IT Strategy

February 15, 2007 from Newsfactor.com – “A growing marketplace for ideas, innovations, and uniquely qualified minds is changing the long-standing rules of innovation and talent management. Companies seeking solutions to seemingly insoluble problems can tap the insights of hundreds of thousands of enterprising scientists without having to employ everybody full-time. This shift is rippling through Corporate America and changing the way companies invent and develop products and services.

Take Colgate-Palmolive. The company needed a more efficient method for getting its toothpaste into the tube -- a seemingly straightforward problem. When its internal R&D team came up empty-handed, the company posted the specs on InnoCentive, one of many new marketplaces that link problems with problem-solvers.

A Canadian engineer named Ed Melcarek proposed putting a positive charge on fluoride powder, then grounding the tube. It was an effective application of elementary physics, but not one that Colgate-Palmolive's team of chemists had ever contemplated. Melcarek was duly rewarded with $25,000 for a few hours work…”

180 View – Got any good ideas? Better yet, if you need some, there’s a place to get them.

How Real Is the Software as a Service Phenomenon?

February 2, 2007 from IT Business Edge – “Info-Tech surveyed more than 1,900 IT professionals, including more than 200 recruited by ITBE. In one area of the survey, respondents were asked to quantify the impact of SaaS as a proportion of new software spending over three time periods: two years ago, today, and two years from now.

The results show that SaaS, while still accounting for a modest portion of new software purchases, is a growing force in the industry. This year, on-demand software is expected to account for 20 percent more of your software acquisition budget than it did two years ago. If our respondents’ forecasts are correct, it will grow by a further 30 percent over the next two years. In the near term, the uptake has occurred primarily in small organizations (1-100 employees); these were already about 20 percent ahead of the industry-wide use of SaaS two years ago, and have increased by roughly 25 percent since then.

However, looking forward, it is large accounts that see the greatest proportional future growth. IT professionals in enterprises with more than 1,000 employees believe that although their organizations have been slower to respond to SaaS than smaller firms, they will experience strong growth – perhaps as high as 40 percent – in the proportion of new software acquisition budgets allocated to on-demand products.

180 View – The name has changed from Application Service Provider, but SaaS has now become mainstream. We now typically include SaaS vendors in our RFP’s. They don’t always win the day, but it’s not because the SaaS model doesn’t make sense. It’s more often that the products are not as mature as their on-premise/license-based counterparts.

Two new tools that CIOs want – Virtualization and Software as a Service

May 2006 from The McKinsey Quarterly – “While many promising new technologies vie for the attention of IT leaders and CIOs, only a few of these innovations actually end up improving top-line performance or bottom-line productivity. Our recent survey of senior US IT executives and our experience with clients suggest that companies view two new technologies as highly promising tools for obtaining real business benefits: server virtualization (which helps companies improve the match between their computing capacity and their application workloads, so that they can do more with fewer machines) and software as a service (which allows IT departments to offload the delivery and maintenance of software applications). Companies clearly view these technologies as priorities that promise to help them become more efficient and agile.

Virtualization is a software technology that helps raise the utilization rates of servers. It allows companies to run several different operating systems—UNIX, Linux, and Windows, for example, as well as the applications that run on top of them—on a single machine. Distributed servers running a single operating system typically utilize only about 5 to 15 percent of their full processing capacity. Virtualization can make it possible for companies to boost their average server utilization rates to 40 percent or higher while still meeting peak demand. IT departments can then consolidate their servers, reduce the complexity of their environments, and, over time, buy less hardware (though the servers they do buy may be higher-capacity boxes). Related technologies let a single application run across several machines, further boosting reliability and utilization rates, since a machine that isn't too busy can take some of the load off others that are. Finally, the flexibility to set up and tear down test environments quickly and to move applications across physical servers helps to increase administrative productivity and to reduce hardware outlays still further.

Most companies have already begun consolidating their servers—86 percent of the CIOs we asked cited progress in this area. Virtualization is the next natural move. Consolidation aims to combine multiple instances of identical or similar applications on fewer machines. Virtualization goes a step further by making it possible to run more applications on them and by increasing a company's flexibility, so that it can meet shifting workloads without excess hardware. One CIO with a budget of $600 million told us that his company has virtualized 30 percent of its servers and plans to have 60 percent of them virtualized within two or three years. He expects to reduce capital expenditures during the next server-refresh cycle by 30 percent and to reallocate the savings to different projects.

The other trend cited by the IT executives we surveyed is the delivery of software as a service over the Internet. Rather than purchasing and deploying applications inside the enterprise, many companies are buying access to externally hosted applications, so they pay for the software as they use it. The software-as-a-service model can cut the total cost of deploying some classes of enterprise applications by 30 to 40 percent as compared with the total cost of purchasing and maintaining them in house. Of the senior IT executives we talked with, 38 percent said that they plan to use the software-as-a-service approach during the next 12 months. Popular applications include business software for human-resource management (including payroll), billing and order entry, and sales management, as well as security services that guard against spam and viruses. The range of applications delivered in this mode continues to grow, though to date few companies are using software as a service in systems (such as those for production planning and forecasting) that need a lot of tailoring or customization.

Software as a service differs from the fad of the late 1990s for application service providers (ASPs) because the most successful companies offering this latest generation of hosted software have redesigned their applications for scalable delivery over the Web. In this way, these companies innovate more quickly and thus have lower total costs—and pass the benefits on to their customers. Contrary to some expectations, the acceptance of this model isn't limited to midsize companies with understaffed IT departments; some very large enterprises are among the earliest adopters.

IT executives are shifting to the software-as-a-service model for some applications not only for lower licensing and maintenance fees but also because implementation is usually quicker and companies don't have to maintain special skills in software-specific areas. Some enterprise applications can cost tens of millions of dollars and take 6 to 24 months to implement, and many executives prefer to outsource the task. Web services protocols—transport rules that make it easier to link applications flexibly—are helping to speed this migration: 60 percent of our survey respondents said they were implementing Web services, in some cases to integrate externally hosted applications into their own systems.

Taken together, these two adoption trends indicate that a technology architecture transformation is beginning to take shape in many large and midsize organizations. In the past, CIOs deployed their own self-contained application architectures on their own servers and storage systems. This old model is giving way to a hybrid application architecture that combines hosted functionality with in-house applications running on consolidated and virtualized commodity servers. We believe that this transformation will drive efficiencies across the full stack, from business processes to physical infrastructure, while increasing IT's ability to meet new demands in a rapidly changing business environment. Of course, technology alone won't deliver this vision: IT and business leaders will need to rethink governance models and management processes to take full advantage of new technology trends.”

180 View – This article was recommended to us by a company called FavorData
that builds custom systems. The article discusses two important IT trends - Virtualization and Software as a Service (SaaS). The article says that “few companies are using software as a service in systems that need a lot of tailoring or customization.” We think that we will see more customized SaaS solutions using Service-Oriented Architectures (SOA). SOA enables a network architect to mix and match existing elements (software, data, or processes) to create custom-made composites to better serve the business’s needs. SaaS using SOA - don’t you just love acronyms?

Is XML Past Its Prime?

December 20, 2006 from Enterprise Open Source Magazine – “Is XML overrated? This is a question not asked lightly. It is a heavy and bloated question, much like XML itself. XML has been around since 1997. It is document based and it is extremely verbose. It requires a higher payload across the network and cannot be natively used once it arrives. The XML payload must be consumed in some fashion. None of these activities attribute to the speed of an application…

XML still thrives on the strength of one key factor: its market penetration. As clunky and obtrusive as it may be, XML is still a highly-used standard for data interchange between disparate systems. Most application servers can accept XML and apply some layer of processing to the XML. EDI is a key driver to not only XML's perpetuation, but its very existence.

JSON ("JavaScript Object Notation") is a format that more and more languages are "learning" to consume. It is, as the name implies, a standard object notation. Logic can be created to consume and serialize this notation into language-specific native datatypes. The only limitation to this would be language-specific object instances which cannot be serialized and de-serialized. If more systems were to use JSON for data interchange, in lieu of XML, the payload would decrease and application performance would increase because the parsing of an XML document still outweighs the de-serialization of a JSON string.

Where does this leave the first question? Is XML overrated? There are compelling arguments on both sides of the aisle, but the answer lies in individual preference. If a developer is more comfortable with XML, it will be used. If they are more comfortable with an alternative data interchange format, that format of preference will be used.

Either way, XML will continue to exist; but its days may, indeed, be numbered.”

180 View – For some of our readers, this article will be too technical and they may be wondering why we included it. The reason is that XML is touted by many people as a panacea to solving integration issues and as the tool that will enable B2B eCommerce to become the way to exchange transactions between organizations. We too could be accused of hyping XML. This article shows the warts of XML, which we think are not fatal. By the way, XML stands for eXtensible Markup Language.

