(I have very limited experience in Mainframe systems to take my comment with a grain of salt) The problem as I see it is IBM wants to have its cake and eat it

(I have very limited experience in Mainframe systems to take my comment with a grain of salt) The problem as I see it is IBM wants to have its cake and eat it too. Typically a Mainframe is leased and then setup onsite. Under this model, it would seem that you would get unlimited use out of it because you’re paying for the power, and it’s literally on site. However by charging per CPU usage, even though you’re using it on site, you still treat it as a “cloud” appliance in terms of pricing If I spin up something in AWS for example, it’s metered yes but that comes to be at the benefit of not having the machine on site and therefore not having to worry about it’s power, upkeep, etc. It would be like a car company selling you a car and then charging you to drive it per mile.