Blue Streak

IBM - An analyst's view

2007-04-08T21:55:00.000+05:30

[from FT]: Gambits of Big Blue-sky thinking

Competitor bashing is always fun! :))

2007-01-15T19:08:00.000+05:30

http://www.dailytech.com/Canadian+Customers+Sue+Dell+Over+Notebooks/article5701c.htm

http://www.efytimes.com/efytimes/fullnews.asp?edid=16770

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/12/inspiron_defect_lawsuit/

Will finish these later

2007-01-15T16:36:00.000+05:30

http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/Bhardwaj1.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russel

http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html

Interview Tips

2006-12-17T10:57:00.000+05:30

[via S Anand]

Interview tips from Prof. Vijay Kumar.

Although I don't see my self taking any interviews in the medium term, it's good to remember those general skills that any company looks for in an employee.

And I guess once you start working, it's eaqually important to remember why your company chose you, and what it expects from you.

I've noticed that employer expectations are fairly similar across companies -- Indian/ MNC, and irrespective of which fucntion of the company you handle (meaning you could be in sales, or you could be in project management!).

Companies want certain general skills, apart from competency in specific functional areas.

From Anand's post --

During the interview (what does the interviewer want?):

Brains: logical thinking, primarily
Creativity
Hard-work, but one can take that for granted for a person from the IIMs
Willing to take direction, and yet is a self-starter
A person who can explore new ideas on their own
Good interpersonal relationships
A person who can make casual conversation
Can suavely deflect objectionable questions
Well dressed, good posture, etc.

And once you're on the job (although this was written for a consultant's role, I would think that most points apply in other roles as well):

Quality of assignments
Followup on assignment
Client feedback
Budget overruns (applicable more to PLs and managers)
Input into thought leadership and knowledge-base
Strengths and weaknesses
Future directions for improvement.

Relevant articles from Rediff -- Awesome!!

2006-12-16T18:52:00.000+05:30

Like most other things that I stumble across, wish I'd read these articles much earlier!

Have spent almost a year now away from home.

Although my post-graduation course also required me to be away from home for 2 years, it was spent with 240 batchmates in a residential course at a campus that's just got the most awesome facilitites. Those 2 years went by in a jiffy, and I never really got the time to miss home.

But work's different in many ways:

1. Colleauges/ peers are very few in number -- the sales role is only for a select few! :))
2. Colleagues are much older, and 'settled' in life -- most of my colleagues have a lot of work experience.
3. Kerala is NOT known for it's commerce! So naturally, none of my batchmates from b-school, engineering college, or even school work or live in Kochi, Kerala!

So here's the list of articles from Rediif on this topic:

Plagued by loneliness?

From the article (simple things that we always seem to froget!)

1. Strengthen your network

Make the effort to stay in touch. Write letters, call, send greeting cards to stay in touch with people you care about. If you have access to a computer, browse the Internet, send emails to friends and also try to meet them.
Find ways to make new friends. New friends can add spice to your life.
Attend events and social gatherings. Invite people to your home.
Make a date to share meals with a friend or neighbour who is also alone.
Share experiences and feelings with your friends. Be a good listener.
Get a pet. A pet can lessen loneliness. Additionally, it can also help lower your blood pressure, anxiety and depression.
Take a walk with a neighbour every day.
Join a health club.
Stay positive. More importantly, stay away from negative people.

2. Be a volunteer or mentor

3. Be a lifelong learner

Life seems more rewarding when you make learning a lifelong habit. You build new skills. You challenge your mental processes. You understand things and are able to adjust better. Most importantly, you keep growing and evolving. Of course, you also have more things to talk about with others, which makes you a more interesting friend. Here are some ideas:

Take a meditation, yoga or aerobics class.
Read books, newspapers and magazines.
Study a foreign language.
Learn to play a musical instrument.
Join a travel group.

As I was reading this article, I couldn't help but nod my head in acceptance every 2 lines.

11 rules for living alone.

How to enjoy the single life.

Others that might prove to be useful! :))

Survival guide: From heartbreak to happiness.

Heal your broken heart.

Brilliant, brave, and under 25!

2006-12-16T16:44:00.000+05:30

[via Rediff] A Rhodes Scholar speaks. Liked this article -- lots of take-aways!

77 ways to learn better

2006-12-16T16:39:00.000+05:30

[via S Anand] I always find good stuff at Anand's blog!

This is 77 ways to learn better!

Looking for meaning? Listen to what this author has to say: "If someone granted you one wish, what do you imagine you would want out of life that you haven't gotten yet? For many people, it would be self-improvement and knowledge."

Remembering Smita Patil

2006-12-16T16:31:00.000+05:30

I would definitely have been Smita Patel's fan .. (if I were watcing movies in the '70s and '80s!)
These takes on her made my day!

[via Rediff]
1. The best of Smita Patil
2. Raw stock, rare appeal: Smita Patil

My new favorite

2006-10-24T21:02:00.000+05:30

Like the TCL ad, this is my new favorite!!!

Prison Break

eWeek's IBM repository

2006-10-18T23:46:00.000+05:30

eWeek has a list of IBM moves.

Wish I'd read these some time back!!

2006-09-05T18:27:00.000+05:30

Not that I'm a father or anything, but I guess this could apply to a kid who's growing up too, and not just for parents.

From rediff.com:
10 tips to groom your son well. A must read! Quick look, if you don't have the time:

Imbibing confidence
Being independent
Accepting responsibility
Learning to respect women
Being expressive
Learning household chores
Cultivating friendships
Eating healthy
Exercising effectively
Be there for your son

And another: On girls.

IBM's revved-up software engine

2006-08-16T22:50:00.000+05:30

Software now contributes more profit than services, and it's emerging as Big Blue's most reliable generator of growth. (BusinessWeek)

Massive investments in India

2006-06-08T22:37:00.000+05:30

[NY Times] I.B.M. Will Triple Investment in India in Next 3 Years.

[NY Times] India Becoming a Crucial Cog in the Machine at I.B.M.

[BusinessWeek] Big Blue Shift -- IBM is reorganizing its global workforce to lower costs without skimping on service.

[BusinessWeek] IBM Wakes Up to India's Skills -- The computer company is ramping up operations with cutting-edge projects while using more low-cost, high-value local labor.

Everyone's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

2006-05-21T18:18:00.000+05:30

Song Title: Everyone's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)
Artist: Baz Luhrman

Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of '99. Wear sunscreen.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.
The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists
whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my
own meandering experience...
I will dispense this advice now

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth;
oh, nevermind, you will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they've faded.
But trust me, in 20 years you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now, how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.
You are NOT as fat as you imagine.

Don't worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum.
The real toubles in life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindsides you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday

Do one thing everyday that scares you.

Sing

Don't be reckless with other peoples hearts.
Don't put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss

Don't waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind. The race is long, and in the end, it's only with yourself.

