Warren Buffet has made a $10.7 billion
investment in IBM through his Berkshire Hathaway holding company, the
mega-investor revealed Monday.
Buffett told financial cable network CNBC that he had bought some
64 million Big Blue shares since March, giving him some 5.6 percent
of the company's stock.
The massive investment represents Buffett's largest ever investment
in a technology company, a sector he has shied away from in the past
because of its volatility and difficulty in predicting which
companies will carve out dominant positions.
But he revealed that after talking with IT experts at many of his
companies he realized that IBM had a long-term advantage in providing
technology services to businesses.
"They've done an incredible job" in laying out a roadmap for the
future, Buffett said on CNBC.
"It's a company that helps IT departments do their job better,"
Buffett said. "It is a big deal for a big company to change auditors,
change law firms," or for IT departments to move away from using IBM,
he said. "There is a lot of continuity to it."
Thus, IBM is set for years of growth as it locks in existing
clients and signs up new ones.
"It was something I should have spotted years earlier," he said.
