I dunno about Watson, but it is my (inspecific) opinion that at least one state government and at least one upper-middle-sized corporation have a bunch of IBM big iron laying around that they don&#x27;t need.<p>The real burn is, that&#x27;s not JUST an upfront cost...  You pay per month.<p>At the corp, I could not find <i>anyone</i> except the CEO that thought the investment was a good idea.  I figure IBM gifted him a car or something.  Complete speculation, but it&#x27;s the only thing that makes sense!<p>Elsewhere, inspecifically...  At least the machines are used.  But honestly how many giant black modern IBM boxes does it take to fully emulate every single AS&#x2F;400 machine that existed within the entity back in 1996?  A quick look at the specs tells me: 1.  There&#x27;s no way it would take more than one.