Remember compliments you recieve.
Forget the insults.
If you suceed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters.
Throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch

Do not feel guilty if you don't know what you wanna do with your life,...
the most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives, some of the most ineresting 40 year olds I know still don't.

Get plenty of calcium

Be kind to your knees, you'll miss them when they're gone

Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't.
Maybe you'll have children, maybe you won't.
Maybe you'll divorce at 40.
Maybe you'll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary....
Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either - your choices are half chance, so are everybody else's.

Enjoy your body, use it every way you can...
don't be afraid of it, or what other people think of it...
it's the greatest instrument you'll ever own.

Dance...
even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Read the directions, even if you don't follow them.

Do NOT read beauty magazines they will only make you feel UGLY.

Get to know your parents, you never know when they might be gone for good.
Be nice to your siblings; They're your best link to your past, and the people most likely to stick with you in the future

Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few you should
hold on.
Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle because the older you get, the more you need the people you knew when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard.
Live in Northern California once, but, leave before it makes you soft.

Travel

Accept certain inalienable truths.
Prices will rise, Politicians will philander, you too will get old.
And when you do, you'll fantasize that when you were young,
prices were reasonable, politicians were noble, and children respected their elders.

Respect your elders

Don't expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you'll have a trust fund,
maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse;
but you never know when either one might
run out.

Don't mess too much with your hair, or by the time you're 40, it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who supply it.
Advice is a form of nostalgia; dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts, and recycling it for more than its worth.

But trust me on the sunscreen.

I am India

2006-05-21T17:55:00.000+05:30

[via Atanu Dey] Remember Bharatbala (Vademataram, AR Rahman)? He's made a "I am India" video. I'm kinda a fan of his way of film-making.

My role model

2006-04-06T21:07:00.000+05:30

Rahul Dravid, profiled by Ian Chappel. (from cricinfo.com)

The IT opportunity in Kerala

2006-03-29T23:17:00.000+05:30

Frontline article by a fromer CEO of Technopark. 'The coming boom.'

Interview with Toonz CEO, Mr. P. Jayakumar

2006-03-29T23:05:00.000+05:30

A background to Toonz.

IBM and Innovation

2006-03-15T00:04:00.000+05:30

Thinking the future, with IBM. (from BW)

IBM the leader in eSCM (eScouring Capability Model). (from CIOL)

Fortune on Yahoo! and IBM

2006-03-12T21:42:00.000+05:30

Don't stare so hard at Google you miss Yahoo! (from CNN Money)

IBM's new chip and a reorganized corporate structure aimed at making IBM exciting again. (from CNN Money)

Secret of Success

2006-03-12T21:03:00.000+05:30

[via Emergic] from Working Smart:

I'm not sure I could boil it down to one thing. Life isn’t usually that simple. But if I really, really had to boil it down to one thing, I would say this: responsiveness.

The truth is, you are building your reputation—your brand—one response at a time. People are shaping their view of you by how you respond to them. If you are slow, they assume you are incompetent and over your head. If you respond quickly, they assume you are competent and on top of your work. Their perception, whether you realize it or not, will determine how fast your career advances and how high you go. You can’t afford to be unresponsive. It is a career-killer.

My basic rule is this: respond immediately unless there is a good reason to wait. Obviously, this isn’t always possible, especially since I spend so much time in meetings. Nevertheless, I rarely let messages sit longer than a day. Twenty-four hours is the outside edge. If you can’t respond now, then at least acknowledge that you have received the message: “I received your message. I don’t have time to give it the attention it deserves right now, but you can expect to hear from me before the end of the day tomorrow.”

The great thing about being responsive is that it will quickly differentiate you from your peers. People love doing business with responsive people. Nothing will advance your career faster than this.

Making your work day sane

2006-03-12T20:03:00.000+05:30

Five rules. Practical and useful pointers. (Fortune, through CNN Money)

1) Give yourself a time-out. Devote an hour to uninterrupted thinking and planning every day. First thing in the morning is safest, but anytime that works for you is good. No calls, no e-mail, no chitchat, just quality time. "If there's an emergency, someone will come get you," says organization expert Julie Morgenstern. "Use this time to think strategically about your work."

2) Show your technology who's boss. Constant e-mails and phone calls bring a sense of urgency and importance that's tough to resist, not to mention the thrill of instant accomplishment. But keep your eye on the prize. "Anyone who has his e-mail client notify him anytime an e-mail comes in has already lost," says Shirky.

Most of today's devices and software actually can be set to be less intrusive. You just need to learn how: Switch off the ping that heralds the arrival of an e-mail, create folders into which incoming messages are automatically shunted. When busy, let outgoing message capabilities alert others to when they might reasonably expect to hear back from you.

3) Keep your meetings rare. Surveys show that most people find meetings a major time waster. Use them sparingly, keep to an agenda, start and end on time. And unless someone is expecting a baby (or using technology is part of the meeting) turn off all cellphones and BlackBerries. Intra-meeting texting is rude and counterproductive.

4) Say no. "Sorry" isn't the hardest word -- "no" is. But not saying it to desperate colleagues or harried bosses is the quickest way to overload your schedule and muck up more important goals. Focus first on meeting your stated objectives. Also, consider family and personal time when filling your calendar: Work-centric employees are more likely to report feeling overloaded than those who plan for their personal lives.

5) Delete. Surveys show we waste 20 percent of our day on nonproductive activities. Cut out or delegate anything on your to-do list that doesn't have long-term consequences for your work. Be ruthless. And while you're at it, don't let a stuffed e-mail in-box sap your will to live. When reviewing each e-mail, make an on-the-spot call to delete, file, or reply to each one -- even if the response is, "I'll get back to you on this later."

He says, she says

2006-03-05T21:38:00.000+05:30

I've always had the feeling that I never understood girls. (Now isn't that what all guys say?!) Blame it on the 14 years spent in a boys-only school, or on whatever else. Maybe a crash course from this blog would help a bit!

HiPODS

2006-02-25T21:39:00.000+05:30

From w3: (Lots of jargon, but such labs basically help large customers simulate an entire solution - consisting of applications and infrastructure software & hardware - before actually sinking in massive amounts of money in them. Just like the GSDC, clients definitely get impressed! Only the 7th such facility for IBM.)

"IBM India unveiled the High Performance On Demand Solutions Lab Â a dynamic infrastructure facility with world class servers to develop, test and validate high performance customer solutions. Housed in IBM India Software Lab, Bangalore, this first of its kind lab for IBM in India will bring in specific high-value skills to help clients in India and the surrounding region to enhance and optimize their IT resources to support the growth of their businesses."

Industry material on Communications - Digital Media (IBM NICA)

2006-02-25T20:45:00.000+05:30

What we did at The Hindu. (from w3.)
Digital Media SMB solutions. (from w3.)
NICA page. (from w3)
NICA on the web. (from ibm.com)

Industry material from w3

2006-02-25T20:41:00.000+05:30

Travel and transportation. (Can be used at ibs.)
Retail. (Can be used at Lulu.)
Consumer products. (Can be used at Medimix?!)