The 30 Most Important IT Trends for 2007

November 17, 2006 from CIO Insight – The article breaks out the trends by Strategy, Management, Security/Risk and Technology. There are slides in the article showing the results of 13 surveys taken in 2006. The trends are as follows:

Strategy
1. Process improvement will be job No. 1
2. IT works on closing the sale
3. Companies make their Web sites more engaging
4. Customer service gets a tune-up
5. Companies put their mounds of data to work
6. Information governance gains momentum
7. CIOs strive to be strategic

Management
8. The division between IT and business will diminish
9. CIO compensation keeps climbing
10. IT organizations will keep growing
11. CIOs struggle to find business-savvy technologists
12. Outsourcing changes IT management
13. Outsourcing growth slows
14. Offshoring shifts from India
15. Companies invest in IT leadership
16. Demonstrating ROI will remain a struggle

Security and Risk
17. No abatement of IT security threats
18. Security concerns turn users away from Windows
19. Security morphs into risk management
20. Compliance achieves what government intended
21. Compliance spurs financial process improvement

Technology
22. The move to a new architecture marches on
23. Enterprise applications start losing their luster
24. Data quality demands attention
25. IT reluctantly embraces Web 2.0
26. IT innovation loses traction
27. Business process management services and software will frustrate users
28. For business intelligence, the best is yet to come
29. IT organizations start going green
30. Dissatisfaction with vendors is on the rise

180 View – We also share the view that process improvement will be job No. 1. It’s interesting that process improvement shows up under security and risk. This makes sense to us. Compliance reviews are deemed a bitter poison by most companies and want them done as quickly/cheaply as possible or at least to provide some suggestions to improve business process.

SOA in Plain Language

August 31, 2006 from Datamation – “Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) is big business – and it’s getting even bigger. Heavyweight vendors like IBM and Accenture are promoting it intensely. Forward-looking enterprises are moving to adopt SOA into their business plans.

In the view of SOA’s proponents, Service-Oriented Architecture has the potential to create a revolution in IT departments. It will blur the line between software and service, radically changing the software industry. It will save companies money, greatly increase productivity, and empower network architects to envision brillant new services.

The only thing it can’t do, apparently, is cook an egg in under two minutes. And with time SOA might even develop that capacity.

But amid the growing interest in SOA – and the grand claims about it – plenty of businesses are still wondering: should we get on board? And what exactly is SOA?

Their confusion is understandable. SOA is a buzzword that is defined using buzzwords. The jargon is so deep you need boots to walk through it.

For example, try to decipher this clear-as-mud definition from Wikipedia:

“Service-Oriented Architecture expresses a perspective of software architecture that defines the use of services to support the requirements of software users.”

Huh? Can you put that in English?

Given that SOA vendors are still working to explain this concept to potential clients, a clear, plain language definition is needed. One of the best experts to provide that is Marianne Hedin, an IDC analyst who tracks SOA.

So, Marianne, what is SOA?

“It’s not a technology, and it’s not something you can buy off the shelf,” she tells Datamation. “It’s a paradigm, it’s a shift, it’s an architectural concept. It’s a new way in which you architect your IT environment.”

“But what,” she asks, with a laugh, “does all that mean?”

Good question. So what exactly is SOA?

Interoperability and Integration

SOA’s greatest value is that it allows enormous interoperability between software, information, and processes.

SOA enables a network architect to mix and match existing elements (software, data, or processes) to create custom-made composites to better serve the business’s needs.

Enterprise managers “can create new services for their clients by taking a component from this application and combining it with a component from another application,” Hedin explains. In doing so, “They can create a new type of service, or a new kind of application, that can serve their clients much, much better.”

With SOA, the divisions between proprietary software start to blur. For instance, a network architect can allow users to combine functionality from software by Oracle and Microsoft and Sun all into one composite application. “The name of the game is interoperability,” Hedin says.

The services offered by these various applications become one composite service. Hence the name “Service-Oriented Architecture.”

(IDC will host a forum in September demonstrating that SOA allows interoperability between .NET, BEA’s Web Logic, and Sun’s Java.)

SOA’s ability to combine disparate elements also applies to legacy software and data. So, for example, SOA can help an insurance company more easily tap data that’s stored in outdated 1980s-vintage software.

In fact, SOA enables companies to avoid constant software upgrades, as well as that once-a-decade software overhaul, by allowing employees to more effectively work with legacy applications.

“The architecture allows you to do a lot of integration of disparate systems, regardless of the age,” Hedin says.

Related to (But Separate from) Web Services

Say a Web site wants to sell airfares from many airlines. The site allows users to book a hotel room, rent a car, and buy concert tickets in the destination city.

“In order to be able to provide that kind of service to the client, that Web site had to be able to integrate multiple applications together, and many pieces of information from disparate systems,” Hedin says. “They have all kinds of technology they want to take advantage of there.”

With SOA “Even if the [the data streams and software] are all different, different codes, etc, they can all talk to each other. They can be combined and integrated.”

(Note: This functionality can be combined without SOA, but it’s much easier to combine disparate data and applications using SOA.)

The standards that have been adopted for Web services, like SOAP and REST, enhance and expand SOA’s capability.

However, “You can have an SOA architecture without Web services,” she notes. “But with Web services you can leverage SOA much more effectively because you have the interfaces that help you with the integration.”

In sum, SOA really does create something of a revolution in the data center. SOA turns a network comprised of discrete elements – purchased over several years, held together by rubber bands and band-aids – into a refreshed and ever-flexible source of business solutions.”

180 View – If you still don’t understand SOA, you’re SOL.

Is there real business value behind the hype of SOA?

June 19, 2006 from ComputerWorld - "The No. 1 business priority for CIOs in 2006 is business process improvement 1 -- implementing technology to help the business become more streamlined and easier to do business with. The good news is that IT executives realize that collaborating with business leaders to drive business process improvements is vital to company success; the bad news is that even though business/IT alignment has been a top priority for the past eight years and IT organizations are transforming, the issue of business/IT alignment remains.

Now comes service-oriented architecture (SOA) with promises to change the way that IT helps drive business process improvements and even how IT and business work together. The idea behind SOA is that a services-centric application and IT infrastructure can be assembled flexibly to support changing business demands, growth and innovation. But is SOA just another vendor initiative to sell more hardware, software and services, or is it truly an industry-changing construct? In other words, is there real business value behind the hype?

SOA is being sold as a flexible way to configure all IT assets, both current and future, so that each is available as a service. SOA is supposed to provide the foundation for rapid, dynamic adaptation to changing business conditions.

The ills SOA is meant to cure are well known. Application and infrastructure investments have created islands, with applications developed to support a specific business function or need -- a payroll application, say, or an order-entry application. The IT group works with the business to identify a specific business process need, then procures, develops or customizes software to solve the problem. It deploys the software on dedicated server and storage hardware. Later, when the business realizes that these islands need to communicate and interact with one another, large integration projects are undertaken. And when the applications are modified, vendor enhancements, upgrades and support are all in jeopardy. In the end, much of the dedicated capital investment in hardware and purchased software has been underutilized, highly customized and inflexible to change.

With SOA, the organization begins by trying to better understand business processes, mapping out various process steps and then devising Web service-enabled applications and integrations in support of these steps. Process improvement has its roots in the Total Quality Management movement in the late '80s, but the goal of process automation wasn't possible until the Internet became part of a global network that can provide a foundation for program-to-program communication and standards-based information exchange. Today, Web service enablement allows for application components to deliver data and processing to other applications. And as the library of service-enabled applications grows, each service can be reused to optimize other business processes…

The coverage SOA has received recently may make it seem like pure hype. However, the benefits are tangible and substantial. Those who have taken even minor steps on the road to implementing SOA are reaping immediate IT cost reductions and incremental business benefits. Those that have gone farther down the road, embracing enterprisewide implementation of service-oriented applications and a service-oriented, virtualized infrastructure, are finding that they have made a fundamental change in the way IT and the business invest in technology and work together.

180 View - The article gives an example of Visa with "savings said to total $52 million a year in direct operating costs and $300 million in ancillary savings" using SOA. Unfortunately it's so easy to find numbers that support a business case especially when the numbers come from the people responsible for the project. In the VISA example, a paper based system was replaced. Perhaps, the savngs would have been even more with a different technology.

CIO spending in 2006 - ERP, BI...

February 2006 from McKinsey Quarterly - "47 percent of the respondents say they are budgeting substantial investments in ERP for the coming year. The top priority is sector-specific enhancements to basic ERP platforms. Most large companies have already implemented the basic elements of ERP systems to manage materials and core operating processes and to generate financial metrics. Now many CIOs report that they are building extensions to these systems to improve the productivity of sector-specific operating processes and to address competitive issues in their industries...

CIOs also plan to invest more in business intelligence tools, including applications that extract data from ERP systems and allow users to analyze customer or market trends in finer detail. And they are enhancing the finance and accounting modules of their ERP systems to comply with governance regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley." For the rest of the article, click here.

180 View - We also see a trend to making the most of what you have rather than starting all over again.

EDI On Demand

March 07, 2006 from E-BUsinesss News - "We are focused on applying our vision of Software as a Service (SaaS) to bear on EDI and the gamut of EDI related issues, as well as to other services for suppliers and retailers. To that point, we are not a VAN or software company... We are seeing that SaaS is being accepted much more widely because of the likes of SalesForce.com have driven the awareness of the viability of this kind of service... We are finding that more people are frustrated by handling the details of EDI on their own and we are seeing more and more software ripouts... companies eliminating their existing EDI software installations and replacing them with hosted services." For the rest of the article, click here.

180 View - We don't know the company, SPS Commerce, that is discussed in this article. But we do think they have a good idea.

Oracle's New Enemy

February 15, 2006 from Forbes - "Mårten Mickos may give away his software, but that doesn’t mean his competitors aren’t taking him seriously. His MySQL has raised $39 million in funding, claims to have more than 8 million installations of its database software, and counts Alacatel, Google, and Yahoo! among its customers; they get free software but pay the company for support and maintenance.

