Wednesday, August 25, 2004

[news] An "Olympic Gold" for Shenzhen + RMB 4,000,000,000: Easy Come, Easy Go ...

Wednesday, August 25, 2004
Dateline: China
 
Back in the blogging biz after a week in SH and HZ.  (Lots to say, albeit not until September.  See my "Casting a Wider Net" section which follows.)  Also encountered a "slight" computer problem upon my return to QD.  (More in "Entering the Twilight Zone".)  This posting may seem a bit schizophrenic:  I'm reading several trade articles, reviewing my Bloglines updates, scanning a few newly-published ACM proceedings, and writing this posting simultaneously, so don't be surprised when you see that my perspectives are all over the map.  I already have 51 items for my urls update, so I'll mostly focus on commenting on some of these items.
 
An "Olympic Gold" for SZ
 
I've been waiting for the right time to do a write-up on SZ.  Since the Zensar and Broadengate deal is now public knowledge, this is as good a time as any.  (BTW, I'll be providing much more in-depth coverage of SZ/GZ/HK in a future "Letter from China", including a take on Accenture's expansion plans in South China.)
 
The most interesting business model I have encountered during my visits with over fifty SIs (systems integrators) all throughout China is the Zensar and Broadengate model.  There has been a lot of press about the deal, although I didn't notice any in the American trades.  (However, articles about this announcement might still be scattered among my Bloglines subscriptions; as I stated in the opening paragraph, I'm still in the process of reviewing articles and postings published early last week since my Bloglines feeds are LIFO.)  Two of the better articles were published by Xinhuanet ( http://tinyurl.com/4y5xe ) and rediff.com ( http://tinyurl.com/48eo6 ).  I've been privy to this deal for a couple of months; I was even invited by an exec with the SZ Software Park to speak at their announcement, but it was a bit too rushed and I was in the final prep phase for my SH and HZ trip.
 
Here's what I can say on the record:  The deal between Zensar and Broadengate portends a fascinating future for those SIs with a "Golden Triangle" (U.S., India, China) strategy.  The Xinhuanet and rediff.com articles provide some details, but I'll cut to the chase.  What is most significant about this deal is NOT the way it is structured, but the way it is being implemented.  In fact, here's the scenario.
 
What China's SIs lack the most are experienced PMs.  Of course, they also have no clue how to sell into the U.S. market.  This deal solves both problems.  Zensar already generates sales in the States, something that virtually all SIs in China lack (and ALL domestic SIs do it poorly at best).  Looking beyond this particular deal, many SIs in India (and, of course, in the States) already sell to U.S. CIOs and LOB managers.  With this kind of deal, the sales channel problem is somewhat resolved.  (I say "somewhat" because I'm not convinced that the way sales are generated is optimal.  Alas, addressing this issue is best served in another posting.  I'm still not convinced that many Indian SIs -- and American SIs, for that matter -- really understand the difference between and the need for new business development AND global account management.)  The other problem is also solved, i.e., the lack of PMs.  And this is where the Zensar strategy shines brightest.  The "trick", so to speak, is to use experienced Indians as PMs and bright (but generally inexperienced) Chinese software engineers and programmers.  Over time, Zensar will train their Chinese engineers to be PMs; this is NOT an "Indian master, Chinese slave" relationship.  It simply addresses the short(er)-term need for experienced PMs in China ... and finding experienced PMs in China is next to impossible except at places like BearingPoint, IGS, ... (see a thread developing?).  And trust me, I know it's not easy for them, either.
 
I expect to see a lot more deals like the Zensar and Broadengate deal.  And what I hope to see are a lot of deals between American SIs and Chinese SIs, especially among the American SIs which have already ventured into India.  (Nat, are you reading this?)  I'm not convinced this will happen, but I'm hopeful that it will.  BTW, unless an American SI is one of the largest (e.g., a VARBusiness 100), I'd suggest a partnering strategy in China; don't try to copy IGS, Accenture and B'Point.  An interesting little twist on this was published earlier today in EE Times; see http://tinyurl.com/68ao8 .  BTW, another reason that the Zensar deal will shine rests with Zensar's CEO, Ashish Rahinj.  I have no doubt that he will turn the Zensar and Broadengate deal into a phenomenal success.  However, since he can't be cloned, a "Ashish Rahinj" strategy cannot be duplicated ... and, let's face it, stating the need for a superb CEO like Ashish is stating the obvious.  On a related note (and a bit higher on the food chain), also see an article published in The Star (Malaysia); http://tinyurl.com/6x3uh .
 