Hospitals - Electronic Medical Records. (from AP)
Retailers embracing technology. (from Mercury News)

What makes GE great?

2006-02-25T17:27:00.000+05:30

Read this to find out! (from Fortune)

Interesting read on the server market

2006-02-23T22:11:00.000+05:30

Suddenly, servers are hot. (From Mercury News.)

BW on Dell

2006-02-23T22:02:00.000+05:30

How the PC maker's once-revolutionary sales strategy may actually be holding it back. (from BW)

HP has narrowed the gap in productivity and price.
Will Dell work with AMD? And let Google put its software on its desktops?

People don't wish to shop the 'old' way:

"The world is clearly changing around Dell. The once-torrid growth in sales of personal computers has slowed, to about 5% a year. More surprising, consumers seem less enamored of buying their tech wares over the Web or phone. According to researcher NPD Group, the percentage of PC sales done via the phone and Web fell last year, and the share of sales through U.S. retail stores rose, as people flocked to shops to fiddle with new gear such as digital-music players, digital cameras, and slick laptops."

"That's a difficult development for Dell. It spends less on research and development ($463 million) than Apple Computer ($534 million), despite being four times Apple's size. "Not investing in R&D works great in the commoditized PC world," says Vinnie Muscolino, general partner with Babson Capital Management. "It doesn't work as well in other areas.""

"Putting more money into R&D. Selling through retail stores. Breaking with Intel. None of these steps sound anything like Dell. The fact that analysts are raising these ideas underscores how dramatically the times are changing. If Rollins and Dell want to keep up the company's image as one of the great stock market performers of all time, they may have to think different."

CREATIVITY!

2006-02-23T21:42:00.000+05:30

Reading, writing, and creativity. (From BW)

"the ability to think creatively is essential for students as they seek jobs, companies as they go up against competitors, and nations competing in the global economy."

"Ultimately it's the process of having original ideas, but there are several steps. The first step is imagination, the capacity that we all have to see something in the mind's eye. Creativity is then using that imagination to solve problems -- call it applied imagination. Then innovation is putting that creativity into practice as applied creativity."

"The Renaissance was a flowering on all fronts. It concerns me that this U.S. initiative is focused on a piece of the problem but not the whole thing. A second element is teaching. You can't just give someone a creativity injection. You have to create an environment for curiosity and a way to encourage people and get the best out of them."

"On the corporate level, Pixar is a good example. The company has something called Pixar University, that runs classes, events, workshops and stuff throughout the day. Every employee is entitled to spend four hours a week at Pixar University, and they are encouraged to not take anything job-related. That keeps peoples' minds alive."

"You can't be a creative thinker if you're not stimulating your mind, just as you can't be an Olympic athlete if you don't train regularly."

Windows bumps Unix to #1 spot

2006-02-23T21:12:00.000+05:30

From news.com.

#1: Windows
#2: Unix
#3: Linux (Similar to Unix, but runs on the x86 platform)

Windows took longer than expected to do this due to:
1. Solaris' growth during the dot-com boom
2. Linux

IBM set a target to be the top Unix vendor, and got there last year.

Sun trying to reverse its losses in the Unix market; makes Solaris open source, and also available on the x86 platform.

IBM leads the overall server market, but HP and Dell grew faster last year. Sun's been losing share (for years now).

Much of the growth will continue to happen in the lower end (<>

In x86, AMD grew its share from 6% to 14.3%.

Blades posted the strongest growth of all, and IBM leads this space with 41% market share.

IBM in Health Care & Life Sciences

2006-02-21T21:41:00.000+05:30

Scripps Research Institute and IBM to collaborate on Pandemic research.

Linux on Sun Niagra

2006-02-21T21:15:00.000+05:30

Linux can now run on Sun UltraSparc :: Linux's been running on IBM's Power processors for a few years now.
UltraSparc is now an open source chip :: Power.org has also been around for quite some time now (chip design available here, among other things)

People are skeptical about Linux on Sun.

The ZDNet article covers IBM's, HP's experiences with Power and Itanium respectively.

"Faced with difficulties getting Intel's Sparc rival, Itanium, to catch on, HP is underwriting a large portion of a five-year, $10 billion effort to popularize the chip family."

The largest distributors for Linux, Red Hat and Novell, don't support Sun.

"Red Hat dropped its Sparc support in 2000, and Novell Suse's last supported version was released in 2002."

"The effort is part of Sun's attempt to restore its relevance and financial fortunes by shaking its image as a proprietary technology company. That legacy from the '90s hurt the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company when it missed out on two major growth trends that spanned the rest of the server industry: machines built with x86 processors such as Opteron and Intel's Xeon, and the open-source Linux operating system."

Dravid on Raina

2006-02-19T00:28:00.000+05:30

Rahul Dravid's always been my idol. Here's something from him on Suresh Raina that I can relate to right now:

"We would like to win every game and this one is no different. Raina played superbly in the last game and showed what a phenomenal player he can be and it's important to give youngsters different challenges. The only way you can get the best out of players is by giving them chances under pressure. No point in being soft on them or cocooning them. It doesn't get the best out of them."

Kochi!

2006-02-18T21:17:00.000+05:30

What did I do today?? Well, I don't know anyone in this city, so I thought I might as well work for some time. Finished a client call in the morning (If you insist on knowing, well, he wanted to negotiate on the rate we've quoted. These purchase managers...), and after comning back late afternoon to office, the only thing to do was check mail.

But surprisingly (or not so surprising, as most of my friends access mail from office, and today being a Saturday...) there weren't too many new messages. I panicked for a moment, and then realized that I could always spend the evening reading a few of the 28.1 million (and growing rapidly!) blogs out there.

So I start with the usual (Lazy Geek), and proceed from his blogroll to my namesake's funny blog. Pretty funny. Only, not funny enough. Which then lead me to this.

The folks at Sulekha and Penguin decided that these were the real funny ones (I only found the 1st and the 4th to be good though):

Manjul Bajaj

S Narayan

Madhulika Liddle (Space on the net.)

Deepanjali Pandey (Managed to locate blog too. Gawd, these Sulekha people could've made it easier. Poor netiqutte I say!)

Three women out of the four winners! (The writing in the above competiton was of the sophisticated -but thoroughly enjoyable- kind. I guess guys are good at slapstick comedy, what with Leno, Letterman, Conan ... even 'Who's line is it anyway?' (1 2) had only the one woman among all the men.) Way to go!!

So that's how I ended up spending this Saturday evening in Kochi. My friend Vijay would've wated me to travel, and explore Kochi's, and some other nearby places' beauty (and I WILL, only not this weekend), and some of my other friends would've said 'Da, get a life!,' but what to do, we are (I am) like this only!

Time well spent I'd think. And now, to worry about Monday's weekly sales review call with the manager from HQ...

Outsourcing is climbing skills ladder

2006-02-17T20:32:00.000+05:30

From The NYT.