MySQL’s success has caught the eye of mighty Oracle, which is now buying its way into the same open source business: This week Oracle bought open source vendor Sleepycat, and observers expect it to close a deal on JBoss, another open source company, as early as today. The acquisitions are likely to let the database giant offer its own free, open source database for smaller customers." For the rest of the article and an interview with Mickos, click here.

Tech Titans Launch Ajax Initiative

February 2, 2006 from CIO Today - "The primary advantage of Ajax -- which stands for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML -- is that it eliminates the need to refresh a browser manually to send or receive information over the Web. Rather, information is automatically updated and available on-demand, allowing users to "drag and drop" or input data and get a response, in effect replicating the use of desktop applications." For the rest of the article, click here.

180 View - One of the reasons we have seen only a few web-based applications is that the user interface is not as rich as the traditional client server version.

IT professionals need to know more about business

December 19, 2005 from ComputerWorld - "Top managers at Marriott and Whirlpool believe that their staffers will better understand the breadth and depth of the organization by going into the field with the business people. New IT managers in Marriott's Information Resources (IR) Field Services organization must work in one of the company's hotels for a week. They shadow people in various business functions such as sales, the front desk, engineering, food services and housekeeping.

"New associates get a real taste of what it's like to have to work and manage these different areas, and it helps them understand how technology makes the functions more cost-effective and efficient," says Wendell Fox, senior vice president of North American IR Field Services. At Whirlpool, every IT person is encouraged to tour manufacturing facilities or ride in a service truck -- not just once but on a recurring basis. "Everyone needs to be understanding the needs of our customers," says Urban." For the article, click here.

Software Revolution?

December 6, 2005 from InfoWorld - "If Marc Benioff, CEO and founder of Salesforce.com, is the biggest spokesperson for SaaS (software as a service), then Greg Gianforte, CEO and founder of SaaS CRM competitor RightNow Technologies, is in the avant-garde of that software revolution, adding open source to the war on packaged apps... RightNow is not as large as Salesforce.com, but it does have some heavyweight clients. It handles all the online queries for the Social Security Administration and Medicare Web sites, to name two examples, and it does it all on a single instance of the MySQL database...

Yes, bringing someone in to fix a problem with open source software will still cost you $300 an hour, but the real win comes when you don’t have to pay 25 percent of the cost of your software license in yearly maintenance costs and your products aren’t forcibly sunset on you. Between that and having access to the source code, IT definitely has more control.

There is a caveat to this rosy picture... Open source companies have historically operated on margins that are thinner than proprietary companies, which doesn’t necessarily bode well for their futures. They don’t have much buffer compared with a company such as Oracle that generates a lot of cash. Can such a company generate enough revenue to weather a major competitive storm or a short-term software problem? A customer relying on a SaaS solution provider that builds its platform on open source may be trading future risks for short-term, tactical cost savings. That said, SaaS and open source together are a juggernaut, the rewards of which may outshine its risks." For the article, click here.

XML Is Taking Over the World

September 23, 2005 from CIO Today - "XML is taking over the world as we know it, having become the foundation of almost all of today's Web services and most service-oriented architectures. XML is not a technology per se; it's a programming language that supports developers devising their own custom tags for Web information. This allows that information to be shared by XML-aware applications that can interpret the tags and organize the data accordingly.

Recently we've seen a spate of watershed XML-related events: 1 ) Microsoft announced the next version of Microsoft Office, code-named Office 12, will have XML as its native file format. Say goodbye to .ppt, .doc and .xls. These "default" XML file formats are designed as an extension of the WordprocessingML and SpreadsheetML schemas and will be interoperable with the binary formats of Office 2000 and later." For more, click here.

Software as a Service

June 22, 2005 from CFO.com - "In total, worldwide spending on SaaS (software as a service) exceeded $4 billion last year and is expected to grow to $10.7 billion by 2009, according to IDC. In an IT environment where many vendors are learning to live with single-digit growth, that's an eye-popping CAGR of 21 percent, a figure that leaps to 40 percent when looking at major services companies such as IBM...

SaaS comes in two basic flavors. "Net-native" or "Web-native" companies develop their own applications and design them to be run via the Web for a multitude of clients. Other companies don't develop their own programs, but simply take over the management of applications that customers have already licensed from traditional vendors. The latter approach is how most ASPs operate today; customers still buy software outright, but arrange to have it run from remote data centers, saving on infrastructure, manpower, and other support costs. Currently, the market is divided about equally between vendors that have developed their software expressly for the Net and those that simply host standard programs in their own data centers, according to IDC analyst Amy Konary. But she believes the Web-native approach will eventually win out.

Whether developed specifically for remote hosting or simply hosted to eliminate the cost of acquiring and managing infrastructure, the appeal of on-demand software lies in its speedy deployment, low up-front costs, and overall promise of savings. When a customer licenses software for on-premises use, it pays an up-front fee, along with ongoing yearly maintenance costs that typically run to 15 percent or more of the initial licensing fee. Additionally, the customer must acquire the hardware and supporting systems (such as a database) to run the application, and will most likely need to employ pricey consultants to get things up and running. That makes for hefty overhead, but companies have usually been willing to pay it because they feel it buys them maximum control...

But the SaaS model does face some major hurdles — technology, for one. As Andy Stern, CEO of USi, explains, software written expressly for the Web has thus far appealed chiefly to small and midsize businesses. "Today, most of the Net-native products aren't fully capable enough for a billion-dollar company," he says, adding that they tend to lack the rich feature sets and customization capabilities that large enterprise customers often require. They can also be difficult or impossible to integrate with other applications and to modify as internal business processes change. And the programs aren't dubbed "Net-native" for nothing: while the Internet is a very low-cost way to provide access and essentially share one program among many customers, it also creates a host of security concerns. "This is an issue for us," says Kim Perdikou, CIO at Juniper Networks, which does subscribe to some SaaS services. "I'm concerned about the security of customer and company data, that it not be copied or interfered with or compromised in any way"...

The remote hosting of software applications offers users many benefits. These include lower up-front costs, speedy deployment, free maintenance and upgrades, and perhaps best of all, no need for pricey know-it-all consultants. But there are risks in embracing software as a service (SaaS). Here are three key considerations that can't be overlooked:

Service-level agreements. What level of uptime will a remote host guarantee, and how quickly will it respond to a problem? Many customers insist on negotiating guaranteed uptime. If a provider, for example, falls short of 99.9 percent (or some other agreed-on level of) uptime, there should be some negotiated penalty to compensate the customer.

Data security. Although SaaS vendors invariably emphasize the resources they devote to security, many customers remain uncomfortable with their employee and customer data flying over the Internet, not to mention potentially residing on the same data-center server as their rivals'. "Look at security. Do the due diligence. Make sure the vendor has the right premises and that protecting your data is its top concern," counsels David Brooks, director of CRM at Magma Design. Juniper Networks CIO Kim Perdikou insists on modifying SaaS contracts so that she has the right to do periodic security audits.

Customization capabilities. Does your changing business process require more tweaking of the software than a remote host can — or is willing to — provide? Or do you need (or plan) to integrate the capabilities of the software with in-house applications or other software that you may subscribe to? Either one of those can be a deal-breaker. For the article, click here.

The Developing Electronic Invoicing Market

2005 from gtnews.com - "Electronic invoicing (e-invoicing) is not a new phenomenon - it has been around for over a decade but has not yet reached the point of market penetration that makes it an ubiquitous technology. The benefits of e-invoicing are well-touted. For the buyer receiving e-invoices, benefits include cost reductions (through improved efficiency in the back office); more accurate financial reporting and forecasting; improved cash flow management; support for corporate governance initiatives; and faster VAT reclamation. The supplier sending invoices enjoys advantages such as assured invoice delivery, faster invoice processing and fewer disputes.

Beyond these commercial motivations, governments across Europe have also been keen to promote e-invoicing. The EU Invoicing Directive, which came into effect in January 2004, stipulates that all member states must accept the use of e-invoices (legislation previously required paper invoices). From a government's perspective, e-invoicing is a way to promote commerce, reduce the costs of doing business, improve the efficiency of collection and reclamation of tax, as well as improve public sector purchase-to-pay operations themselves.

Despite the obvious business case for e-invoicing, the majority of the 18 billion invoices processed in Europe are still printed on paper and sent by post, while the same is true for 22 billion paper invoices in the US. Are finance departments happy to continue to deal with paper invoices in a well-established legal and operational environment or are there barriers in the market preventing further widespread adoption of e-invoicing? This report looks at the opportunity for e-invoicing, the dynamics of the market and how it is developing." For more including electronic invoicing solutions, click here. (requires free registration)

Introduction to SQL Server Report Builder

From developer.com - "By now you probably know that there are a lot of fancy new high-end features coming in Microsoft SQL Server 2005. But in its quest to conquer the data center, Microsoft hasn't forgotten the end user. In fact, there are more new features for desktop users and business analysts than ever before. One good example of these features is Report Builder. For the first time, SQL Server is shipping with an end-user reporting tool right in the box. After a little setup by the DBA, your end users can create their own attractive and informative browser-based SQL Server reports (assuming you've installed the Reporting Services component of SQL Server). There was nothing comparable in previous versions of SQL Server, and the new capability looks likely to be a big hit." For the article, click here.

IT Gets Down to Business

June 22, 2005 from CIO Update - "The uptake in interest in business processes and related technology has hit the business side in a big way. So big that the CIO is stepping in to make sure that a hodge-podge of unworkable technology silos don’t emerge from a bunch of ad-hoc projects getting funded using different technologies and standards.

