Believe it or not, the company that became IBM was founded in 1896, and at the moment, IBM has a market cap of around $172 billion.  So it's not going anywhere.  And IBM's CEO - who has been with the organization since 1973 - doesn't think Google will become nearly the behemoth some people have predicted.

Sam Palmisano recently discussed a number of subjects in a wide-ranging interview with Leslie P. Norton.  He devoted little time to the search giant, however, rejecting the idea that Google's tech will ever act as any sort of global backbone or even threaten his company.

Palmisano asked, "Is Google going to become the computing platform for the enterprise?  Is a bank going to run itself on Google?  Is an airline going to run itself on Google?  Is IBM going to run its supply chain on Google?"

He also said, "Is Bharti Wireless going to run themselves on Google?  Is the banking system of China that we've built going to be on Google?  Is the Russian Central Bank [network] that we're building going to be on Google?"

IBM's CEO then provided a very simple answer to all of the questions: "No."

Of course, there are those who believe differently, and Google itself might be among them.  Sherri Davidoff noticed not too long ago that an ad encouraging people to "Learn about Google at Work" bragged, "Over 60% of the U.S. state governments have gone Google."

It may also be worth noting that Google's market cap of about $196 billion is about 14 percent larger than IBM's.

Still, it's hard to imagine how Palmisano could have made his position on the subject of Google's potential dominance any clearer.

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