IBM beats Wall Street expectations with better-than-expected results, even as Q4 2018 revenues drop by -3% Y-o-Y to reach $21.8 billion, since full-year revenues are up by 1% to $79.6bn with strong growth from the cloud and services divisions.

"In 2018 we returned to full-year revenue growth, reflecting growing demand for our services and leadership solutions in hybrid cloud, AI, analytics and security," CEO Ginni Rometty says. "Major clients worldwide, such as BNP Paribas, are turning to the IBM Cloud and our unmatched industry expertise to transform their businesses and drive innovation."

Panduit, a global electrical and network infrastructure solution vendor, announces the acquisition of Atlona in a deal the two companies describe as beneficial for both sides. Financial details are not available.

“Atlona has been at the forefront in developing cutting-edge AV technology that embraces the full potential of the convergence of AV and network infrastructure,” Panduit says. “Their industry-leading solutions complement Panduit’s extensive physical infrastructure portfolio, which will allow us to offer customers a quality end-to-end solution as they move to increasingly complex network infrastructure systems.”

Bose announces the acquisition of ZiipRoom, a developer of productivity and connectivity software for meeting rooms, conferences and devices. Financial details of the deal are not available.

Post-acquisition ZiipRoom will be integrated into Bose Professional, the dedicated group within the company focusing on the needs of professional audio designers, consultants and system integrators. ZiipRoom CEO and co-founder Martin Bodley (formerly of RevoLabs) will lead the the enterprise conferencing category within Bose Professional.

IBM takes to a consumer electronics show to present what it claims is the first "integrated universal approximate quantum computing system" for commercial use in the world-- the Q System One.

The Q System One is housed inside a dramatic glass cube, and features what Big Blue describes as "a sophisticated, modular and compact design optimized for stability, reliability and continuous commercial use." It promises to address one of the challenges involved in quantum computing, namely maintaining the quality of qubits (aka quantum bits, the superposition of 1s and 0s making the basic units of quantum computing) used in quantum calculations. Qubits are apparently delicate creatures, and are easily affected by vibrations, temperature fluctuations and magnetic waves.