IBM Software Group (MS related links)

2006-02-15T21:38:00.000+05:30

IBM spearheads AJAX tools at Eclipse. (news.com)

Microsoft is losing some of its elbow room. (Washington Post)

Council snubs MS by going in for open-source software. (Blog)

Eclipse rises victorious. (infoworld.com)

Smoother sailing without MS. (Newsweek)

Summary (w3)

3 trends - Linux, Networking, Security

2006-02-15T10:22:00.000+05:30

A client once told me that Linux, Networking and Security were going to be the most important things to watch out for in the next few years.

Something covering IBM's portfolio in the security area.

news.com covers a conference on security. (McNealy, Gates et al)

The man behnd Cisco's security. (news.com)

McNealy's top 10 list (of security nightmares!). (news.com)

IBM and the Channel

2006-02-14T20:37:00.000+05:30

IBM's glowing report card. (VAR Business)
Hardware and sofware.

Chennai as a manufacturing hub

2006-02-12T15:31:00.000+05:30

From the Washington Post:

"This new wave is not about Gap T-shirts or Dell laptops, the poster children for the light industries that already have global supply chains. And it is not about software and/or call centers, the industries for which India is famous. Instead, this new globalization is about heavier manufacturing, particularly cars. Detroit's panicking firms know it."

Chennai's already got Hyundai and Ford. BMW will soon be here. And it seems that VW and GM are interested too.

Mentions: TVS, Rane, Sundaram Fasteners. Jayalalithaa, SEZs, Quality awards our companies are bagging.

A copycat named MS

2006-02-11T21:13:00.000+05:30

Another instance of MS being the fast and aggressive copycat - and not the innovator.

Flashback: IE 7 will have tabbed browsing capability (the feature I like the most about Firefox).

Back to the present: MS to challenge the iPod. (news.com)

Now, to the story about the bully:

Flashback: Netscape vs. IE or, 'How the bully killed the start-up'

From the WSJ: "Ten years ago, Microsoft used PC makers' reliance on its operating system to block competition from a browser offered by Netscape Communications. Its tactics led to a landmark antitrust suit against the software giant that eventually restrained Microsoft from using its hold on PC software to close out or limit rivals. The ruling granted PC makers greater freedom to pitch non-Microsoft software on the PC's earliest set-up screens."

What the bully does today: "Still, last summer, executives at Google, H-P, Yahoo and other companies started to worry about Microsoft's continuing influence. Early versions of Microsoft's newest web browser, which is due out this year, featured a built-in box for searching the Internet that automatically directed PCs to Microsoft's MSN search service. They feared Microsoft was using the feature to put rival search companies at a disadvantage."

And at a Google-MS meeting to discuss this issue: "Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of Microsoft's browser team, wasn't at the meeting but received a series of text messages from his colleagues who were. "Not sure they're hearing us," read one message describing the Google group, he recalls."

But I guess they're not all bad: "After months of back and forth, Microsoft backed down on some, but not all of the debates. Mr. Hachamovitch recently demonstrated the latest test version of Explorer. The built-in search box features options such as "Get Search Providers" and "Change Search Defaults" that enable users to select search engines from AOL, Ask Jeeves, Google, MSN and Yahoo. "Our overriding principle from the get-go is 'respect user choice,'" he says. "There's no desire to do anything other than that.""

IBM Software Group's point of view

2006-02-11T20:58:00.000+05:30

IBM software doesn't play in the 'applications' space. Steve Mills' point of view.

Enterprise applications = SAP, Oracle e-apps, Siebel, Peoplesoft (ISVs). Even after all the so called consolidation in the applications space (Oracle eating up Peoplesoft and Siebel), all these ISVs put together probably hold around 25-30% of market share (??).

That still leaves all the thousands of ISVs in all the different parts of the world. (Including a place called Angamaly near Kochi, where an ISV named 'trescon' has built a 'Hospital Information Management System,' that a hospital named 'Litte Flower,' also in Angamaly, is all too happy to use.)

By not competing with these ISVs, IBM Sofware Group hopes to partner with such ISV and through them, sell its Middleware software stack. (Lets companies build, run and manage their applications.)

Blades (from w3)

2006-02-11T20:50:00.000+05:30

Blades are the hottest server market segment, and IBM's BladeCenter family is enjoying the fastest growth in IBM server history. Since its introduction in 2002, IBM is the only vendor to install more than 350,000 blades.

According to market analyst IDC, IBM held 42 percent of worldwide blade revenue share in the third quarter of 2005, the ninth consecutive quarter the company held the leadership position.

In contrast, HP's record includes several failed blade form factor attempts and the company is likely to make further architectural changes this year to try to catch up with IBM.

Dell hasn't faired any better: it's seen its blade platform come and go, and today the company buys its blades from another company.

USES:

BFSI: Twelve of the world's top 13 investment banks are using BladeCenter, with more than 25,000 blades installed.
Digital Media: The movies King Kong, Matrix Reloaded and Lord of the Rings were animated using BladeCenter.
Supercomputing: Fifteen percent of the world's Top 500 supercomputers are BladeCenters, including Europe's largest, Mare Nostrum.
SMBs are buying: Based on the current pipeline report, 40 percent of BladeCenter revenue comes from small and mid-sized business.
Server Consolidation: More than 100 U.S. retailers use BladeCenters in their Data Centers, and more than 1,600 are deployed in more than 1600 retail stores for infrastructure consolidation

Power vs. Itanium

2006-02-11T20:27:00.000+05:30

Power marches on. Power 6: For IBM, speed rules. (BW) (from w3) (news.com interview)

The Cell chip (co-developed by IBM, Sony and Toshiba, and based on the Power architecture), which will power the Play Station 3, will now be available on IBM Blade servers. (w3)

It also has applications in Defense and Medicine. The Cell chip's other life. (BW)

Power chips will also run the latest Xbox 360 from Microsoft, and the GameCube from Nintendo. IBM discovers the power of one. (BW)

Itanium: A cautionary tale. (news.com)
Intel throws good money after a bad chip. (CNN Money from Business 2.0)

Things I WILL read

2005-11-03T21:13:00.000+05:30

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman

http://www.qinfo.org/people/nielsen/blog/archive/tough-learning/tough-learning-final.html

http://www.ergonomics.com.au/pages/400_useful_info/420_how_to_sit.htm

http://cognitivedaily.com/

How to search for mp3's with Google

http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/feature/story/0,13026,1409019,00.html

The boss' profile

2005-09-05T09:33:00.000+05:30

I just found out that the IBM India head, Shanker Annaswamy, is from my engineering college!

An important competitor - HP

2005-09-02T11:16:00.000+05:30

I work in sales for IBM, and my seniors tell me that sales if fun because of the competition that we face in the marketplace everyday, among other things.

HP is more like IBM than any other company, and BusinessWeek has an article on HP's focus on sales execution under its new head, Mark Hurd. Good insight into the working style of the new boss!

