBM's positive revenue growth in every year.
- Krishna, Rometty, Palmisano & Gerstner 1999–2024 Revenue Growth
- IBM Revenue Growth in this twenty-first-century chart is a picture of inconsistency. Annual revenue growth was negative thirteen out of the last twenty-five years. In each of the last four years (2021-24) inflation outperformed IBM's best-case revenue growth. So, considering inflation, it is easy to add a footnote to this chart that states: "Considering inflation IBM has had negative revenue growth in seventeen out of the last twenty-five years."
Arvind Krishna: IBM's 2020-24 Profit Growth Numbers
- Krishna 2020-24 Profit Growth
- IBM’s 2024 Profit Growth under Arvind Krishna’s leadership was down -19.7% in 2024. In the three previous years, IBM’s profit growth was down -40.7% in 2020, up 2.7% in 2021, up 6.5% in 2022, and up 22.6% in 2023. Considering inflation over these five years, IBM’s yearly profits have dropped 36% while inflation was up almost 22%.
- Krishna & Rometty 2011–24 Profit Growth
- IBM Net Income or Profit Growth was down six years and up seven years. Considering inflation, profit growth was down eight years and up five years. This seesaw picture of inconsistent profit growth combined with the lack-of-revenue-growth chart above should cause any analyst to question the corner offices' on-going premise that they are focusing on building products of higher value that are in demand by their customers.
- Krishna, Rometty, Palmisano & Gerstner 1999–2024 Profit Growth
- IBM Net Income or Profit Growth was supported in the first decade of the twenty-first century by financial engineering and aggressive bookkeeping as annotated on this chart. These tactics appear to have reached their limits in 2011-2012 as under Virginia (Ginni) M. Rometty and Arvind Krishna profit growth bounces between the red and black from year to year and fails to even match inflation rates.