neoIT Slams China Again: The Philippines Takes The Number Two Slot After India
 
They must be comped at neoIT for slamming China.  (Actually, it's more like dissing China.)  A recent posting in Offshoring Digest ( http://tinyurl.com/6g2gg ) quotes neoIT's CEO stating that the Philippines is India's most formidable competitor and goes on to make a lot of claims, often citing ridiculous sources.  To be fair, I find no fault with Offshoring Digest; I'm simply attempting to correct some of the flaws in the posting.  First, the salaries quoted are NOT comparing apples to apples.  US$15,000 is true for Shanghai, but certainly not in most other cities in China.  Also, there's a skill set difference between the engineers in SH and in lower cost places in China.  The objective is to find an appropriate mix, which is what a lot of domestic SIs are attempting to do.  LCW (a Langchao company) is doing just this with a Shanghai op-center facing the U.S. market coupled with their largest development center in Jinan (and a smaller center in Qingdao).  Look at payroll figures and it becomes obvious why this makes a lot of sense.  When put in proper perspective, a software engineer in China does NOT make US$15,000 per year -- not even CLOSE!!
 
Computerworld Special Report on Web Services
 
Not much to say except, "READ IT!!"  Includes a couple of book excerpts, too.  The Table of Contents (of sorts) can be found at http://tinyurl.com/5s3e6 .  A glossary is at http://tinyurl.com/62d4v .  A book excerpt and introduction to Web services is at http://tinyurl.com/59skq .  Another book excerpt with a look at when to use Web services can be found at http://tinyurl.com/4laot .  Great stuff!!  Not part of the Special Report, but also from Computerworld, some Web services myths at http://tinyurl.com/5tbqh .  And a couple of other superb articles on a related topic, service-oriented architecture.  One was a cover story in CRN; see http://tinyurl.com/6rbsg ; the other, a feature in Portals Magazine; see http://tinyurl.com/4eg2k .
 
IT Tidbits
 
Wipro tells the truth:  It's not so much about GDMs (global delivery models), even if their press releases say so.  (See http://tinyurl.com/5jaqs .)  It's really about customer evangelists.  That's it, folks!!  See http://tinyurl.com/7xog9 .
 
"RIP" R.I.P.:  In other words, Russia-India-Philippines, your fate is at hand.  I was going to write a lengthy piece about this, but I'll capsulize instead.  Bottom line:  Not afraid of terrorism?  Then by all means, feel free to do your offshoring in the "RIP" countries.  Russia is having their own problems (see http://tinyurl.com/53l5m ) as is India -- and India's latest threat is from a political force (see http://tinyurl.com/6bj5f ).  Definitely, no outsourcing in Hyderabad or Delhi!!  Good 'ol political terrorism almost sounds like a relief, but it's certainly a serious issue.  And there's no need to talk about terrorism in the Philippines, is there?
 
Financial Services Not Leveragable:  Brief comment.  As firms in SH, HZ and even in QD have found, although the financial services sector is the hottest for ITO, the practices of financial institutions in China are too radically different from the practices of financial institutions in the States to be truly leveragable as a vertical market.  This may change over time, especially with WTO, but it's a hard sell right now.  Game over, NO; game delayed, YES.
 
RMB 4,000,000,000: Easy Come, Easy Go ...
 
EVERYBODY with a pulse knows about the Google IPO last week.  The real news, however, was the P2P decision.  But first I'm going to take a stroll down memory lane.  (Certainly feel free to stop reading here.  Except for a bit on the P2P legal decision, the balance of this posting is mostly personal stuff.)

Back in early 2000 I was interviewed by Google for a position which was ultimately filled by Omid Kordestani.  (Google was still on University Avenue, near Stanford and in downtown Palo Alto.)  At that time I had just started the interviewing process with the PSO group at McKinsey and I was pumped-up for a shot at a partnership with McKinsey (albeit starting as a Principal or Associate Principal).  Well, when I checked a couple of days ago, Omid's stock was worth RMB 4,000,000,000 (yes, nine zeros), that's US$500,000,000 (see http://tinyurl.com/3jeqq ).
 
Frankly, I was NOT (and I'm still not) enamored with the way Google does search; I've been a fan of specialized search engines and databases for over 25 years since I first learned to use Dialog, Orbit, BRS and DTIC.  However, I admit that a guy like me who enjoys reading SIGIR proceedings is not your average searcher.  I was also not too thrilled by their revenue model.  I have nothing against their model, but I couldn't see how I was able to add value in their game -- and I guess that they couldn't see it, either.  (I didn't have a second interview.) 
 