Coming back to the point: competition. I've come to believe that it's absolutely important to have really strong competitors against you when you go out everyday to try and make a sale. It's obviously a pain, and you'd probably lose as much as you win. But competition is good because it then makes you work that much harder, and there's a sense of respect for the other guy.

Which is why it's pretty sad to see a competitor - Sun - doing pretty badly nowadays. But there's a lot going on at Sun nowadays: 1 2. (news.com)

EDS, BearingPoint, CapGemini watchout...

2005-09-02T11:10:00.000+05:30

...because Indian companies are now in the major league! TCS, Infosys, Patni win parts of a $2.2B outsourcing deal with ABN Amro.

IBM was the biggest winner, and will collect $1.8B over 5 years for providing the IT infrastructure for the bank's datacenters, among other things.

Emerging technology program - From business to technolgy, and not the other way around

2005-08-30T11:21:00.000+05:30

This cnet news.com article talks about IBM's emerging technology program. An example of how this division's work is different from all the product teams that clients are more likely to meet from IBM (the client also points to the difficulty faced in reaching the appropriate people inside the ocean that is IBM!):

Take BusinessMart, a business-to-business portal that connects more than 2,000 tool and parts retailers to roughly 90 manufacturers. The portal, which handles about 2,400 orders per day, is the largest of its kind in the country, but the company faced problems connecting a variety of customer interfaces running on disparate systems.

After considering offerings from other vendors, BusinessMart settled on IBM, says chief operating officer Thies Frahm. At first, the sprawl of IBM's global reach and product mix made it hard to figure out whom within the organization to approach.

"It was very difficult for us to get the right information from IBM," he says. "There was a point in the project where we needed a much-improved relationship with IBM."

The problem, Smith says, was that BusinessMart was talking to IBM product teams, which have a tendency to plug a product into a problem in an attempt to create a solution. "BusinessMart wanted to build an ecosystem, and that's a business question," Smith says. "The product guys don't know how to answer this."

JStart intervened, built the initial middleware architecture and got BusinessMart started with the software implementation. "The emerging technology group doesn't have a lot of people, but they really have a visionary power of ideas," Frahm says.

Google as the new Microsoft!

2005-08-25T19:56:00.000+05:30

[from the NYTimes] Google is no longer perceived as the David that took on the big bad Goliath's of the tech world. In fact, in Silicon Valley, it's being looked upon more as the new Goliath!

Sharing is good!

2005-08-25T19:19:00.000+05:30

Fortune (subscription required) takes a look at the strategy behind IBM sharing patents, contributing to the open source community, and helping make technology more open rather than proprietary (all this from the company that used to sell the most proprietary mainframes!).

Fortune article (Intranet version) - Nice; goes into history, and talks about a lot of things, including Infy and Wipro!

An excerpt (something I liked):

Growth in the developing world is a natural part of implementing a "global delivery model" for services, says senior vice president Bob Moffat. In July, Palmisano reorganized services, naming the 49- year-old Moffat one of three executives who will run it jointly. While the other two will oversee the delivery of services to clients, Moffat's job is to find efficiencies. He spent the past three years taking billions of dollars in costs out of IBM's physical supply chain--the delivery of parts and goods to and from factories and on to the customer. His mission now is to cut the cost of delivering services, even high-value ones, by tightening the "services supply chain." That mostly means people--getting the right ones to the right place at the right time. He has to extract every last penny of value from IBM's 260,000 developed-country employees if they're going to stay on the payroll.

Palmisano has picked someone he knows and trusts--Moffat has worked closely with him at almost every step of his career--to oversee what is in effect a redesign of half the company.

The corporate Mr. Fixit rises daily around 4 A.M. to do e-mail and make calls around the world. He works till after 7 P.M. He has an obvious intensity, but simultaneously can be disarmingly casual and interested in whomever he's talking to. That serves him well in his endless dealings with IBM employees, many of whose jobs he is likely to change before he's through.

Sun's been more of a 'sharing' company too.

Did you know that Microsoft even has a centre dedicated to making sure that Windows works well with Linux?? (Microsoft working with Linux?!) Read on.

Leadership - with an IT flavour!

2005-08-23T17:07:00.000+05:30

CIO.com has a larger article on Leadership in an IT environment.
Tips include:
1) Building credibilty through accomplishment
2) Speaking the customer's language
3) Building buy-in on the front lines
4) Cultivating champions of change

Another 'whoa!' - difficult decisions first!

2005-08-23T16:55:00.000+05:30

[via Rajesh Jain - actually, this is taken verbatim from his blog!]
Very relevant to me. And to many more I guess!

Seth Godin writes:

There are two ways to catch a plane. The first, which happens to be the most common, is to leave on time, do your best to park nearby, repeatedly glance at your watch, and then start moving faster and faster. By the time you get to security, you realize that you're quite late, so you cut the line ("My plane leaves in 10 minutes!" you shout). You walk fast. As you get closer to your gate, you realize that walking fast isn't going to work, so you start to jog. Three gates away, you break into a run, and if you're lucky, you barely make the flight.
The second way is to leave for the airport 10 minutes early.

He adds: "A key corollary to this principle is the idea that if you don't have the time to do it right, there's no way in the world you'll find the time to do it over. Too often, we use the urgent as an excuse for shoddy work or sloppy decision-making...The most important idea of all is this one: You will succeed in the face of change when you make the difficult decisions first. It's easy to justify running for your plane when it's leaving in two minutes and you're only five gates away. It's much harder to justify waking up 10 minutes early to avoid the problem altogether."

11 traits of a true leader

2005-08-23T16:20:00.000+05:30

From CIO.com:

Ones to Watch honorees—those likely to become the CIOs of tomorrow—need to be good at many things. Critical skills include:

1. Fluency in both technology and the business

2. Ability to work at tactical and strategic levels simultaneously

3. Foresight to connect disparate pieces into cohesive solutions

4. Flexibility

5. Commitment to lifelong learning, with a readiness to stretch beyond core competencies

6. Marketing competence

7. Consummate communication skills

8. Ability to find and manage top talent

9. Vendor management expertise

10. Project management excellence

11. Willingness to delegate

Boredom numbs the work world

2005-08-23T16:07:00.000+05:30

Research says that too much work is still better than no work at all.
Boredom is one of the biggest contributors to work-related stress. The lesser someone works at work, the more pressure they feel!
So get to work!!

Good leaders

2005-08-23T10:22:00.000+05:30

One common trait was found across all winners of a 'Good Managers' contest inside IBM recently. Excerpt:

A study of the shortlisted nominations reveal that the single most popular trait identified as part of successful people management is empowerment of employees.

Be it in terms of empowering with responsibility or investing in their reportees, our winners, have touched their teams with their trust and their drive to enhance the work lives of their employees.

SMB Portal

2005-08-23T09:50:00.000+05:30

ibm.com in Russia has got a portal to reach out to customers in the SMB segment.

You gotta do what you love!!!