CIOs are smart people, after all. They realize that the only way a process-deficient enterprise will succeed in turning its un-automated processes into smoothly running software will be to make sure that everyone is singing from the same technology hymnal.

And sing they will. The nice thing about the CIO as business process traffic cop is that it’s exactly what’s needed in a world where process and software and business all blend together in pursuit of greater efficiency and effectiveness.

Whereas the business side can be left to buy a $300,000 point solution that can return $900,000 in value in 10 months, it’s never a good idea to let individual business managers begin to dictate changes that will impact technology and infrastructure choice across the enterprise." Click here for the article.

Top 5 Technology Projects in 2005

May 23, 2005 from Baseline - "According to Baseline's survey of 1,270 readers, most organizations this year are writing their biggest checks for projects to extend systems they've already deployed. No. 1 on the list of Top 5 Projects for 2005: application integration. An average of $12.1 million is expected to go to such projects by those who deemed integration one of the "most critical" technologies at their company. For this group, the top priority isn't rolling out a brand-new system, but connecting previously isolated systems...

In second place is business analytics (average spending: $11.1 million), software that finds new patterns in existing sets of data. Enterprise portals, at No. 3 ($6.8 million), are designed to present data in easily accessible and customizable Web sites for employees or customers. Companies planning projects in category No. 4, customer relationship management ($6.6 million), say they're primarily building new ways to distribute and analyze customer information they already have. Rounding out the survey's Top 5, at $6.3 million, is intrusion detection and prevention: systems designed to protect networks from new strains of fast-moving attacks." Click here for the article.

Software was the leading venture-capital investment in 2004

March 17, 2005 from Business Week Online - "Despite some recent high-profile mergers and the inevitable speculation that they are signs of broad industry consolidation, the $190 billion software industry is expanding, not contracting...

Here's what happened in 2004: Private-equity firms invested $1.1 billion in first-time funding for more than 200 software companies, according to the National Venture Capital Assn. (NVCA).

And here's what didn't happen: Software did not stop being essential to streamlining and integrating strategic business operations. The typical enterprise has deployed thousands of software applications. Making them all work together is a profound challenge.

"INFLECTION POINT." Why? Because companies know that they must have top-notch performance across their entire computer networks, not within particular, so-called vertical functions. That requires the horizontal integration of varied systems, combined with sophisticated software tools and business intelligence analysis programs to allow the real-time use of all the information software generates.

This desire to integrate is creating pressure -- and strong incentives -- for software providers to expand beyond their traditional areas of expertise. Some have responded with new products, others have acquired expertise they want from smaller firms. So rather than reaching maturity, the industry has come to an "inflection point." We're not going to see clients buy software just to boost productivity. Instead, they'll invest in software (and services) to redesign business models and the way work gets done.

That shift is creating opportunities across an industry as a complex "ecosystem" of newer, small companies align with more established players. Software companies -- thousands of them around the world -- may compete with one another when selling products, but partner together in establishing standards that allow systems to work together.

GLOBAL REACH. According to the NVCA, software was the leading venture-capital investment in 2004, with $5.1 billion invested, or 24% of all venture-capital dollars. That's not the investment profile of a contracting market. Expansion is fueled by programming standards and open-source software, which lower the barriers to entry. Click here for the article.

IBM ends 2004 with most profitable quarter in its history

January 19, 2005 from Datamonitor - "If you were wondering why IBM has been shedding business units in recent years, the title of this article sums it up. The Big Blue of old was interested in controlling the IT market and wringing huge profits from that control. In recent years, as Timothy Prickett Morgan explains, IBM has shed its less profitable businesses and launched itself into other areas...

In the fourth quarter, IBM booked $27.7 billion in worldwide sales, up 6.8%, and brought $3.04 billion to the bottom line, up 12.2%...

Mark Loughridge, IBM's chief financial officer, said in a conference call with Wall Street analysts that IBM's business transformation outsourcing, engineering and technology services, strategy and change consulting, and business performance management software units - the leading edge products of the evolving IBM - had sales of over $3 billion for all of 2004, an increase of 45%. You can see now why IBM decided to focus on these areas and ditch various commodity hardware businesses...

For the full year in 2004, IBM had revenues of $96.5 billion, up 9.1%, and net income of $8.4 billion, up 11%."

By now, you must have heard that IBM spun off their PC division to China-based Lenovo Group. IBM has reinvented itself with its focus on services over hardware. Unfortunately after writing this, we have been unable to retrieve the article again, and therefore have not provided a link to the source document.

Is this the end of IT as we know it?

November 26, 2004 from InfoWorld - "Halsey Minor, CEO of hosted integration provider grand central Communications, has a powerful message for IT: “In four years, ... basically the whole notion of enterprise application software is going to be dead.” He believes application functionality will instead be available as hosted, pay-per-use services delivered by companies such as Salesforce.com...

Marc Benioff — CEO of Salesforce.com, which originated the “no software” marketing campaign — offers a similar view. “Enterprise software is dying out,” he says. “Look at companies like IBM, which says things should be delivered on demand, and Oracle saying things should be delivered on demand. Even Siebel, who for years and years said it would never happen, is now saying it has to happen...

Although the on-demand model is still evolving, many of the problems that scuttled the first round of ASPs have been or are being solved... And various technologies — much of them developed by a handful of ASP survivors — are making hosted provider platforms more reliable, scalable, and secure... Such advances lead many to identify on-demand software as the next big thing, although the number of current deployments is tiny compared with the software market as a whole...

Ask any on-demand partisan about the integration issue, and you’ll hear two words: Web services. As SOA (service-oriented architecture) and Web services spread across enterprises and as on-demand providers outfit their offerings with Web services interfaces, data-level integration gets easier inside and outside the enterprise...

In the end, the fear that an on-demand provider could fail remains the biggest single obstacle to large-scale enterprise adoption of software as a service. One can argue, as Grand Central’s Minor does, that on-demand providers can afford to invest in redundancy and uptime at levels individual enterprises can only dream of achieving. Maybe so, but customers must be confident that the provider is doing everything right with its architecture, core technologies, security, and choice of partners. IT has a natural resistance to losing control — and to losing personnel." Click here for the article.

Just Speechless

December 1, 2004 from Forbes.com - "At home on a PC, the communications method of choice is instant-messaging programs, such as the free services offered by America Online--a division of Time Warner (nyse: TWX - news - people )--Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) and Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO - news - people ). These PC-based messaging tools are hugely popular. According to a survey performed by Jupiter Research, a whopping 71% of consumers between the age of 13 and 17 use instant-messaging programs on their computers. "We feel like IM is the communication medium of choice for the kid generation," says Frazier Miller, director of product management for Yahoo Messenger. Teens were the vanguard for instant messaging and now tend to be heavy users, keeping multiple windows open and conducting several simultaneous conversations with friends... When they can't be near a PC, kids use their phones to trade text. According to the Yankee Group, more than half of all teens between the ages of 13 and 17 are active users of wireless text messaging, sending blurbs using the "SMS" short message service. And since cellular carriers often charge as much as 10 cents per SMS, these communications represent a huge and growing revenue stream. In 2004, revenues from SMS will total $1.5 billion in the U.S., according to research firm IDC. By the end of 2005, they'll surge to $2 billion."

I suspect that most readers of our newsletter are like me, and don't like the idea of being interrupted while working or communicating with someone. Are we old fashioned in our thinking or do we have a higher quality of work and communication? Click here for the article.

Blogs

December 3, 2004 from ITBusiness.ca - "The term blog, short for Web logs, was reportedly coined in 1999 by Peter Merholz, at the time a creative director at Epinions. Blogging has since been embraced by many big name high-tech firms such as Microsoft Corp., Sun Microsystems Inc., HP Co. and IBM Co. While estimates for the number of blogs in existence are all over the virtual map, at least one source, PubSub Concepts Inc. in New York, has said that it’s now tracking over 6.5 million blogs.

This has been a banner week for blogs. According to Merriam-Webster's online dictionary, "blog" is the most requested definition, and on Wednesday Microsoft launched a service called MSN Spaces to allow users to create their own blogs and track others.

Microsoft itself has more than 1,000 bloggers in its ranks. Craig Flannagan, senior marketing manager for MSDN at Microsoft Canada Co. in Mississauga, Ont., said that he uses his blog to connect with the Canadian developer community.

"(Blogging) is important because it (enables) more connectivity," said Flannagan. "It’s a more transparent way of talking. . . . No editor, no copywriter. It’s a more personal way." Click here for the article.

And from Fortune Magazine "Why There's No Escaping the Blog - Freewheeling bloggers can boost your product—or destroy it. Either way, they've become a force business can't afford to ignore...Early in the evening of Dec. 1, Microsoft revealed that it planned to take over the world of blogs—the five-million-plus web journals that have exploded on the Internet in the past few years. The company's weapon would be a new service called MSN Spaces, online software that allows people to easily create and maintain blogs. It didn't take long for the blogging world to do what it does best: swarm around a new piece of information; push, prod, and poke at it; and leave it either stronger or a bloody mess.

Typically Microsoft would have taken the hits and kept powering forward. That is the Microsoft way. For years such behavior has done little but make people feel defenseless against the company. But this time Microsoft deployed one of its most important voices to talk back: not Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer, but Robert Scoble.

