So says Jim Porell of IBM in this ITBusinessEdge interview.

Mainframes are so off the radar of the average IT department these days, and thus of the industry as a whole, that I don't think I have ever seen a real study done to compare TCO with more common client/server, SaaS, or virtualization solutions. This prompted me to do a search, and it turns out that there are some, and they tend to agree: despite the significant up-front investment, the robustness, singularity, and manageability of mainframes does compare very favorably in TCO terms with newer technologies. As with all TCO arguments, of course, one has to make certain allowances for the environments in which they are done, and realize there is no silver bullet. Still, when is the last time you even saw someone consider bringing in a mainframe? I've never even listed it as an option in a recommendation report... it simply hadn't crossed my mind.

But perhaps I have been remiss. Is it time for a resurgence? Do you secretly yearn for some serious big iron in your server room? Now is the time to take it to the board!