Archive for the ‘Trends’ Category

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Market pressures and organizational maturity drives new master data management (MDM) trends Buy casodex no prescription, Conversations with 31 leading edge organizations seeking business transformation highlight shifts in the MDM trends of the past.  Organizations awash in data need to move beyond the clutter and get to the information.  More data does not equate to more information.  In order to make sense, MDM initiatives now move to align with a new set of focus - business transformation and optimization.  Seven key trends now drive the new world of MDM as we enter a new decade. Epogen price,


  1. Master data management must go vertical to succeed in business. Customers no longer want horizontal solutions.  MDM must tailor to industry specific requirements.  Results must be relevant to how an industry works.

  2. Structured and unstructured content will evolve into the MDM ecosystem, ordering zometa online legally. Kjøp Discount arimidex, Customers seek tools to tie hierarchies and relationships back to unstructured data in the effort to achieve value in information.

  3. Data in the cloud and SaaS will force hybrid approaches. Cloud based and SaaS models change where and how data becomes augmented.  MDM systems must support hybrid models in real-time.  Proven data integration must be a given not an afterthought.  Data integration must be event driven.

  4. Master data management styles no longer matter, cheap casodex, Nevada NV Nev., just the results. Issue of styles get relegated to the IT owner, buy casodex no prescription. Business users seek results and actionable insights.

  5. Data governance and stewardship more important than ever, cytoxan. New Hampshire NH N.H., Processes must align with use cases.  Data hygiene needs to be omnipresent but not cumbersome

  6. Social CRM creates demand for trusted profiles. Organizations now need to understand their advocates and detractors  Today's social and connected world requires more targeted marketing, sales, buy capecitabine, Comprar capecitabine, and service/support programs.

  7. Business optimization and transformation will require MDM to cover more data types. MDM moves beyond customer, Jotta zometa verkossa, Order arimidex overnight delivery, product, accounts, For gleevec online, Acquistare a buon mercato iressa, and employees.  New forms of content such as location, images, cheap cytoxan online legally, Kansas KS Kans., video, and tweet streams will enter the equation.


Expect to see more details on each one of these trends in the coming year, evista discount. Texas TX Tex.,

Your POV


Where are you with your MDM strategy?  Have you deployed?  Are you redeploying?  Do these trends resonate with you ?  Let us know how we can assist or please post or send on your comments to rwang0 (at) gmail (dot) com or r (at) altimetergroup (dot) com and we’ll keep your anonymity.

Copyright © 2009 R Wang, buy cheap casodex online. Cheap iressa online, All rights reserved.

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Event Report: 2009 Information Week 500

Insight From This Year's IW 500 Shows Shifting Role Of The CIO And Technology Adoption

VIP cocktail reception at the IW 500Information Week 500 Gala Awards Dinner Information Week 500 Gala Awards - St. Regis, Monarch Beach, CAInformation Week 500 Awards Ceremony - St Regis, monarch beach, Rob Preston Up Close and Personal - Information Week 500-Information Week 250 Wall of Fame - St. Regis, Monarch Beach, CA

(Source: R Wang & Software Insider POV, Copyright © 2009  All rights reserved.)

Lots of lessons learned amidst the celebration of the leading innovators in IT at the Information Week 500.  In conversations with CIOs these past days, a few trends have emerged:
  • Companies less loyal to existing investments and vendors. Because budgets remain tight and drive most investment priorities, CIO's are now open to new ideas that reduce operating costs -- even if this means replacing existing investments.  CIO's and IT leaders no longer hesitant to move away from established investments.  Conversations with a IW500 financial services CIO put it quite clear, "I don't care how long we've used the stuff.  If it's cheaper, I'm open to it.  Better and faster would be nice too"
  • Economic conditions put SaaS and cloud computing top of mind. CIO's and IT leaders find new service offerings with faster deployment times, lower operating costs, or significant impact to the business users more attractive .  The adoption and interest has past the tipping point.   As one IW500 manufacturing CIO put it, "All the new stuff is going to be on SaaS.  The business wants it and we embrace it, even when our existing vendors tell us they will build that in the future.  We don't have time to wait"
  • Realization that the CIO role continues to evolve. SaaS adoption now allows employees and business units make decisions on their own.  CIO's must still find ways to secure these applications and ensure seamless integration.  Some CIO's seek a single integrated approach, but most realize that their role has changed. A IW500 pharma CIO notes," My role has changed from large ERP implementations or enterprise wide SOA to more vendor management, hybrid integration, and application development."
Your POV What are your organizations doing? Are you seeing similar trends?  Post your comment here or reach me direct at r at altimetergroup dot com or r at softwareinsider dot org. Copyright © 2009 R Wang. All rights reserved.

