The technology in your business must deliver one of the following:

1. Improve efficiency
2. Enhance communication
3. Provide better information for decision-making

Is technology improving or hindering your business?

Gartner's 2010 and beyond predictions have been released with some interesting insights available at:

http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=1278413

The key predictions are as follows:

1. By 2012, 20 percent of businesses will own no IT assets.
2. By 2012, India-centric IT services companies will represent 20 percent of the leading cloud aggregators in the market (through cloud service offerings
3. By 2012, Facebook will become the hub for social network integration and Web socialization
4. By 2014, most IT business cases will include carbon remediation costs.
5. In 2012, 60 percent of a new PC's total life greenhouse gas emissions will have occurred before the user first turns the machine on
6. Internet marketing will be regulated by 2015, controlling more than $250 billion in Internet marketing spending worldwide.
7. By 2014, over 3 billion of the world's adult population will be able to transact electronically via mobile or Internet technology.
8. By 2015, context will be as influential to mobile consumer services and relationships as search engines are to the Web.
9. By 2013, mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide.

Central Desktop ran an interesting webinar in conjunction with IDC recently about the use of Software as a Service called:

"The Benefits of an Integrated Approach to Collaboration and Social Technology in Today's Tough Business Environment"

This webinar is a good first step in learning how to implement SaaS based collaboration and social technology for a better ROI accross your entire organization. Lower IT expenses and save workers time by taking a SaaS-based integrated approach to collaboration. Leverage web workspaces, meetings and social tools to manage your business better and more easily.

Visit http://www.centraldesktop.com/saas_webinar to watch. (You'll need speakers)

This article at

 http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13331334

IT WAS the day Sun Microsystems was supposed to rise again. On March 18th the Silicon Valley computer-maker had planned to unveil a new online service to allow start-ups to manage with much less hardware, by buying computing capacity from a “cloud”, rather like electricity from the grid. But the event was overshadowed by the news, hours earlier, that IBM was in talks to buy Sun for at least $6.5 billion in cash, which would translate into a near-100% premium over the firm’s depressed share price in recent weeks.

As The Economist went to press, a deal had yet to be confirmed. But it is no surprise that the two firms are talking. The economic crisis has pummelled Sun, which never really recovered from the dotcom bust. As its share price plumbed new lows, IBM’s remained relatively unscathed (see chart)—a reflection of its business, which has been protected by the computer giant’s global scope and the fact that it makes most of its money from software and services.

In the months to come, more big fish will seek to swallow smaller fry. That is because something deeper is going on in the computer industry. Thanks to ever more powerful chips and new software, servers and other hardware can now be “virtualised”, meaning physically separate systems can act as one. This enables computing power to become a utility: it is generated somewhere on the network (“in the cloud”) and supplied as a service. To simplify their complex data centres and cut costs, more and more companies are thinking about building in-house computing utilities, called “private clouds”, or outsourcing computing to “public clouds” of the kind Sun launched this week.

What is more, as computing becomes a utility, the borders between different systems are starting to blur. A server, for instance, can easily function as a router (a box that directs data around networks). And this convergence means that companies that used to be allies, or in totally different markets, are now starting to compete with each other, argues James Staten, an analyst at Forrester Research.

As a result the industry’s landscape is shifting. Last year Hewlett-Packard (HP), the world’s biggest computer-maker, bought Electronic Data Systems, a big provider of computer services, giving HP more manpower to help its customers build more advanced data centres. HP has also acquired software to manage data centres and put a greater emphasis on networking gear, an important component in the computer centres that have become the heart of many businesses.

Cisco, the world’s biggest maker of routers, has responded by moving into a new area: it will soon start selling servers. Together with other firms, including BMC and VMware, it has developed what it calls a “Unified Computing System”, which was unveiled on March 16th. This is essentially a private cloud in a box. Instead of having to wire up servers, storage devices and networking gear, companies can build and reconfigure virtual computer systems with a few mouse clicks.

For IBM, the third big contender in this emerging field, part of the attraction of Sun is that it has some assets, such as networking gear and data-centre software, which would beef up IBM’s ability to build private clouds. Industry observers think IBM would probably sell many of Sun’s other businesses, however, such as its line of high-end servers. A counter-bid for Sun from HP or Cisco is also possible.

HP, Cisco and IBM (and perhaps Dell, another troubled computer-maker) are gearing up to fight what has come to be called the “war for the data centre”. Much is at stake: this year alone, companies will spend about $100 billion on data centres, according to IDC, a market-research firm. As computing moves online, however, these companies will increasingly have to compete with operators of “public clouds”. Microsoft plans to enter this field, in effect offering to run companies’ computer systems for them inside its own giant data centres. Google is gradually expanding its suite of cloud-based offerings. And Amazon, the world’s biggest online retailer, is also a pioneer in the field of cloud-computing services, which it has been offering for some time.

In a way, all this is a throwback to the era of “time-sharing” on mainframe computers. In the early days of computing, companies either had to buy a mainframe, which cost millions, or share one with someone else. Now firms will once again be confronted with this choice. Contrary to what some argue, however, big companies are unlikely to go fully either way. In fact, the computing sky will probably always be cloudy, meaning that there will be many private and public clouds, and they will come in all shapes and sizes. And most of them will be interconnected. Cisco already has a name for this computing climate: the “Inter-Cloud”.

A very useful section of the CIO website for those needing a refresher course on crucial IT topics:

http://www.cio.com.au/section/quick_introductions_to_technology_topics

Quick Introductions to Technology Topics Sometimes we all can use a refresher course -- or we need to make sure our team and our colleagues are all on the same page.

The latest addition to CIO magazine's Web site, CIO's Quick Introductions to Technology Topics, gives you and your counterparts a jumpstart on the fundamentals behind a variety of hot IT topics.

Presented in a easy-to-digest FAQ format designed to save time for busy IT executives, the articles in CIO's Technology 101 series provide you with the insight you need to get the facts behind the latest industry trends and buzzwords.

Discover hints and tips across a variety of topics including the benefits of Virtualisation, how Web 2.0 can fit into your enterprise and much, much more!

 

The Information Agenda: Unlocking Data

View the video at http://www.internetevolution.com/document.asp?doc_id=168856

IBM's Ambuj Goyal talks about how companies are data rich and information poor, and the approaches, processes and tools necessary to leverage that data and unlock business value. Goyal also talks about some companies that have done this successfully.

This video talks about treating and managing information as a strategic asset, just as you would people. This approach, together with service oriented architecture is enabling business to leverage the value of their data and provide information on demand.