Scoble has been at Microsoft only 19 months and has neither a high-ranking title (he's a "software evangelist" who works with outside programmers) nor such corporate perks as a window in his office. What Scoble does have is a blog of his own, Scobleizer, on which he weighs in daily with opinions about happenings in the tech world—especially the inner world of Microsoft. On a recent day he posted nine remarks, each averaging a paragraph, on topics ranging from how a company programmer had fixed a security bug to the fact that his wife is becoming a US citizen. Nothing too profound or insightful, yet Scobleizer has given the Microsoft monolith something it has long lacked: an approachable human face.

When it came to the criticism emanating from Boing Boing, Scoble simply... agreed. "MSN Spaces isn't the blogging service for me," he wrote. Nobody at Microsoft asked Scoble to comment; he just did it on his own, adding that he would make sure that the team working on Spaces was aware of the complaints. And he kept revisiting the issue on his blog. As the anti-Microsoft crowd cried censorship, the nearly 4,000 blogs linking to Scoble were able to see his running commentary on how Microsoft was reacting. "I get comments on my blog saying, 'I didn't like Microsoft before, but at least they're listening to us,'" says Scoble. "The blog is the best relationship generator you've ever seen." His famous boss agrees. "It's all about openness," says chairman Bill Gates of Microsoft's public blogs like Scobleizer. "People see them as a reflection of an open, communicative culture that isn't afraid to be self-critical." Click here for the Fortune article.

And click here for a link to BoingBoing - a directory of Blogs.

Although we read great things about Blogs, I get the feeling that Blog readers must have lots of spare time.

Open source software

November 30, 2004 from infoconomy.com - "Open source software has evolved to become the single greatest threat to Microsoft and, increasingly, to other sections of the business software industry. The reason: the model has now reached a stage where organizations are proposing to use the free software to build most, if not all, of the core elements of the enterprise software stack - from the operating system, through database technology and application and web servers, to content management systems and (soon) business intelligence software." Click here for the article.

Web services the latest next big thing?

November 2004 from the Bottom Line - "Would you believe that Web Services is the most hyped technology on the planet? Would you believe that "48 percent of U.S. enterprises have already deployed Web Services, and another 39 percent are planning to do so in 2005" according to a recent study by the Yankee Group? This article is written for those accountants, who have either not heard of Web Services or don't understand what it means. Don't feel bad if you don't know what it means as there is a lot of confusion about this technology - even the terminology is confusing..." For the article written by Michael Burns, click here.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Primer

Mid-November 2004 from the Bottom Line - "Although it has been around for over 30 years Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) has climbed from relative obscurity to become one of today's most discussed retail technologies. When Wal-Mart announced, in June 2003, that it was going to require its top 100 suppliers to track shipments to them by using RFID technology-instead of bar codes-by January 1, 2005, it sent a shock wave through the retailing and logistics industries. Just as a bar-code scanner reads a label's universal product code (UPC), radio-frequency identification (RFID) readers get information from an electronic tag that transmits signals containing data about the product. But because the new system requires only proximity, not the line-of-sight accuracy of a bar-code scanner, palettes of products can cycle through warehouses and onto trucks faster...." For the article written by Michael Burns, click here.

PalmOne-Microsoft Deal Not Good For Good

October 5, 2004 from Forbes - "Microsoft and PalmOne today announced a partnership that will likely have a negative impact on Good Technology, a well-capitalized startup with eyes on a public offering. PalmOne said it has licensed Microsoft's Exchange Server ActiveSync technology, giving users of the Treo smartphone direct, wireless access to corporate e-mail without the need for third-party technology. Forthcoming versions of the Treo, due this fall, will have the technology built in. Until now, Good Technology had the market cornered. Its servers and software sit between a company's Exchange e-mail server and the Treo, and serve up corporate e-mail to the phone. Its system also automatically synchronizes a user's mobile e-mail and calendar with a desktop.

Four-year-old Good, which has raised more than $140 million in venture funding, is one of the more promising startups to emerge in recent years. It followed on the heels of a market created by Research in Motion, the Canadian company behind the wildly popular BlackBerry devices. According to Kevin Burden, an analyst at IDC, unit sales of BlackBerry devices through the first half of this year more than quadrupled over last year to 960,000. By year's end, RIM will introduce an add-on product for the Treo that gives users wireless access to e-mail, further watering down Good's advantage in that particular segment..."

Even a "Good" idea is not always enough to be successful. Click here for the article.

Deloitte Offers Guidance Manual for SOX Section 404

September 2, 2004 from accountingweb.com - "As the Sarbanes-Oxley Act marks its second anniversary, Deloitte & Touche LLP says many public companies are struggling to meet the upcoming compliance deadline for reporting on the effectiveness of internal control over financial reporting, as required under section 404 of the law. In a recent study released this month by the Center for Continuous Auditing at Texas A&M University shows that half of large U.S. companies polled are still less than 60 percent complete in meeting their Sarbanes-Oxley section 404 filing requirements. Anticipating this challenge, Deloitte & Touche released Taking Control, a comprehensive guide to section 404 compliance." Don't expect to be able to provide SOX services from this guide. If anything, you will go running to Deloitte or a similar organization. For the guide, click here.

Insourcing? JPMorgan Reverses Outsourcing Deal With IBM

September 15, 2004 from InformationWeek - "JPMorgan Chase & Co. plans to undo a technology outsourcing deal with International Business Machines Corp., taking back about 4,000 employees and contractors from the computer giant. The bank's technology operations, including data centers, help desks, and telephone networks were fully outsourced to IBM in April 2003. The seven-year deal was valued at $5 billion when it was signed in December 2002, making it one of the largest outsourcing contracts ever. In a press release Wednesday, JPMorgan Chase said it will begin to transfer the workers back to the company in January." This could be a new trend or it may be based on a merger earlier this year between JPMorgan Chase and Bank One Corp. For the article, click here.

An executive guide to Knowledge Management

From darwin - The article explains Knowledge Management (KM) and includes challenges of KM, buzz words, metrics, a case study, hot questions, and ROI data. Check it out by clicking here.

Are accounting firms moving away from technology consulting?

July 2004 from Accounting Technology - This short article, containing quotes mostly from CPA firms, shows the trend is away from technology consulting. The reasons appear to be 1) lack of profits, 2) IT complexity, and 3) independence issues. As well, based on personal experience, many accounting firms don't have enough opportunities that originate from their own client base to sustain a technology practice. Therefore the technology practice needs to find clients outside the client base, but technology people are often not good at marketing, and the accounting firm's marketing activities are typically not helpful to the technology practice. All this is really good news for 180 Systems, which can complement an accounting firm and not pose a threat to an accounting firm's core business. For the article, click here.

The long view on Longhorn (Microsoft's next operating system)

July 16, 2004 from InfoWorld - "In its first preview at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference last fall, Windows XP successor Longhorn was shown running a 20-year-old copy of Visicalc. Ancient DOS software won't be the lone occupant of the Longhorn compatibility box. Win32, the Web, and even WinForms -- the .Net era's first GUI framework -- are all legacy APIs from Longhorn's perspective. Their replacements, Microsoft says, will jointly deliver "the best of Windows and the best of the Web."

The article talks about Longhorn as unifying Windows and discusses its 3 pillars - Indigo (Communications), WinFS Windows File System) and Avalon (user interface). Indigo will use XML messaging to connect services, applications, people, and devices. WinFS will include a relational database to optimize searching and organizing information. Avalon will combine video, animation, 2-D and 3-D graphics, rich document display... For more on Longhorn, click here.

July 14, 2004 from ZDNet - "Speaking at the company's annual partner conference in Toronto on Tuesday, Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer argued that promising a delivery date for Longhorn that the company couldn't actually hit would be unfair for customers and partners and would make the whole Windows upgrade cycle even more painful. "We are going to be as transparent as we can be, but we are not promising a final ship date today," he said. Microsoft has been persistently vague on when the various server and desktop versions of Longhorn will ship, with the year 2007 the most precise estimate so far." For this article, click here.

Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference 2004 held in Toronto on July 11-13, 2004

July 12, 2004 from VARBusiness - "Velocity. That's the theme for this year's Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference 2004 in Toronto, July 11 to 13. Nearly a year into the rollout of its new partner program, Microsoft says it is now accelerating into a phase of tactical initiatives and investments that augment last year's wholesale program changes.

Many of the new programs are aimed at technical enablement, co-marketing and sales efforts, and ways to foster partner-to-partner business relationships. In all, Microsoft is increasing investment in partner initiatives by $200,000 in fiscal 2005, which started July 1, bringing the total to $1.7 billion. That money will be used to fund training and readiness programs, marketing toolsets and support, and to increase head count for 200 new partner technology specialists.

In addition, Microsoft plans to reallocate 35 percent of the local marketing dollars awarded to each Microsoft subsidiary globally to certified and gold-certified partners who participate in the company's go-to-market campaigns and have earned a sufficient number of points in the partner program."

We tried to find one article that seemed written by an independent observer of the conference that included an unbiased analysis of the event, but could not find a thing. Unfortunately, all we found were highlights that read as if they were written by Microsoft marketing people. For the article by VARBusiness, click here.

Human Resource (HR) Services is big business

June 16, 2004 from InformationWeek - "Human-resources outsourcing service provider Hewitt Associates said Wednesday it has reached an agreement to acquire rival Exult Inc. for about $690 million in stock. The move creates an HR services giant expected to post more than $3 billion in sales this year." For the article, click here.