Trends: What Are The Emerging Technologies And The Future Of Business?

Thanks to the 799 registrants and 458 attendees who participated in today's webinar on The Future of Business.  There's so much to cover across leadership, innovation, customer, and enterprise as we enter a more social, connected business world.   The key thing we learned today was just how interested everyone is about these converging trends that shape the future of business.  To succeed, we'll have to move beyond interest and towards action.  For those who missed out, here are today's slides: The Future Of Business by Altimeter Group
View more presentations from Charlene Li.
Your POV Keep the dialogue going.  Check out the #futurebiz tweets.  What do you see are the key trends?   When do you think we'll get there? Post your comment here or reach me direct at r at altimetergroup dot com or r at softwareinsider dot org. Copyright © 2009 R Wang. All rights reserved.

Tuesday’s Tip: Note To Self – Start Renegotiating Your Q4 Software Maintenance Contracts Now!

Labor Day (US Holiday) traditionally marks the end of summer BBQ's, the beginning of the fall conference season, and yes, the time to begin a review of your software maintenance contacts that expire end of year.   As clients prepare for this seasonal ritual, a few trends in 2009 should set the stage for negotiations:
  • Continued weakness in the economy. Vendor revenues continue to decline as new license sales drop and vendors become more dependent on support and maintenance revenues.  Customers looking to upgrade or commit to new apps can expect vendors to be more generous on the support and maintenance front.
  • Dated and inflexible architecture of legacy applications. Change in business models, workplace dynamics, and macro economic conditions apply new pressures to aging systems purchased pre-Y2K.  Customers seek paths to upgrade but are limited by economic pressures.
  • Vendor awareness of customer discontent with existing support offerings. Customers now seek to understand what value vendors deliver in their support and maintenance agreements.  Many vendors have proactively responded by improving service or making appropriate concessions.
  • Growing acceptance of third party maintenance (3PM) options. Vendors such as Rimini Street and Spinnaker have proven to the market that they can deliver 3PM to an array of ERP applications.  Cutting maintenance fees by 50% or more can free up funds for innovation or pay for the next upgrade.
Align your apps strategy before negotiating contracts - do your homework Contract negotiations strategy should be planned in conjunction with an overall apps strategy.  Begin the process 2 to 3 months in advance.  Make sure the teams have the proper incentives in place.  Take the following steps as you prepare for your maintenance renewals: The bottom line - follow the seven simple steps to successfully negotiating software contracts.
  1. Ensure that the right team is in place
  2. Identify the organization’s key business drivers
  3. Determine the product adoption plan
  4. Consider contract strategy implications of the software ownership life cycle
  5. Align contract strategy with product adoption
  6. Identify leverage points
  7. Prioritize key contract objectives
Your POV Looking to hear your best practices with software maintenance contract renewals.
  • Is your maintenance contract up for renewal at the end of the year?
  • Do you need help putting a strategy in place?
  • Have you conducted an apps strategy assessment?
  • Would you like to break free from your vendor but don't know what options exist?
Post your comment here or reach me direct at r at altimetergroup dot com or r at softwareinsider dot org. Copyright © 2009 R Wang. All rights reserved.