2005-08-22T15:48:00.000+05:30

I'm all senti today. Everything I read points to one thing: you gotta do what you love!!

All the stuff that can get automated, outsourced are all things that require your left brain to work really hard: quantitative, analytical skills.

But the most important skill in the future would be all right-brain stuff. Read 'Revenge of the right brain,' by Daniel Pink. Here's where passion, and creativity and all that come in!

And you're only passionate about the things that you absolutely love doing, aren't you??

Tangential thought: Learn how to learn/ unleran very quickly (or something like that).

Inspired to work!

2005-08-22T11:37:00.000+05:30

It's absolutely important to find work that you truly love doing. The onus to do that (the finding!) rests squarely on our shoulders.

Steve Jobs swears by this! (Searched for his speech, but came across a lot more of the kind!)
Speeches at Stanford.
Jobs' commencement address.

[via DD] Ramaraj (Sify CEO) talked about this too.

Strength in research

2005-08-22T11:00:00.000+05:30

IBM Research is the most prolific research organization in the world. These guys don't just sit in labs wearing white coats and working on arcane issues. They're actually helping solve business problems!

Research in the area of Services seems pretty interesting too. IRL's got a satellite centre in B'lore doing just this (Intranet).

IRL tells us a little bit about the lind of work they do.
A Business Standard article.

Supercomputers

2005-08-22T10:33:00.000+05:30

[via the NYT]

The US has used its supercomputers mostly for military purposes (the fastest in the world, the IBM Blue Gene/L is at the Lawrence Livermore National Lab).

The Japanese, on the other hand, have used their supersomputers for the following:
1) Climate simulation (the NEC machine)
2) Automobile accident simulations
3) Oil and natural gas exploration

By not restricting the use of supercomputers to only military purposes, and by opening them up for use by other commercial businesses (eg., auto companies in Japan), Japan tries to put its companies in a better position to compete internationally.

Other uses of supercomputers include:
1) Genomic research
2) Drug discovery
3) Cancer Research
4) Studying of complex phenomena such as turbulence, prediction of material properties, and the behaviour of high explosis

Boeing even designed a new plane completely through simulation, without ever building a prototype!

Meetings!

2005-08-22T10:15:00.000+05:30

Have you heard of the 'I've been meeting' company?!
Good meeting tips from the Intranet (use Collaboration Advisor!).

How to keep your enthu up!

2005-08-17T19:16:00.000+05:30

If you're in IBM, and if you're feeling a little low about how your career's going, this article on the IDP (Individual Development Plan) might cheer you up!

PS: Something from the Intranet again. Sorry to everyone else.

Animation Studios use IBM's help

2005-08-17T09:52:00.000+05:30

The animation industry is one that's getting quite a bit of attention in the IT circles in India. IBM's worked with a few cleints (Intranet!) in this space, and the best thing is that technology today is so accessible that a small company today can take on, and beat, the biggest of imcumbents.

BW covers India and China

2005-08-16T19:58:00.000+05:30

[via Rajesh Jain] BusinessWeek has a LOT of articles on India and China - will take long time to get through them all!! But one thing's certain: they'll make for extremely interesting reading.

When Windows Breaks

2005-08-12T19:12:00.000+05:30

A feel-good article from Forbes.com. No no, seriously, the feel-good is backed by solid innovation - IBM's Rescue and Recovery with Rapid Restore.

When Windows crashes, and you think your world's gonna end becasue of that, don't worry! (But that's assuming you've got a Thinkpad or a Thinkcentre!!)

PS: Heard this joke the other day:

A: What do you think they're gonna call the Thinkpad, now that its been sold to Lenovo??
B: Chinkpad??

Intrapreneurship

2005-08-12T16:43:00.000+05:30

[From Fast Company]
In an effort to nurture new businesses, IBM's putting its best and brightest in charge of risky start-ups. India is one such EBO (Emerging Business Opportunity).

[From the Intranet]
Why India (and the other BRIC countires too) are important for IBM:

1) Large, educated, tech-savvy population.
2) Outnumber the number of science and engineering gradutates from the G4 (6MM vs. 4MM).
3) Governments here support open-standards technology such as Linux.
4) Skills in Technology manufacturing, IT and ITeS.
5) Their world-class industry solutions are sold around the world (eg. Flexcube).

Growth rates here vis-a-vis world average:

1) Systems - 7x
2) Software - 3x
3) Services - 2x

A day in the life of a salesman!

2005-08-11T10:48:00.000+05:30

I'd wouldn't mind such a JD! I'd like to keep coming back to this story (Intranet version - sorry!) many times in the coming days!!

Security

2005-08-11T10:45:00.000+05:30

Security continues to be a big headache for most big corporations. An IBM survey ranks the most affected sectors: (Intranet version - useful for me!)

1) Government
2) Manufacturing
3) Financial services

How Netscape changed the world

2005-08-11T10:35:00.000+05:30

An article from the WSJ (subscription required) marking the 10 year anniversary of the company that had tired to change it all (and probably did!). It's a pity then that Netscape as a company doesn't exist anymore. Nevertheless, I guess it's legacy will continue to live on!

Tech renaissance

2005-08-09T18:49:00.000+05:30

cnet news.com covered India's Tech Renaissance some time back.

IBM's well and truly 'in' India

2005-08-09T17:22:00.000+05:30

A look at all the different things that IBM does in/ out of India

1) Research lab (one of only 8 in the world)
2) Software labs (not too many of these either)
3) Global Services (Daksh included) (largest component of IBM Corp)
4) Selling to India (I fit in here!)

12th March, 2006: IBM to move all solutions development to India. (InformationWeek)
More detailed article. (InformationWeek)

Lotus Domino/ Notes vs. MS Exchange/ Outlook

2005-08-05T12:46:00.000+05:30

Only yesterday did I have a conversation with a friend who was complaing about how bad his Lotus Notes client is!

Here's an article on why I still have faith though! Workplace (the evolution) is pretty good, I hear and read.

Messaging, Collaboration, Workflow, Productivity (OpenDocument, a standard for documents, allows for exchange of data between disparate applications) et al...

Sam Pitroda on Teamwork!

2005-08-05T09:59:00.000+05:30

My boss sent the team this article:

Team

Very good article, by the man who started the telecom revolution in India.

Some interesting points on our work culture :
1. "Teams in India somehow tend to focus on achieving total agreement, which is almost always impossible. " - Does this drag us towards mediocrity, as a "safe" option?
2. "Indians do not differentiate between criticizing an idea and criticizing an individual." - True?
3. "Diversifying tasks increases workers' self-esteem and motivation and makes them team players" - An antithesis to the "specialise to succeed" theme?

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE MAGIC OF TEAM WORK

Here is a very interesting article by Sam Pitroda,Chairman & CEO of World Tel. The article is a bit lengthy but a 'Must' read for all Indians.

