Outbound IBM chief executive Louis Gerstner, the outsider who shook up the staid company and helped guide it into the Internet age, has turned over the reins to replacement Samuel Palmisano, a consummate insider.

Palmisano, 50, joined the formidable sales force of International Business Machines 29 years ago and rose over the years to become a senior manager of Japan operations and head of IBM’s personal computer business. He already was a rising star by 1998, when he got the call to replace the head of IBM’s global computer services business who departed for health reasons. His formidable task was to lead a staff of 135,000 in one of IBM’s fastest growing operations.

In July of 2000, he became IBM president and chief operating officer, charged with the day-to-day operations of the technology giant—very much in the tradition of how succession was done for many years at IBM before Gerstner. With his promotion to chief operating officer, it became clear that Palmisano was being groomed as a possible successor to Gerstner. Palmisano, well regarded in the computer industry, was seen as the heir apparent for years before it became official.

“This appointment reinforces the IBM culture that Gerstner parachuted into, the internal development of successors, and incumbents leaving at age 60,” said Jeffery Sonnenfeld, associate dean at Yale School of Management. “He comes in from the old core business of the culture. He comes from the core of the big-box business,” referring to IBM’s class mainframes.

In fact, Palmisano was hand-picked as long ago as the 1980s, by chief executive John Akers, as his executive assistant, a classic road to the top in the IBM career ladder. He is seen as a bridge between the old and the new IBM.

“About the only thing that Akers and Gerstner agreed on was Sam Palmisano,” said Sam Albert, a former IBM marketing executive who is now president of consultancy Sam Albert Associates.