I just wish the hardware was more available. There is precisely one, barely affordable, non-IBM POWER8 system available to buy[2] (if you have $3-4k burning a hole in your pocket). Where are the development boards?
[1] http://research.redhat.com/powerlinux-openpower-development-...
My company runs an IBM POWER7 series system as our ERP/WMS, but that's really only because our vendor sold it as part of a package.
From a user standpoint, POWER architecture just means it will cost me more (on all fronts, from acquisition, to maintenance, to power consumption, etc...). Come upgrade time, it makes it very unlikely I'll be able to unload this system on someone else and recoup anything but a few hundred bucks, sold to someone as a testbench.
When compared to a run-of-the-mill x86 system, POWER doesn't seem to have any real tangible benefits.
Running all cores at full tilt is another story.
On the other hand,IBM have just tried to book three 3-hour long pitching sessions with me so it does not sell itself...
The only niche I can see for a platform that offers maximum performance per-machine at a huge price premium is hard-to-parallelize and legacy applications that need reliable maximum performance in a single box. That's not really that big of a niche these days.
If IBM wants to launch this they're going to have to take a loss to prime the pump: sell the chip at cost or even slightly below cost to get it out there into the market and get people using it. Otherwise it's going nowhere.
That's a shame, they're excellent machines... I guess we'll have to find another sponsor soon.