(One Indian = 10 Japanese, 10 Indians = One Japanese)

Lack of teamwork and co-operation is one of the most serious problems affecting progress in all areas of India and wherever Indians work worldwide. The key problem in India is always implementation, not lack of policies. We have great policies and ideas about how to do things, but severely lacking teamwork.

When the Japanese came to work in India to develop the Maruti Suzuki car, a joke went around that one Indian was equal to 10 Japanese: Indians were very smart,capable and dedicated individuals. But 10 Indians were equal to 1 Japanese. Indians lacked team spirit and co-operation.

What makes matters even worse is our "crab" mentality- if someone is trying to climb higher and achieve more, the others just drag him down. The signal that the others send out is, " I wouldn't do it; I wouldn't let you do it; and if by change you start succeeding, we will all gang up and make sure that you don't get to do it."

The question is: Where does this attitude come from, and how do we recognize and handle it?

Hierarchical System

Part of the problem is our cultural background. We've had feudal and a hierarchical social system in which whoever is senior supposedly knows best. This was fine in earlier times when knowledge and wisdom were passed on orally; but in modern society, there is no way that one person can know everything. Today, you may find that a young computer-trained person has more answers for an accounting problem than a senior accountant has. Until we understand how best to leverage this diversity of experience, we will not be able to create and fully utilize the right kind of teams.

Sam Patrido: " In my younger days in the US, I attended an executive seminar for Rockwell International, where about 25 senior company executives had congregated for a week for strategic discussion. In the evenings, we would break out into five different groups of five people each. In those group workshops, someone would delegate tasks, saying: " You make coffee; you take notes; you are the chairman; and you clean the board". The next day, there would be different duties for each group member. No one ever said, " But I made coffee twice or I cleaned the board entire day". I thought to myself,if this were happening in India, people would be saying, " But I'm the senior secretary - why should I make the coffee and you be the chairman?" Hierarchy comes naturally to our minds.

What Derails a Team?

Group work requires a thorough understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of individuals irrespective of their hierarchy. Because of our background, we often don't learn how to exercise and accept leadership- to lead and to follow - simultaneously. Some gravitate toward exercising leadership, and others gravitate toward accepting the lead of others. But in true teamwork, everyone needs to do both.

Being a good team player implies respect for others, tolerance of different points of view and willingness to give. The ability to resolve conflicts without either egotism or sycophancy is a very important aspect of being a team player: You have to agree to disagree. I find that people in India somehow tend to focus on achieving total agreement, which is almost always impossible. So before work begins people want everyone to agree on everything instead they should say OK. This is what we agree on, so let's start working on this. What we don't agree on, we will resolve as we go along". For things to move forward,it's important to work on the agreed-upon aspects and not get bogged down in the areas of disagreement. Yet another snake that kills teamwork is people's political agendas. You've got to be open, clear and honest to be a good team player. Most people though, have a hidden agenda - they say something but mean the exact opposite. I call it "split-level consciousness". To say and mean the same thing is a very critical part of a good work ethic.

Criticizing the individual or the idea?

When Sam was working in C-DOT (400 employee size company), If someone had not been doing well, Sam used to tell the person directly to his face in a general meeting. The employees said that was insulting and they should be pulled aside individually to be told of the inefficiency. But in today's world, you cannot afford to do that every time. Besides, Sam figured that criticizing someone in a meeting was for the benefit of all present, and everyone could learn from that individual's mistakes. It was then that Sam learned how Indians do not differentiate between criticizing an idea and criticizing an individual.

So in a group, if you tell someone that his idea is no good, he automatically takes it personally and assumes that you are criticizing him. No one can have a good idea everyday on every issue. If you disagree with my idea, that does not mean that you have found fault with me as a person. Thus, it is perfectly acceptable for anyone to criticize the boss - but this concept is not a part of the Indian System. So from time to time, it is important for an organization's Chief Executive to get a report on the psychological health of the firm. How do people in the team feel? Are they stable? Confident? Secure? Comfortable? These are the key elements of a team's success. For a boss to be comfortable accepting criticism from subordinates, he must feel good about himself. Self-esteem is a key prerequisite to such a system being successful.

Mental Vs. Physical Workers

Another serious problem facing India is the dichotomy and difference in respectability between physical and mental workers, which seriously affects team performance. Mr. Sam had a driver named Ram, who he thought was one of the best drivers in the world. He used to open the door for him whenever he entered or exited the car. Right in the first few days Sam told him " Ram bhai, you are not going to open the door for me. You can do that If I lose my hands". Ram almost started crying. He said, " Sir, what are you saying? This is my job!" Sam told him that I didn't want to treat him like a mere driver. He had to become a team player. Sam told him that whenever he was not driving, he should come into office and help out with office work - make copies, file papers, send faxes, answer phone call or simply read - rather than sit in the car and wait for me to show up.

Diversifying tasks increases workers' self-esteem and motivation and makes them team players. Now, even If Sam calls him for work in the middle of the night, he is ready - because Sam respects him for that he does. Team Interactions unfortunately, when good teams do get created, they almost invariably fall apart. In our system today it is very difficult to build teams because nobody wants to be seen playing second fiddle. It is very hard in India to find good losers. Well, you win some and you lose some. If you lose some, you should move on! You don't need to spend all your time and energy of different cultural backgrounds, religions, ethnicities and caste groups - a fertile ground of diversity in the workplace. We should actually be experts in working with diversity. But it can only happen when we get rid of personal, caste and community interests.

There could be a 40-year-old CEO with a 55-year-old VP. It has nothing to do with age; capability and expertise are what counts. But you don't yet see these attitudes taking hold in India. Managers in the US corporate environment who work with Indians - and in fact, with Asians in general - need to recognize that these individuals have a tendency to feel that they are not getting recognition or are not being respected. It must be realized that these individuals have lower self-esteem to begin with and therefore have to be pampered and encouraged a little more because they need it. This makes them feel better and work better. No Substitute for Teamwork. Teamwork is key to corporate and national governance, and to get anything done.

The fundamental Issues are respect for others, openness, honesty,communication, willingness to disagree, resolution of conflict, and recognition that the larger goal of the team as a whole rumps Individual or personal agendas.

Don't be afraid of pressure. Remember that Pressure is what turns a lump of coal into a diamond.

What Oracle is doing...

2005-08-04T14:16:00.000+05:30

The IT stack of any enterprise comprises of the following (I think!):

1) Systems hardware, at the bottom (Servers, Storage, Networking)
2) Systems software, in the middle (OS, Database, middleware?)
3) Business applications, at the top (enterprise applications like ERP, other legacy application, for other business functions like tracking customer orders or for procurement)

Of the three, business applications are the most important to any IT vendor's clients because this part of the IT stack is the one that's closest to the business user. And it's business needs tha drive IT; IT, at the end of the day, being only an enabler.

So the technology vendors closest to the business side of things are the ones who will drive IT purchsing that can enable savvy businesses to do what they do for customers (ICICI lets me pay my Airtel bills online, for example).

