Apple, IBM in mobile tie-up

Apple and IBM will collaborate on optimizing IBM's cloud services for Apple's iOS operating system, covering device management, security, analytics and mobile integration.

"For the first time ever we're putting IBM's renowned big data analytics at iOS users' fingertips, which opens up a large market opportunity for Apple," Apple chief executive Tim Cook said. "This is a radical step for enterprise and something that only Apple and IBM can deliver."

The tie-up is designed to attract more corporate clients for Apple, who will benefit from IBM's strength in providing corporate IT services. IBM has struggled with stagnating sales and hopes to boost turnover by being able to offer its services on the popular Apple devices.

'Reimagine how work is done'?

Both companies are banking on smartphones and tablets becoming an integral part of doing business. IBM CEO Ginni Rometty said the services would be used "to reimagine how work is done."

The two companies are in the process of developing more than a hundred applications for several different industries.

The latest tie-up seems to have put to bed old rivalries between the two companies. In the mid-1970s, when Apple developed its first PC, it threatened to challenge what it called the IBM "dictatorship" at a time when Microsoft was not yet dominating that market.

Now both companies emphasize that their products hardly overlap, as IBM has sold its PC business to China's Lenovo, and Apple does not offer corporate software for its products.

ng/ (Reuters, dpa)