Small and medium-sized businesses (SMB) will spend increasing amounts on IT

June 22, 2004 from E-Business News - "Reports recently released by research companies AMR and IDC have identified the small and medium-sized business (SMB) segment as driving a growing share of IT spending in the years to come. Specifically, AMR's report found that SMBs will ramp up their IT spending by 6.6 percent (a rate also found in a recent report from Forrester) in 2005 while the IDC study predicted a 7 percent compound annual growth rate for SMB IT spending.

Both AMR and IDC define SMBs as those companies with fewer than 1,000 employees. It's a broad continuum, and both reports found that IT spending growth will be greatest in the mid-sized segment, with AMR identifying those companies with between 250 and 999 employees and IDC pegging those with 100 and 999 employees as IT spending standouts. AMR says that this sub-segment will experience 10.8 percent growth in 2005 IT spending. For e-business vendors, the opportunities represented by SMBs (of whom AMR says there are 12 million worldwide) is, and has been, enormous. For the article, click here.

Volume Rises on Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) but

June 15, 2004 from Financial Post - "Based on Voice over Internet Protocol technology, Internet telephony seems set to revolutionize the US$300 Billion global telecommunications industry... The reality, however, is while VoIP is gathering momentum, it is nowhere near to shoving aside existing technologies. The numbers of consumers, for example, using Internet telephony services in North America last year was about 250,000 - a drop in the bucket compared with the 250 million telephone lines.

"For all the media attention, Vonage.... only has 150,000 subscribers...Primus Telecommunications Canada Inc. has only "several thousand" customers after launching its Internet telephony service in January... Still, VoIP will have a major impact on the telecom industry... Telus Corp. is among the most aggressive in migrating its network traffic to an Internet-based network, while Bell Canada has a plan to adopt the Internet technology by 2006... Unfortunately, the Financial Post did not make their "Special Report" on telecommunications available online and we are don't have a link for more information. However, the author of the article, Mark Evans, does keep other articles online. Click here for more about the telecommunications industry from Mark Evans.

Bell makes historic long-distance call

June 21, 2004 from Toronto Star - "It may seem like just another telephone offer, but Bell Canada's decision to let consumers call anywhere in North America at any time for $5 a month could be viewed as a defining moment in Canadian telecom history... Customers are only eligible for the package if they already have or sign up for at least two other major Bell services, specifically high-speed Internet, wireless or digital television... The $5 plan is also limited to 1,000 minutes worth of calls each month, working out to nearly 17 hours or slightly more than 30 minutes each day...

Bell's announcement Thursday is a defining moment. It's an admission by the industry's largest and most powerful player that the "distance" in long-distance has been officially erased — obliterated — by the Internet. Long-distance, as a service in and of itself, is dead. From now on, consumers can expect to see long-distance minutes included in local phone plans or promoted, as Bell is doing, as a loss leader for getting customers to buy higher-value products under the lock of bundles and long-term contracts." For the article, click here.

Down on the Server Farm

April 28, 2004 from CFO.com - The server farm allows "companies that want to be rid of those expensive mainframes — to plug into a remote 'farm' of servers, churning up just as much computing capability as they need, for just as long as they need it, and paying only for what they've consumed." Click here for more.

Canadian IT Value Proposition Appealing to American Buyers

May 2004 from Outsourcing Journal - "American companies outsourcing their IT prefer the nearshore Canadian value proposition as an alternative to offshore options, according to new research from IDC, a global market advisory firm. The study also discovered quality is more important than cost savings when outsourcing IT. Sponsored by IT services provider Compuware, the study queried US executives on IT sourcing. Entitled Global Sourcing Trends Necessitate Considerations of Nearshore Sourcing in Canada (March 2004), the survey compared nearshore (Canada) versus offshore IT outsourcing. The survey sample involved evenly distributed respondents from smaller businesses to the Fortune 500...Sending work to Canada offers cost-effective IT solutions with reduced risk for US firms. The US business has become more oriented toward quality and less interested in cost savings alone." Click here for more.

Bell Canada to collaborate with Dexit allowing for an innovative Electronic Payment Service To Be Available Nationwide

April 29, 2004 from Bell Canada - "The Dexit(R) service allows consumers to pay for items like coffee, newspapers or quick service meals, using a new payment system that will be supported by Bell Canada's IP based national network. By tapping a Radio Frequency Identifier (RFID) tag over a reader which displays the cost of the purchase, money is then deducted from a customers' prepaid Dexit account and moved to the merchant's account. The payment service will initially be extended to merchants in the 416 and 905 area codes, and eventually to merchants in other major urban centers across the country." For more, click here.

Recharging the Workplace

April 2004 from Darwin - We often hear that people are resistant to change and to be very careful in introducing changes to people's jobs. In this article the author makes a different and compelling argument for change -"Unfortunately, some executives tend to keep a worker in the same job because he or she is performing that job very well. This is just the opposite of what should occur, especially if that person has been performing that job for a long time. People need change to keep their work interesting. Doing the same thing day after day, week after week, no matter how interesting the tasks, can become less challenging and less rewarding." For the article, click here.

Small and Midsize Companies will Lead IT Spending

April 27, 2004 from InformationWeek - "According to Forrester analyst Meredith Child, the author of a survey which polled more than 1,000 technology decision makers at small and midsize companies in North America, small and midsize business will increase their IT spending by 6.6% this year from 2003. That compares with an anticipated 1.7% uptick in IT spending for large companies, said Child--so it's no surprise that vendors are chasing the SMB market."

"Overall, small and medium-sized businesses are more positive about the business climate and more optimistic about where their industries are going, said Child in explaining why these companies are opening the wallet wider than larger businesses. They're especially eager to spend on hardware--both servers and PCs--as well as on more bandwidth. And they're planning on dropping some serious dollars on security." For the article, click here.

Bill Gates on Web Services

March 30, 2004 from WebServices.org - This is a good read about web services - you can hear Bill's excitement about this new technology as you read - "Web services are super, super important. Essentially in the '90s, with the Internet, we got the ability to flow bits from any computer on the planet to any other computer on the planet. And people sort of thought, well, wow, we can flow bits between all these things; doesn't that mean we're going to have electronic commerce and buying and selling and all the software will magically work together? Well, the answer is no... And so there's never been a protocol that lets software connect to another piece of software, find it, look at its capabilities and have really complex flows of information back and forth.

And the starting point for doing this was XML. In the mid '90s Microsoft and some other people got very excited about taking that, which was really a document standard, and turning that into a data standard. And that has flourished. XML is such a phenomenal technology and the tools around it, it's been amazing. Everything we dreamed XML would become, it is becoming. When you have nuts in your shop who say XML is magic, well, basically they're right. This heterogeneous data, data mapping, data-viewing stuff is all coming out of that.

But XML is just a way of expressing the data; we still needed protocols for finding each other and exchanging it. And amazingly, starting at about 2001, both IBM and Microsoft decided it was important to us to have these high-level protocols in a completely system-independent way, so that the mainframe could talk to anything, Windows could talk to anything. And this was because we wanted customers to be able to develop this next generation of applications where data flows very easily. E-commerce is just one example of that.

And we both put super-good people on it, and this year the spec for even the super high-level stuff, the security, transactions, reliable messaging, these specs are almost final. We've had a lot of interoperability fast, we've drawn in lots of other companies. Those things will go final this year.

And so Web services gives us the ability of any software component, written in any language, running on any operating system, to find and connect up to and exchange in a secure, reliable, transacted way information with another piece of software."

For more BillSpeak, click here.

Too much hype about Sarbanes-Oxley?

From BetterManagement.com - "As businesses race to comply with key provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, IT companies of every imaginable persuasion are racing to potential customer sites with elaborately crafted pitches about how their products or services will not only stave off regulatory disaster but usher in a new era of transparent, responsive, vastly more efficient operations. With immediate ROI, of course. The marketing blitz inevitably invites a certain cynicism, particularly when contrasted with surveys (including our own) that indicate that most CFOs don't plan a substantial investment in IT in response to Sarbox.". For the article, click here.

The only way to achieve sustainable competitive advantage

From darwin - "Communicate Well - It's the only way to achieve the only sustainable competitive advantage there is: a focused, motivated and committed workforce....In a survey over a base of 2,000 senior executives and managers across the U.S., the overwhelming majority (94 percent) of respondents said that "communicating well" is the most important skill for executives and managers to have in order to be successful today." For the article, click here.

Sites to see

Looking for another source of information on Benchmarking, Business Continuity, Customer Service, Data Management, e-Commerce, Emerging Technologies and Outsourcing. For CIO Insight's recommendations, click here.

Enterprises prep for PIPEDA panic

January 7, 2004, ITBusiness.ca - "Time's up: If you haven't become compliant with Canada's new privacy law, you could run what one lawyer calls "headline risk." Will warding off the dangers become a full-time job?" For the article, click here.

Top 12 e-business topics in 2003

January 8, 2004, Line56 - "In e-business, 2003 was a year mostly dominated by the economy, flat spending and a wait for a turnaround. By requirement, enterprises examined existing and new infrastructure and application investments closer than ever with a focus on value. The vendor marketplace also contracted to the point where business models could no longer be sustained, where venture capital was flat, and where a even a good idea could no longer ride its own coattails." The top 12 includes Consolidation, Outsourcing, Mid Market, Portals... For the article, click here.

