Smoke and mirrors...
IBM's Information Management Lab services support (L2 and L3) are done via Markham labs (DB2) in Toronto and Lenexa (Informix). God only knows where IBM's L1 support is being handled.
IBM inherited Informix's 'Follow the Sun' support where there was live L2 and L3 support for Informix products and you'd get someone around the globe for after hours support. DB2 has been always supported out of Markham regardless of the time of day. (This could have changed in the last couple of years, but I doubt it.)
Clearly IBM is starting to realize that People want same shore support and that off shoring of these roles isn't a good idea.
An alien because doing a smart job of creating a global workforce is alien to IBM.