Oracle’s Exadata Refresh Ups Ante on Technology and Selling Strategy
The Exadata marketing story is unrelenting, and Oracle backed it with plenty of happy customers for analysts to query at Open World this year. The stories were compelling; I’ll mention a few below. In the analyst pitch, we were shown a couple of dozen logos – good for a still relatively new high-end, long sales [...]
The Industry Speaks about Cloud, Part II: business execs fear its impact on work culture, IT execs doubt their ability to drive competitive advantage
The Cloud Business Services study we just conducted, in conjunction with the Outsourcing Unit at the London School of Economics, has served up some contrasting concerns that business executives are having versus their IT counterparts: its impact on wo…
Observe to Test: Screencasts, Hugs, Selenium, Sauce Labs
Tweet Last Friday Jason Huggins aka @hugs popped into the office to talk about Sauce Labs, a business set up to commercialise the Selenium open source testing framework. Jason is outstanding company- he was showing off arduino-powered 3d plastic gizmos before he even sat down (if you’re looking for a local 3d lazer-cutting shop in [...]
Check in Fatigue
Danny Sullivan wrote up a piece on Foursquare that perfectly encapsulates the issue I have with Foursquare (and their ilk) these days… summed up as “really, who gives a shit?”. I have really made an effort to apply myself to FourSquare and have accumulated a handful of mayorships and a dozen badges in the process… [...]
Heretical Thinking: Enterprise 2.0 is Dead
After reading Dennis Howlett’s piece, “Enterprise 2.0 is beyond a crock. It’s dead,” and Andrew McAfee’s counterpoint, “Social Business is Past Retirement Age,” I found myself in the surprising position of agreeing with Dennis that E2.0 is dead. I’m not suprised because of any issue with Dennis, I’ve been reading and enjoying his work for [...]
Understanding Lumber Liquidators’ ERP failure
Retailer Lumber Liquidators announced disappointing earnings due to “reduced productivity” associated with its SAP implementation. Here’s what really happened.
The CEO is the Decider
“… organizations are becoming more social but perhaps the right application hasn’t come along yet to enable a CEO to be more social in a professional setting.”
Mahindra Satyam eyes big comeback
While the rest of the outsourcing world has been carrying on through challenging times, the most challenged of its citizens, Mahindra Satyam, has been quietly rebuilding a global business under the charismatic and candid leadership of Atul Kunwar.
Is Enterprise 2.0 Dead, or Just Regenerating?
In the BBC’s long-running cult sci-fi series Dr Who, the titular character ‘regenerates’ into a new body once the old one becomes worn out or damaged. It’s a narrative sleight-of-hand that allows the show’s producers to refresh the character each…
The Apple of the eye of the New York Times
A couple of weeks ago I highlighted how mainstream media like the New York Times, Fortune etc write overwhelmingly and fawningly about Apple, Google, Facebook and other consumer tech and largely ignore enterprise tech. One exceptional journalist I identified was Steve Lohr at the New York Times. He often tackles complex tech topics and enterprise [...]