Voice-enabled Software Applications

From CRM Access - In an interview with Mobile Gas -"Mobile Gas looked at using laptops in the trucks, but we found it to be cost-prohibitive. We also felt that we could accomplish the same thing with speech - voice-enabled software applications...Mobile Gas has 35 field technicians using the Datria voice-enabled applications today, and we are processing approximately 300 tickets per day...Some of the results include a reduction in clerical staff by 50%, a reduction in paper and office supplies by 33%, reduction in technician’s overtime by 20%, and an increase in job revenue by 18%." For the article, click here.

The "Amazon-ing" of online retail continues

June 13, 2003, from Forrester Research - "Borders, NBA, Target, and Toys"R"Us already outsource their entire site operations to Amazon, and we think more will follow. Why? Because in today's environment, many multichannel retailers must focus scarce investment dollars on technology that differentiates their store and brand experience, and they might not be able to afford the next eCommerce upgrade cycle. Instead of falling behind, budget-conscious retailers will select Amazon to manage their Web experiences, as will manufacturers that want to sell direct but can't afford the investment. Having spent nearly $1 billion to build its best-in-class commerce platform, Amazon will become the first vendor on the list, threatening ATG, GSI Commerce, and IBM." For the article, click here.

HR outsourcing to grow 18 percent this year

June 26, 2003, from InfoWorld - "Companies outsource their human resources (HR) functions more than any others and will continue to do so, according to Gartner... HR business process outsourcing (BPO) revenue is set to grow to $46 billion in 2003, Gartner said, compared to $39 billion in 2002. What's more, the researcher predicted that the market would reach $51 billion by 2004 and represent 39 percent of all BPO revenue. Businesses view HR outsourcing as less risky than outsourcing other critical practices, and see it as good value for money, Gartner said. Payroll and benefits services are the most popular outsourced HR practices and are driving the market growth, the researcher noted." For the article, click here.

The Overselling of Internet-Based Architecture and the Rebirth of Client/Server

May 16 - AMR Research challenges today's thinking about web-based applications. "The promise of Internet applications has not been realized and, for the most part, it has been painful for and affected productivity of the primary users of the systems". For the article, click here.

Wi-Fi - The next big thing that changes everything

March 23, 2003 - From Darwin (another good source for news and opinion on information technology), "If one Wi-Fi connection can provide broadband service to several homes in a neighborhood, why pay more? Is the next big giveaway the Internet itself?" Wi-Fi is a wireless technology that allows high speed access to the internet within a range of about 300 feet. So if your neighbour has Wi-Fi, you could too without paying $40/month for cable or DSL. According to the article, "The availability of such signals is growing by leaps and bounds. A recent Jupiter study showed that 83 percent of small businesses and 71 percent of large businesses will have deployed Wi-Fi in the next 12 months." For the Darwin article, click here.

March 18, 2003 - And from BusinessWeek "This week, at the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Assn. conference in New Orleans, the buzz was all about Wi-Fi, which carriers see as a bright spot in an otherwise gloomy outlook. No. 1 U.S. wireless provider Verizon Wireless opened the show by announcing that its subscribers soon will have Wi-Fi access at hundreds of hotels and 10 airports. Intel launched its $300 million marketing campaign for its new chip family, called Centrino, which caters specifically to wireless users. Along with primetime-TV spots and glossy magazine spreads, Intel is creating "mobile technology zones (hot spots)" at a dozen airports worldwide where travelers can test Centrino-based notebooks and wirelessly surf the Net. The chip giant is also behind plans to offer hot spots at 400 Borders Book & Music stores. And on Mar. 12, Cometa Networks, a start-up backed by AT&T, IBM, and Intel, unveiled hot spots at 10 McDonald's restaurants in New York City." For the BusinessWeek article, click here.

WorldCom writes off $80 Billion

March 20, 2003 - From Ziff Davis Media - WorldCom said that it would write down the value of its assets by $80 billion. Some of this had been expected; $45 billion in good will largely a result of overpaying for acquisitions, which had little value. But WorldCom also wrote down the value of its property, plant and equipment and other intangible assets to $10 billion from $44.8 billion. WorldCom's hard assets, including its network, are now worth almost 75 percent less than what they had cost. And these assets were bought with actual cash. WorldCom isn't the only one with overstated assets. For more, click here.

Microsoft bails out of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), but...

March 25, 2003 - From globetechnology.com, "In a sign of growing discord over Web services guidelines, Microsoft has pulled out of a key Web services standards working group. Over the past month, IBM and Microsoft have been at odds with other companies around standards submissions, including a high-profile effort within the Web's leading standards organization, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Now Microsoft has upped the rancour by dropping out of a W3C working group focused on establishing rules for how businesses will send and receive data to one another via Web services." For the globetechnology.com article, click here. For a recent FYI explaining Web Services, click here.

But W3C is not the only standard setting organization for web services. WS-I (Web Services Interoperability Organization) acts as a quality assurance group over web services and it includes IBM, Microsoft, Intel, and IBM. An just a few days ago, Sun Microsystems, a fierce competitor of Microsoft, became a board member of WS-I. So it seems that we take one step back and 3 steps forward with web services. For more about the WS-I announcement, click here.

Outsourcing: A 50-50 Proposition

March 26, 2003 - From InformationWeek, "Half of this year's IT outsourcing projects will be tagged as losers by senior decision makers for not delivering on bottom-line promises, Gartner says. Outsourcing is prone to failure because of breakdowns in communications between outsourcing providers and their clients, the research firm adds "Outsourcing goes further than the ASP (Application Service Provider) which hosts the application. The Outsourcer also manages all of the business processes and staff related to whatever has been outsourced. It could be your accounting, HR, warehouse management operations. The only bright spot in the outsourcing market seems to be in the outsourcing of IT itself. "Companies such as IBM and EDS have struck major outsourcing deals during the last several months, in some cases acquiring all of a client's IT assets and staff, then managing them for the client." For more, click here.

Almost $9 Billion outsourcing contracts signed in December 2002

Feb 12, 2003 - From Wall Street & Technology, we read that most of the recent high-profile deals involve mainly infrastructure outsourcing, focused on servers, networks and data centers - areas that most firms do not consider proprietary or competitive." Most of the $9 billion was attributed to JPMorgan Chase who signed a seven-year contract with IBM Global Services totaling in excess of $5 billion. "JPMorgan Chase is leveraging IBM's On-Demand Computing...(which) is similar to utility usage with a pay-for-what-you-use philosophy." For more, click here.

Defining Knowledge Management

Knowledge management is the transfer of knowledge from people's heads into documentation, procedures, directories.. that can be easily shared with others. But where do you start? It has been said that 90% of knowledge is in people's heads. It's not going to be easy to get the knowledge out when people are concerned about their jobs. Even if employees are willing to share the wealth, knowledge is not easily structured as you would structure data in a database. Nevertheless, we are beginning to see examples of Knowledge Management. FAQ's on a web site are a simple way to share information with your customers. Many companies have built intranets to share information amongst employees. For an irreverent article on defining knowledge management from destinationKM.com, click here. For an article from E-Business Executive published February 2003 on Knowledge Management, click here.

Gartner's predictions to watch in 2003

Gartner, one of the leading research companies, has recently released their top 2003 predictions about what they call "the most profound technologies" which include:

Radio frequency identification (RFID) tags will find their way into everyday objects.
The number of public wireless LAN (WLAN) hot spots will quadruple.
Online bill payment will be the fastest-growing online financial application in 2003.
IT begins to go the way of electricity and gas, as the "IT as utility" concept gains momentum. (Outsourcing of IT infrastructure)

For a link to the article, click here.

What are top priorities for IT Investments per Evans Research, IDC Canada and Gartner?

January 17, 2003 — In an article from Computing Canada, Evans Research says, "The key priority for IT investment has to be return on investment. Organizations are tired of projects that are late, over budget and ones that don't produce measurable benefits. IT has not always done a good job explaining how their projects will save their organization money or increase profits". This theme is shared by a lot of people these days. In the past, project managers were faulted if they were over budget or not on time. Now, you also need to produce measurable benefits. Other questions put to the panel of experts include "What's the best strategy to adopt in measuring ROI". Click here for a link to the article from Computing Canada.

Real-time business will emerge as a powerful model for connecting customers, suppliers and partners

January 27, 2003 — In an article from InformationWeek, Bob Evans says "while some that try it (real-time business) will not succeed, those who ignore the reality of real-time business and its ascendancy will face overwhelming competitive pressures and will have next to no chance whatsoever of surviving. In a world where high-value, market-based information is made available almost instantly to the right people inside your company and to customers and suppliers and partners and even customers' customers and suppliers' suppliers -- and where the availability of that information is then, much more importantly, used to make the right decisions -- what chance of survival will there be for a company that keeps doing things the old-fashioned way?" For a link to the article, click here.

Information Technology Management (ITM) at Ryerson University

Michael Burns of 180 Systems will start teaching a course for the Information Technology Management (ITM) program at Ryerson University starting in January 2003. ITM offers 45 courses to both full time and part time students. ITM provides an integrated approach to the study of business management, computers, and telecommunications. For more about ITM at Ryerson, click here.

Web Services is now the most hyped technology on the planet

Web Services is now the most hyped technology on the planet. It has the potential to let different systems communicate with each other easily. Integration problems would be no more. EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) would be replaced by Web Services. Business to Business (B2B) eCommerce would become a reality. New applications could be assembled using programs available on Web Services. Despite the hype, there is a lot of confusion about what is actually meant by Web Services.