Tuesday’s Tip: Now’s The Time To Consider SaaS Software Escrows

With 2009 rapidly becoming the "Year of SaaS" and the tipping point for Cloud Computing, it's hard not to notice the growing number of SaaS start ups (along with the legacy application vendors rushing to provide an "On-Demand", but not really multi-tenant deployment option).  My snarky SaaS bigotry aside, we can expect hybrid deployment options to be here to stay.  As with the early days of on-premise packaged apps, we have to ask the question, "What to do about the risk in working with fly-by-night SaaS vendors who might not be around in 2011?"  In fact, this was an interesting part of the panel disucssion at the "Honeymoon and Divorce: Changing SaaS Providers" session at Interop with Jerry Smith (CTO of Symphony Services) , Michael Topalovich, (CTO of Delivered Innovation), and Rick Nucci (CTO of Boomi). SaaS escrows provide a key safety net for the SaaS users End users often demand software escrows in the on-premise world when they are concerned about vendor viability, takeover threats, and other related breaches to performance or service level agreements. Software escrows vendors serve as the trusted third party independent organization which holds a copy of the software code.  This often includes user data, source code, documentation and any application executables.  For SaaS escrows, expect a few unique distinctions such as:
  • More frequent intervals of version updates, almost similar to live data backups.
  • Hot backups that the end user can immediately and legally swap to the escrow version without business disruption
  • Requirements for SaaS vendors to provide detailed software configuration management and data management
The bottom line - SaaS code is rented so protect yourself With no access to the code or application when a SaaS vendor goes bankrupt or fails to meet performance requirements, now's the time to ask your SaaS provider if they provide a SaaS software escrow.  This should be included in all criteria during SaaS vendor selection.  Those who provide SaaS escrow deliver an additional benefit - peace of mind that data will be doubly backed up both by the vendor and the software escrow company.
Companies providing SaaS Escrow Services Here's a list of a few vendors in the market.  They have not been rated or reference checked so caveat emptor.  If you provide SaaS escrow services and weren't listed, feel free to add a comment to the post.
For more about how to shape your apps strategy to include SaaS, read the Forrester Report found here. Your POV Have you worried about whether your SaaS vendor will be around in 2011?  Did you successfully enter into a SaaS Escrow agreement?  Considering a SaaS Escrow?  Send me a private email to rwang0 at gmail dot com.  Posts are preferred!   Thanks and looking forward to your POV! Copyright © 2009 R Wang. All rights reserved.

Trends: What Can Software Vendors Do To Reduce The Cost of Ownership?

So as I'm thinking about what to write for this week's Monday's Musings, I thought I'd poll the twitter universe on what software vendors could do to make things easier during the recession.  Here's the current twitter stream of thought and thanks to all of you who emailed!  (last update 11:26 am GMT - 8:00):
Photo_7_normal
rwang0: Contemplating what software vendors can do to work with customers to reduce the cost of ownership in a recession. Any ideas?
about 1 hour ago from web · Reply · View Tweet
Copyright © 2009 R Wang. All rights reserved.

Speaking Engagement: Workday – 2009 Predictions for HR and SaaS

Event Information: 2009 Predictions for HR and SaaS

Event status: Not started (Register)
Date and time: Tuesday, February 3, 2009 10:00 am Pacific Standard Time (GMT -08:00, San Francisco) Change time zone
Tuesday, February 3, 2009 1:00 pm Eastern Standard Time (GMT -05:00, New York)
Tuesday, February 3, 2009 12:00 pm Central Standard Time (GMT -06:00, Chicago)
Tuesday, February 3, 2009 11:00 am Mountain Standard Time (GMT -07:00, Denver)
Duration: 1 hour
Description: Predict and Prepare. Are you ready for 2009?Doing business in 2009 is sure to be full of challenges, especially for HR organizations. But what are the most important issues facing HR professionals in the coming months? Join us as three leading analysts break down their top predictions for the rising importance of SaaS in 2009. Topics include: • Changing requirements for an HR system of record. • Top five considerations for HRIS in the current economy. • Where will HR be spending money in 2009. • Evolution in technology and the move to SaaS as the core system for HR. The roundtable discussion—featuring R "Ray" Wang (Forrester Research), Naomi Bloom (Bloom & Wallace), Jason Averbook (Knowledge Infusion)—will be followed by an open Q&A session. Bring all your questions for our experts to answer!