I'll never know how close I was.  Was I a close second ... or a distant 32nd?  (I certainly hope I wasn't a close second!!)  From what I best recollect, Google's VCs brought in their own hand-picked choice.  However, I also recall that Omid had much better qualifications than yours truly.  I even had a chance to read his CV; Larry and Sergey had it face-up on the table opposite of me.  But as a biz dev guy, I had long ago learned to read upside-down documents across a table.  Well, on to the truly important IT news for last week.  Not as exciting as Google's IPO, but much more significant to the industry as a whole.  (In reality, the Google IPO was a statistical outlier.)
 
The "big" news, IMHO, was the decision by the U.S. Appeals Court in favor of P2P vendors and providers.  The Industry Standard had one of the best features on this decision; see http://tinyurl.com/5dkoq .  Why is this so important?  Because P2P is key to the future of computing.  From search to grid computing, P2P provides a foundation for a host of solutions.  I'm been a P2P fan for a long time, although I don't use it much for consumer apps.  Matter of fact, I don't use it very much at all.  However, I see the potential -- and I've seen a lot of research in this area.  For example, it's hard to find an ACM magazine which has NOT had a special issue on P2P; P2P pervades many computing domains.  For those readers who haven't played with P2P, try using the Deepnet browser.  Matter of fact, if you use IE as your primary browser, I suspect that you'll like Deepnet a lot.  Deepnet features a Web browser (in essence, sitting on top of IE), an XML feed reader, and P2P file sharing.  See Deepnet at http://tinyurl.com/56gm7 .  BTW, it looks pretty safe, especially by the way they handle BHOs.  Your mileage may vary ...

Entering the Twilight Zone
 
I came back from SH & HZ only to find my computer in the CCU.  I guess the good news is that it wasn't in the ICU -- or the morgue!  I'm still getting it up and running.  Starting in early September, I'll be off to the US and BJ (and possibly SZ and HK) for much of the following six weeks.  Suffice it to say that this blog will be dark most of the next two months.  Too bad my smartphone is tied to Sprint's CDMA network in the States;  it's nothing more than an overpriced PDA in China.  Assuming I can get my hands on a new Explorer series Pocket PC when I get back to the States or in HK (the first PDA with VGA *and* '03 SE) and that I can find an unlimited cellular data access plan for nationwide use in China (probably with a S-E 900 series unit), at least I'll have a back-up if/when my PC goes into cardiac arrest.
 
Actually, I still hope to publish twice a week: One urls list (albeit with as few as five annotated selections) and a commentary culled from one of my Bloglines "MASTER" sources (e.g., Computerworld, <IEEE> Computer), each posted every ten or so days.  The twilight zone, allegorically and metaphorically.  To round out the publication schedule, there's something new on the horizon.
 
Casting a Wider Net
 
As of next month I will be writing a fortnightly/bi-weekly or monthly (TBD) column for the AlwaysOn Network, Silicon Valley's premier online executive network.   Specifically, I will be one of the two columnists for their "Letter from China" feature/e-newsletter.  Each column reaches several hundred readers through the AO Web site and an additional 16,000 newsletter subscribers, plus an estimated several thousand XML news feed subscribers.  Each AO column will also be distributed through my ITO blog and e-newsletter.
 
My first column will critique Shanghai -- from a myriad of perspectives:  A look at what's possible (and advisable) in contrast to what's merely wishful thinking.  The second (and possibly third) columns will examine Sino-American cultural differences, including differences which may be unique to the IT industry.
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
 
http://www.itestrategies.com (current blog postings optimized for MSIE6.x)
http://tinyurl.com/2r3pa (access to blog content archives in China)
http://tinyurl.com/2azkh (current blog postings for viewing in other browsers and for access to blog content archives in the US & ROW)
http://tinyurl.com/2hg2e (AvantGo channel)
 
 
To automatically subscribe click on http://tinyurl.com/388yf .
 

posted by David Scott Lewis at 2:04 PM

Friday, August 13, 2004

[news] "2004 State of Application Development"

Friday, August 13, 2004
Dateline: China
 
Special issues of journals and magazines are often quite good -- if you're into the subject matter.  But the current issue of VARBusiness is absolutely SUPERB!!  EVERY SYSTEMS INTEGRATOR SHOULD READ IT ASAP -- STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING AND READ THIS ISSUE!!  (Or, at the very least, read the excerpts which follow.)  See http://tinyurl.com/6smzu .  They even have the survey results to 36 questions ranging from change in project scope to preferred verticals.  In this posting, I'm going to comment on excerpts from this issue.  My comments are in blue.  Bolded excerpted items are MY emphasis.
 