Web Services refers to application logic accessible to programs via standard web protocols in a platform-independent way. So, if you hear that companies already have web services in place, this is a stretch. They may be using XML (eXtensible Markup Language), which is a key component in Web Services and they may be communicating over the internet, but they are not using standards in a platform independent way. Before they can use standards, there needs to be agreement on the standards. And that’s the big problem. Just as Paul Simon sings about the 50 ways to lose your lover, there are 50 ways to define a purchase order.

There are also different levels to Web Services that need to be standardized including SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol) and UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery and Integration). Technology companies need an acronym for everything they do, and Web Services has more acronyms associated with it than you would care to know about it.

Although the obstacles to Web Services are large, there is huge momentum and commitment by all the major technology companies to sort out the standards. Only this year, the WS-I (Web Services Interoperability Organization) was created to act as a quality assurance group over web services. The group includes IBM, Microsoft, Intel, and will soon include Sun Microsystems. Although Web Services is a tangled web of acronyms, technologies and companies, its net or as Microsoft refers to it, its .NET will catch us all. Only this time getting caught in the net/.NET is a good thing.

Click here for more technical details written by 180 Systems about web services. For a more comprehensive analysis of Web Services, click here for reports from the McKinseyQuarterly.

A great source for ideas and articles from Boomer Consulting, which is recognized in the accounting profession as a leading authority on technology management.

Although the articles that you can download (many are at no charge) from Boomer Consulting are geared to accounting firms, they also apply to any company struggling with technology. In an article entitled, Winning with Technology, Gary Boomer writes that "Too many businesses today view technology as overhead...", and "According to the Gartner Group, five hours are gained for every hour of technology training" and "Internal technology personnel tend to tell the owners what they want to hear rather what they need to hear". Another article on Boomer's web site entitled "The Keys to Firm Growth" contains benchmarks on technology investment. Click here for a link to Boomer Consulting.

IBM Maps out Mid-Market Plan

From destination CRM, "IBM, long perceived as a player in the largest of global corporations, plans to focus more acutely on delivering solutions to the small and medium-size business market." IBM will be spending $100 Million in marketing its mid market push. Click here for a link to this article.

Disappointed with information technology investments? You're not alone

In an article from CFO.com, "One by one, they rose to make their pitches to the IT steering committee. As the day wore on, recalls consultant Doug Hubbard, business cases were presented for more than 20 IT projects. Each was framed in terms of the tremendous savings and benefits it would provide for the company, a giant midwestern nuclear-power utility. One skeptical attendee listened closely and entered a series of figures into a calculator. Toting up the promised benefits of each proposal, he announced, "If we signed off on all of these, we'd be able to cut staff by 110 percent. Hubbard's tale reflects the past decade's blind faith, massive investment, and sometimes bitter disappointment in information technology." For the article, click here.

From the Butler Group, "The way most companies use IT is sub-optimal, leaving most success factors unaffected. This has not, of course, stopped many large organizations investing heavily in efficiency oriented applications such as ERP, and as if this was not painful enough, going on to invest in CRM systems with the hope that IT could cast its magic spell upon their customers. There’s no need to restate the dismal history of these monolithic monsters – but the lack of return we often get from these applications should be telling us something. If IT is really going to make a difference to our business then we need to get off the efficiency trip and start looking at how IT can support innovation, reinforce market share, promote a healthy corporate culture, and communicate our products and services to customers." For the article, click here.

The role of the CFO has broadened beyond number crunching and shoring up cash flow - a report by Ernst & Young

Ernst & Young has published an article entitled "The CEO's CFO Accountability is Key" based on interviews with more than 60 CFOs and senior executives. In the article, you will read that "CFOs must still possess a superior understanding of a company's financial and accounting practices, the study notes, especially given the renewed emphasis on restoring public confidence in financial statements. However, the CFO's role has now expanded beyond "number crunching" and shoring up cash flow to include responsibilities for shaping corporate strategy, ensuring the credibility and competence of the senior management team, and bolstering the company's position in the market. A CFO's performance in these areas, the study says, helps to solidify a company's standing with investors." Click here for a link to this article.

Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, says that Web Services is "big, big, big, big, big, the biggest thing that's going to happen in the industry"

Web Services are self contained business functions that operate over the internet enabling any application to share information with another application. Web Services should solve the problem of integration between systems and enable eCommerce to become a reality. However, don't expect integration utopia for at least a few years. In order for Web Services to work, there must first be agreement on standards. So we have competitors such as Microsoft and IBM joining The Web Services Interoperability Organization (WS-I) to set the standards. Just a few weeks ago, WS-I opened up some room at the table for Sun Microsystems, which is Microsoft's main rival for web services standard setting. For articles on WS-I from InfoWorld, click here and here. For an article on the battle between Microsoft and Sun Microsystems from Destination CRM, click here.

The reincarnation of dot.com

The dot.coms are coming back. One example is WebShots.com, which was purchased in 1999 for $82.5 Million US and was sold back recently to the original owners for $2.4 Million US. With a clean balance sheet, control over spending, improved technology and lessons learned, WebShots is registering 150,000 new users each week. For more from CNN.com, click here.

2002 best and worst technologies from global research firm

Based on thousands of end-user ROI studies, global research firm, Nucleus Research, defines the best and worst performing technologies of 2002. The best were E-business and E-learning. The worst included business-to-business marketplaces and large customer relationship management implementations. For more, click here.

"If the automobile had followed the same development as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per gallon, and explode once a year killing everyone inside."

This quote is attributed to Robert X. Cringely, who from 1987-95, wrote the Notes From the Field column in InfoWorld, a weekly computer trade newspaper. He is also the author of the best-selling book Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can't Get a Date. More recently, Cringely is the host and writer of the hit PBS-TV miniseries "Triumph of the Nerds. Cringely's weekly sermons on technology are available on-line by clicking here.

ASPs (Application Service Providers) are making a comeback

With ASP's, you don’t buy the software, you rent it; and the program and data are maintained on the ASP’s equipment. The primary advantage of an ASP is less investment in computers and the resources to maintain it. There were a number of high profile ASP casualties last year, and ASPs fell out of favour. But there seems to no denying the ASP's compelling business case. According to ITConsultant, "Oracle Corporation is crowing about its e-business suite outsourcing biz — it grew by a whopping 50 percent with the influx of 100 new customers in Q4 2002." For ITConsultant's article, click here.

Cringely also writes about ASPs in an August 15 article, in which he talks about StoreReport, an ASP for owners and operators of convenience stores. Cringely says "I like the ASP concept because it isn't hype and it can really save both time and money when the circumstances are right. Maybe it isn't politically correct, but I say do what works." Click here for Cringely's article on ASPs entitled "High ASPirations". By the way, StoreReport has not made its way to Canada yet, but it should not be long before it does. For StoreReport's web site, click here.

A good source of information from the UK

Consultants' Advisory is a report, published by Prime Marketing Publications (PMP), which keeps UK consultants and systems integrators abreast of the key issues in the IT marketplace. It is a regular publication available both in online and printed copy form. The on-line version is available free by clicking here.

In the August issue, there is a lot of information on Professional Services Automation including the results of a recent survey, which showed that over half of the respondents plan to adopt PSA in the next 2 years. Asked why they are unhappy with their existing systems, the overwhelming reason was to improve resource allocation (90%), followed by milestone delivery on time (84%), creating metrics for future estimating (72%), re-use knowledge (70%), improving project visibility (68%). Surprisingly saving money was at the bottom of the list at 66%.

Would you like another source for IT strategy and research on emerging technology?

The majority of white papers, profiles, impacts and other documents published by Aberdeen Group are free at aberdeen.com.

What happened to thin client?

A few years ago, the computing industry buzzed with thin technology as way to lower the costs of maintaining PC's. You would not need a "fat" and expensive PC. A low cost computer or terminal would suffice as you would be connected to a powerful server that would do all the work. At the time, it seemed like a return to the days of the mainframe and minicomputer and "dumb" terminals. According to an article published in the May 31, 2002 edition of ComputerWorld Canada, thin client technology never made a serious dent in mainstream computing. What happened? Probably the biggest factor is the objection of anyone who has the power of a PC at their fingertips in not only doing office work, but also using it for enjoyment. Another factor is the cost to replace what already works. Another problem with thin technology is over reliance on the network and servers. With a PC, you can still do some work if the network goes down. There will be situations where thin is better, but don't expect PC's to go on a diet anytime soon. Click here for the article from ComputerWorld entitled "Computing on Thin Ice"

Better to purchase a Palm Pilot or a PDA that uses Windows CE such as the iPAQ Pocket PC?

Palm's advantages include easier to use and more applications that work with it now. Windows CE products have better multimedia capabilities, and come with a mobile version of Word and Excel. For more details, click here for an article that appeared recently in Sales Force Automation.

Can Linux dethrone Windows?

In an article published in the May 2002 edition of Infosystems Executive, Linux is challenging Microsoft as the operating system of choice for enterprise computing. Operating systems manage software applications, data and security, as well as control devices. IBM was reported as investing $1 Billion US in the Linux platform in 2001 with the same amount planned for 2002. Linux in the past was used by universities to run supercomputers, but is now used by business and government. Linux does have some advantages such as lower costs and apparently bug-free code. For the article in Infosystems, click here.

Looking for unbiased evaluations of software or hardware?

There are research companies that charge software and hardware manufacturers to be evaluated. One good source of information for independent research on software is SPEX, which does not charge vendors for their evaluations. Although it is very expensive to purchase the full reports, there is some free research available on their site. Click here for a link to SPEX. For hardware evaluations, check out