Trends: Forget Parallel Computing…The Money is in Parallel Servicing

esteban I know this will be hard to believe, but I am a nerd, a geek, a lover of all things technology.  Why, in the old days when Windows 3.x was just beginning I made a few extra dollars building computers from spare parts for fellow students (hey, it was way cheaper and popular back then), not to mention that I am certified in Novell and Microsoft networks (yes, I was a sysadmin at some point in life).  I love technology and I use my knowledge as much as possible. As I was cleaning one of the hard-drives on my computer last week I came across a paper I had written at some point in my life contrasting the use of parallel and serial ports in computers.  Now, this is not a big deal these days with USB, Firewire, and the myriad other connection options - but back then it was the only way to connect.  In this paper, I looked into the technological considerations, including speed, of using one or the other. So, the elevator pitch - parallel ports work, as their name implies, by sending data at the same time through all possible pins or channels with no interruption.  This translates into a top speed of around 4 Mbps.  Serial, on the other hand, work by sending data bits one at the time and waiting for confirmation before continuing.  This reaches a top speed of 115 Kbps.  The difference is somewhere around 12 times faster for parallel ports once you count in things like hexadecimal conversion, acknowledgments and enhanced ports and accelerators. Why am I bringing this up?  I am not trying to date or label myself, I am using this as the starting point for a new model for customer service - parallel servicing.  All the customer service we do today is in serial form.  A customer contacts us, and they wait.  We take one action, they wait.  We solve their problem, we think, and then we wait to make sure it was solved, or we wait for them to come back.  Not only that, but we cannot serve multiple customers at once unless we deploy more “ports” or resources. The concept of parallel servicing is not having to wait, to be able to service customers at a higher speed, with certainty of delivery and better results.  How would you like to be able to service more customers with just your current resources but faster?  Here are three steps to get you there: 1. Proactively Service Customers. I wrote about this many times, talked about it for a long time - and no one listened (it’s OK, I am used to it).  You have the tools, technologies, and know-how to implement proactive service today - with no major investment.  As simple as writing a few triggers for your database, then letting them run their course.  As you get more comfortable you can get more courageous — the sky is truly the limit.  A new patch released? Send an email to people who own the product you are patching.  Complementary product created for your best-selling product? Up-sell.  You can even charge for it in a subscription service!  So many ways to do this… so easy to do. 2. Change your Processes. Yes, I am telling you to change your processes. No, I don’t know how (but would be glad to do the work for you if you want, just call me).  The secret here is to find serial processes that can be converted to parallel processes.  Why would a customer have to wait for one action to take place before a second starts?  Look, you know your processes, you know where you can find actions or functions to improve.  Once you get used to the idea of parallel servicing you will notice more and more areas where it makes sense. 3. Automate. Nothing makes processes go faster than automation - and you can run multiple instances at the same time (sorta like a parallel communication bus).  Look for areas where you can automate to improve the speed of your processes.  In lots of cases, you can turn long processes into sub-second actions on the computer - virtually parallel servicing if there is no delay!  Think about where automation makes sense, and do it. The bottom line - you don’t have to do all this at once. I am a firm believer in evolutionary changes, not revolutionary ones.  Go slow, little by little, and notice the results.  Get more courageous as you succeed.  Do more and see the speed of your service processes improve, then end up with a great example of parallel servicing. What do you think? Interesting enough to try?  Leave me a comment, let me know how it goes… Copyright © 2009 Esteban Kolksy R Wang. All rights reserved.

Monday’s Musings: A Year of Extremes Brings Us Back Full Circle to the Beginning of the Dot.Com Bust

With a few days left in the year, it's hard to believe that 2008 is almost over.  Just like our paltry .401K's and lowered gas prices, it's like we reverted to the Dot Com bust.  Extreme contrasts in positions and tremendous change made 2008 both exciting, suspenseful, and frankly sobering like 2002.  In fact, it wasn't just the pace of change, it was an intensity of change like no other.  For example in the topical areas I cover:
Software vendor economics: End user enterprise apps (ERP) strategy
  • Engaging in large vendor selection projects to reducing the number of vendor suppliers
  • Building the best SOA strategy to figuring out how to justify all the investment
  • Sole sourcing from one vendor to considering purpose built apps
  • Dismissing SaaS as as fad to embracing Cloud Computing as a cost savings tool
  • Adopting standard middleware platforms to exploring PaaS and hybrid deployment options and related integration options
  • Focusing on growth and strategy business drivers to reverting to operational efficiency and compliance business drivers
  • Crafting a long term apps strategy to recession proofing an apps strategy
  • Moving to all packaged apps to reviving custom development
Software Licensing, Pricing, and Contract Negotiations
  • Locking in new license pricing to reducing shelf ware
  • Negotiating on new license prices to zeroing in on the cost of maintenance
  • Focusing on future product road maps  to avoiding the risk of a revenue led software audit
  • Planning for upgrades to contemplating third party maintenance
  • Worrying about vendor consolidation to considering vendor viability and the need for software escrows
  • Thinking about maintenance as an insurance policy to seeking value from maintenance contracts
Master Data Management - Customer Data Integration
  • Contemplating deployment of multiple data entity MDM to proving the value of one data entity with the ambition of multiple data entities
  • Applauding rapid implementation times of 1 year to expecting results in 6 to 8 months
  • Expanding data governance roles to focusing on specific stakeholder data processes
  • Turning to the incumbent ERP vendor for one throat to choke to considering all options
  • Ignoring BI strategy and focusing on enterprise architecture to incorporating BI into MDM projects
Order Management
  • Reducing inventory to improving transportation management costs and back again
  • Focusing on multi-channel selling to driving efficiencies in multi-channel fulfillment in a perfect order
  • Emphasizing partner channels to taking back ownership of distribution
  • Moving away from piecemeal solutions to purpose built order management hubs
Project Based Solutions
  • Considering PPM apps to seeking broader Project Based Solutions
  • Standardizing on project management methodology to reducing the barriers to adoption
  • Deploying only in one option to expecting various deployment options such as mobile, SaaS, and offline
The Bottom Line - Customers Still Have High Expectations For Enterprise 2.0 Apps Despite the bleak economic outlook, like in 2002, we can expect significant innovation to emerge as new business models meet technology innovations.  Conversations with over 1000 end users this year highlight that customers still expect to see Enterprise 2.0 innovations in the next 3 to 5 years, despite any downturn.  The top seven key Enterprise 2.0 innovations include:
  1. Richer user experiences - role based scenarios across various usability paradigms
  2. Business process orientation - support for end to end business processes
  3. Configurable change - designing with flexible models and rules instead of customizations
  4. Actionable insight - pulling all the key information to make a decision in the context of business process and user role
  5. Collaboration - providing secure private interactions and open and innovative connection with stakeholders
  6. Intelligent response - responding to contextual models and business events
  7. Hybrid deployment - deploying all models from on-premise, hosted, instance virtualization, multi-tenant SaaS, and cloud based BPO.
Let's just hope these humble 2009 industry analyst predictions hold some water. Your POV. Do you believe we'll turn the corner like 2002?  Are you experiencing different trends?  You can post here or send me a private email to rwang0@gmail.com. Copyright © 2008 R Wang. All rights reserved.