The lead article and cover story is titled, "The App-Dev Revolution."  "Of the solution providers we surveyed, 72 percent say they currently develop custom applications or tailor packaged software for their customers. Nearly half (45 percent) of their 2003 revenues came from these app-dev projects, and nearly two-thirds of them expect the app-dev portion of total revenue to increase during the next 12 months."  I view this as good news for China's SIs; from what I've observed, many SIs in China would be a good fit for SIs in the U.S. looking for partners to help lower their development costs.  "By necessity, today's solution providers are becoming nimbler in the software work they do, designing and developing targeted projects like those that solve regulatory compliance demands, such as HIPAA, or crafting wireless applications that let doctors and nurses stay connected while they roam hospital halls."  Have a niche; don't try to be everything to everyone.  "Nine in 10 of survey respondents said their average app-dev projects are completed in less than a year now, with the smallest companies (those with less than $1 million in revenue) finishing up in the quickest time, three months, on average."  Need for speed.  "The need to get the job done faster for quick ROI might explain the growing popularity of Microsoft's .Net framework and tools.  In our survey, 53 percent of VARs said they had developed a .Net application in the past 12 months, and 66 percent of them expect to do so in the coming 12 months."  My Microsoft build-to-their-stack strategy.  "Some of the hottest project areas they report this year include application integration, which 69 percent of VARs with between $10 million or more in revenue pinned as their busiest area.  Other top development projects center around e-commerce applications, CRM, business-intelligence solutions, enterprisewide portals and ERP, ..."  How many times have I said this?    "At the same time, VARs in significant numbers are tapping open-source tools and exploiting Web services and XML to help cut down on expensive software-integration work; in effect, acknowledging that application development needs to be more cost-conscious and, thus, take advantage of open standards and reusable components.  Our survey found that 32 percent of VARs had developed applications on Linux in the past six months, while 46 percent of them said they plan to do so in the next six months.  The other open-source technologies they are using today run the gamut from databases and development tools to application servers."  I guess there's really an open source strategy.  I come down hard on open source for one simple reason:  I believe that SIs in China could get more sub-contracting business from a build-to-a-stack strategy.  And building to the open source stack isn't building to a stack at all!!  "As a business, it has many points of entry and areas of specialization.  Our survey participants first arrived in the world of app dev in a variety of ways, from bidding on app-dev projects (45 percent) to partnering with more experienced developers and VARs (28 percent) to hiring more development personnel (31 percent)."  For SIs in China, simply responding to end-user RFQs is kind of silly.  Better to partner on a sub-contracting basis.  "According to our State of Application Development survey, health care (36 percent), retail (31 percent) and manufacturing (30 percent) ranked as the most popular vertical industries for which respondents are building custom applications.  Broken down further, among VARs with less than $1 million in total sales, retail scored highest, while health care topped the list of midrange to large solution providers."  Because of regulatory issues, I'm not so keen on health care.  I'd go with manufacturing followed by retail.  My $ .02.  "When it comes to partnering with the major platform vendors, Microsoft comes out the hands-on winner among ISVs and other development shops.  A whopping 76 percent of developers in our survey favored the Microsoft camp.  Their level of devotion was evenly divided among small, midsize and large VARs who partner with Microsoft to develop and deliver their application solutions.  By contrast, the next closest vendor is IBM, with whom one in four VARs said they partner.  Perhaps unsurprisingly, the IBM percentages were higher among the large VAR category (those with sales of $10 million or more), with 42 percent of their partners coming from that corporate demographic.  Only 16 percent of smaller VARs partner with IBM, according to the survey.  The same goes for Oracle: One-quarter of survey respondents reported partnering with the Redwood Shores, Calif.-based company, with 47 percent of them falling in the large VAR category.  On the deployment side, half of the developers surveyed picked Windows Server 2003/.Net as the primary platform to deliver their applications, while IBM's WebSphere application server was the choice for 7 percent of respondents.  BEA's WebLogic grabbed 4 percent, and Oracle's 9i application server 3 percent of those VARs who said they use these app servers as their primary deployment vehicle."  Microsoft, Microsoft, Microsoft.  Need I say more?  See http://tinyurl.com/45z94 .
 