IBM made the decision to exit the business applications space quite some time back. This is because IBM felt that it would have a conflict of interest with the thousands of local partners of IBM who build custom applications for clients on top of IBM hardware and software platforms in their local geographies. Another reason was because the market here is very fragmented too.

Microsoft on the other hand, wants it's business partners to evolve, as it has dcided to get into spaces where only the partner worked before (business intelligence, document workflow, security and managed services). MS wants to standardize most of the business aplications that small companies need to use, thereby squeezing its partners, who were building custom applications on top of MS's platform. MS wants to build packaged applications that companies can use off the shelf, without the busieness partner being involved, therefore their need to evolve.

Oracle too is very focused on the applications space (the top layer of the stack), whereby it would then be in a position to drive the platform strategy (the hardware and software platforms on which the applications run) of any company. Acquiring i-flex, which is the most popular business application for the biggest banks in the world, is a step in that direction (vericalization - banking being an industry group, or a 'verical').

"Banking is a strategic industry for Oracle with nine out of the top 10 banks already running Oracle ERP applications. i-flex gets us there in banking," said Oracle CEO Larry Ellison.

IBM, which makes the platform (hardware and software), but is absent in the business applications space, in a way needs to depend on large players like SAP and Oracle and the thousands of smaller partners to help drive sales of it's servers and middleware software (Websphere, DB2). It is they who decide which platform to use to run their applications. (And it's obviously stupid to expect Oracle to push for anything but it's own database, as a platform on which to run business applications!)

IBM hopes spur demand for it's platform through effective partnering. Also, IBM also has it's mammoth Global Services arm that it can leverage.

It'll be interesting to see how will things will play out in future!!

Whoa!

2005-07-27T13:34:00.000+05:30

Did you know that the Federal Reserve was created to replace one man - JP Morgan??

(From Forbes.com)

Wedding pics

2005-07-27T13:27:00.000+05:30

Kumar anna did it again!

Parents' wedding photos.

Jeff Immelt interview

2005-07-27T13:16:00.000+05:30

An interview (by Fast Company) with the CEO of my favourite company on campus! Is running business all about people ultimately??

A line from the interview on how you get people pumped:

"People want to win. And if people think they've been given the capability to win and are with winners, that's how you get people in the game. People who want to build things and like who they work with will stay with us."

I've heard this before!

2005-07-27T13:03:00.000+05:30

Hey, Wall Street's calling for HP to be broken up into different pieces. Standard line of reasoning: certain parts of the company's business are being used to pump money into others than aren't doing well.

The call for chopping up the company sounds very similar to what was being asked of IBM some 13 years back. Back then, Lou Gerstner decided that IBM derived it's strength from all the different things that it was capable of doing. The whole being greater than the sum of parts.

HP's problem is that it's confused about whether it wants to be a Dell or an IBM. Interesting read (from news.com).

IBM's brand value - Can you explain it?

2005-07-27T12:36:00.000+05:30

I also read BusinessWeek because they say good things about my company (hehe)!

IBM is ranked the 3rd most valuable brand in the world by BW. But a certain Kiran Mani (very enthu guy in the company) keeps poiting out that IBM is the highest ranked B2B brand. Coke's and Microsoft's products are used by you and me. IBM's aren't, he says!

I've always wondered how the IBM brand is worth as much as it is. I mean, it's a brand that rarely comes in contact with the average person (now that we've sold off ThinkPad to Lenovo, the chances of 'contact' are even more remote).

If you think of IBM as a manufacturer of hardware products (mainframes, and other servers), then these machines are almost never seen by the person walking into office everyday.

Further, more than half of our revenues are generated by the IBM Global Services, our services arm. Even here, there is no tangible product. Only people's expertise is sold here.

BTW, IBM's also a software company (I'm confused over whether it's the 2nd or 3rd largest here). But again, it's not software products that you and I can work with (except for the Lotus brand). It's software that runs under all the user-facing applications, like the database, for example. Yet again, hidden away from the end-user!

How, how then is the IBM brand worth so much??!!

Software to fine-tune inventories

2005-07-27T12:15:00.000+05:30

Another BusinessWeek article (yes, I am biased in my reading).

Liked it because it combines all my favourite topics:

A business problem - in this case, the amount of all the different types (40,000 in this case!) of spare parts to be held in inventory.
A technology solution - powerful software with algorithms that will do this for you!

I shouldn't call it a 'technology solution.' The technology is only used to 'enable' the solution. Strong understanding of the business problem at hand is required first, and then of course, the technical bit.

The solution - using databases, statistical models, and forecasts - reminded me of a 2nd year elective at IIM Lucknow called 'Quantitative models in transportation and telecomunication' (no prizes for guessing that I didn't do well in that particular course!) taught by a gentleman named Prof. Y K Agarwal.

This one's for Prof. YKA!

Relevance of the CIO

2005-07-27T10:23:00.000+05:30

I thought my first post would be more formal, with an introduction (of myself, who else!), but then I'd like this blog to be a little more meaningful than that!

If it's useful, and is being attended to on a regular basis, that's good enough!

Talking business now: It's been three months since I joined IBM in sales, and I've been pretty disheartened with my limited exposure to the world of the CIO. Here's why:

The CIO (at least the ones I've seen until now) don't really seem to understand the businesses they work for. My reasoning is that IT in such organizations is used only for mundane things like ensuring that certain basic apps are always up and running. How much of 'business understanding' does one need for that?!
The CIO (again, only the ones I've seen!) does not seem to have too many technology initiatives for the company. Again, I feel that if you don't undersand what business you're in, what IT initiatives are you going to push for?? One obviously does not have too many ideas on how one can help the business technologically in such a scenario.

So I guess the onus lies on salespersons (and others who belive technology can be pretty damn useful for business) to get the CIO to think a little different.

Here's an article from set of BusinessWeek articles on the relevance of the CIO.

Excerpts:

CIOs that turn in solid results get asked to join CEOs in mapping out corporate strategy and entrusted to manage projects outside of IT.

CEOs are recognizing that, of all the levers they have to implement their strategy, technology can push all those levers. You want to change the sales force? Part of that change revolves around technology. You want to change the supply chain, how much inventory you need to have? That has a technology component as well.

We see CIOs' credibility with CEOs being driven by two factors: One, by how well the CIO runs IT -- are they managing their resources responsibly? Are they providing quality services? Two, by how well IT helps the business to achieve its goals.

On a basic level, is IT meeting its current obligations, such as providing services to users? Then, does the CIO understand the company's strategic direction and are decisions made that support it, as opposed to just making decisions that support IT?

High-credibility CIOs come with a business solution to a problem and a couple of technology options to solve it. Then they enter into a dialogue with the CEO about how to solve the business problem.

One example: IT departments are, generally, pretty good at managing their suppliers, whereas a lot of other parts of the organization don't manage their vendors well. So we've seen CIOs starting to get responsibilities for managing vendors and managing alliances outside of IT. We've also seen CIOs that are good at project management being given responsibility to manage product launches.