Monday’s Musings: Can IT Services Firms Shift the Balance of Power To Create Choice for the Customer?

Current Model Lopsided Towards the Large ISV's Rapid enterprise apps vendor consolidation over the past 5 years leave end user enterprises with fewer vendor choices and less competition.  The impact to services firms is a continued and increased dependency on the fortune and "good will" of the software vendor by IT Services firms.  However, ISV's now have the upper hand as IT services firms focus on becoming the "best" partners of the ISV's, not the other way around.  Case in point: the investment IT services firms are making in training and staffing for upgrades, partner solution certifications, and in some cases co-development.  This flow of activity and investment typically has been one way:
  • Requires investment expense by the IT services firm
  • Includes forfeiture of intellectual property rights
  • Provides no exclusive guarantees of go to market rights for any time period.
My question to the service vendors: does this have to be the way moving forward? IT Services Firms Must Respond or Face An Increasingly Dominant ISV's Rapid changes in business models, work force dynamics, geopolitical, and economic concerns, and technology advancements challenge IT Services firms to transform existing business models.  As IT Services leaders respond, they must determine which strategies will reduce the dependency on large ISV vendors while advancing market mind share.  IT services firms during this historical point in time have the opportunity to shift the balance of power in their favor. Seven critical strategies will include:
  1. Earn the role as a strategic adviser. Win on thought leadership, innovation, and relevance.
  2. Dominate a category. Focus on micro specialization pivot points such as industries, geos, market size, and roles.
  3. Build and delivery vendor agnostic IP. Use the power of the cloud (i.e. SaaS, PaaS, and Cloud infrastructure) to deliver solutions without being dependent on any one ISV.
  4. Lead your own solution centric ecosystem. Stop building someone else's ecosystem and focus on who your best partners are, not vice versa.
  5. Deliver on the failed promises of enterprise apps. Earn trust and relevance by focusing on lowering ownership costs, increasing flexibility through better integration, and extending functionality without the legacy packaged apps overhead.
  6. Win over customers with 3rd party maintenance. Like the stifling of software innovation in the 70's and 80's by hardware vendors requiring captive maintenance, software vendors today are stifling business process innovation with captive maintenance.  Have customers pressure vendors into offering third party options.
  7. Leverage social media to generate brand awareness. Build community and user generated content leveraging today's Web 2.0 tools.
The bottom line - IT services providers must win or end user customers will lose. Continued domination by an ever shrinking base of ISV's means that consumers will see reduced choice and market competition.  As SaaS development and delivery costs lower the barrier of entry for new competitors, expect new vendors and choices to emerge.  Should the IT services providers make the transformation, the system integrators will be able to deliver unique IP and provide business process/transformation in the cloud like the service bureaus of the 1990's. Your POV. Do you think services firms have the discipline and skill to make the transition?  You can post here or send me a private email to rwang0@gmail.com. Copyright © 2008 R Wang. All rights reserved.