[EVO X]

Found a recent article that says 50 Mac support staff for 210K devices. http://www.cultofmac.com/449972/ibm-now-uses-macs-company/

[Lagmeister]

This is not just a decision by IBM to convert to Mac. This is a partnership and in that joint venture IBM will take over the sales of Mac. The IT for a Mac then is primarily ‘Cloud based’ which brings up all sorts of questions. Sure, you can cut staff, just like asking people to press ‘one’ for English.

[Swordmaker]

That article is using the same speech by the IBM VP at the James conference as source material:

An update on IBM’s partnership with Apple, which sees it deploying 1,300 Macs every week, was provided at the annual JAMF Nation User Conference on Wednesday. Not only has IBM been pushing Macs, but also over 48,000 iPads and over 81,000 iPhones.

I listened to the entire speech and the dedicated help for Macs at IBM is indeed just 5 IT people for the 90,000 Macs. The rest of the Apple support staff that fills out the additional 45 are for the 127,000 iPads and iPhones deployed throughout IBM's 2800 offices. That brings the total up to the 50 IT staff for the 217,000 Apple devices at IBM reported in the Cult of Mac article of October 19, 2016 you linked.