The next article is on open source.  "Want a world-class database with all the bells and whistles for a fraction of what IBM or Oracle want?  There's MySQL.  How about a compelling alternative to WebSphere or WebLogic?  Think JBoss.  These are, obviously, the best-known examples of the second generation of open-source software companies following in the footsteps of Apache, Linux and other software initiatives, but there are far more alternatives than these.  Consider Zope, a content-management system downloaded tens of thousands of times per month free of charge, according to Zope CEO Rob Page.  Some believe Zope and applications built with Zope are better than the commercial alternative they threaten to put out of business, Documentum.  Zope is also often used to help build additional open-source applications.  One such example is Plone, an open-source information-management system.  What began as a fledgling movement at the end of the past decade and later became known as building around the "LAMP stack" (LAMP is an acronym that stands for Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP or Perl) has exploded to virtually all categories of software.  That includes security, where SpamAssassin is battling spam and Symantec, too.  Popular?  Well, it has now become an Apache Software Foundation official project.  The use of open source is so widespread that the percentage of solution providers who say they partner with MySQL nearly equals the percentage who say they partner with Oracle"23 percent to 25 percent, respectively."  There are plenty of choices for those SIs willing to play the open source game.  See http://tinyurl.com/4e3c7 .
 
"It's all about integration" follows.  "There are many reasons for the surge in application-development projects (the recent slowdown in software spending notwithstanding).  For one, many projects that were put on hold when the downturn hit a few years ago are now back in play.  That includes enterprise-portal projects, supply-chain automation efforts, various e-commerce endeavors and the integration of disparate business systems."  Choose carefully, however.  Balance this data with other data.  Right now, I see a lot more play with portals and EAI.  "Indeed, the need for quality and timely information is a key driver of investments in application-integration initiatives and the implementation of database and business-intelligence software and portals.  A healthy majority of solution providers say application integration is a key component of the IT solutions they are deploying for customers.  According to our application-development survey, 60 percent say their projects involved integrating disparate applications and systems during the past 12 months."  "Some customers are moving beyond enterprise-application integration to more standards-based services-oriented architectures (SOAs).  SOAs are a key building block that CIOs are looking to build across their enterprises."  Anyone who regularly reads any one of my three IT-related blogs knows that I'm gung-ho on SOAs.  "Even if your customers are not looking for an SOA, integrating different systems is clearly the order of the day.  To wit, even those partners that say enterprise portals or e-business applications account for the bulk of their business note that the integration component is key."  Yes, integration, integration, integration.  I'll be saying this next year, too.  And the year after ...  "Another way to stay on top of the competition is to participate in beta programs."  Absolutely true -- and a good strategy, too.  See http://tinyurl.com/6x2gg .
 
The next article is on utility computing versus packaged software.  Again, if you read what I write, you know that I'm also gung-ho on utility computing.  "According to VARBusiness' survey of application developers, more than 66 percent of the applications created currently reside with the customer, while 22 percent of applications deployed are hosted by the VAR.  And a little more than 12 percent of applications developed are being hosted by a third party.   Where services have made their biggest inroads as an alternative to software is in applications that help companies manage their customer and sales information."  The article goes on to state that apps that are not mission-critical have the best chance in the utility computing space.  Time will tell.  Take note, however, that these are often the apps that will most likely be outsourced to partners in China.  "Simply creating services from scratch and then shopping them around isn't the only way to break into this area.  NewView Consulting is expanding its services business by starting with the client and working backward.  The Porter, Ind.-based security consultant takes whatever technology clients have and develops services for them based on need."   And focus on services businesses and .NET, too.  "Most application developers agree that services revenue will continue to climb for the next year or two before they plateau, resulting in a 50-50 or 60-40 services-to-software mix for the typical developer.  The reason for this is that while applications such as CRM are ideally suited to services-based delivery, there are still plenty of other applications that companies would prefer to keep in-house and that are often dependent on the whims of a particular company."  Still, such a split shows a phenomenal rise in the importance of utility computing offerings.  See http://tinyurl.com/54blv .
 
Next up:  Microsoft wants you!!  (Replace the image of Uncle Sam with the image of Bill Gates!!)  Actually, the article isn't specifically about Microsoft.  "Microsoft is rounding up as many partners as it can and is bolstering them with support to increase software sales.  The attitude is: Here's our platform; go write and prosper.  IBM's strategy, meanwhile, is strikingly different.  While it, too, has created relationships with tens of thousands of ISVs over recent years,  IBM prefers to handpick a relatively select group, numbering approximately 1,000, and develop a hand-holding sales and marketing approach with them in a follow-through, go-to-market strategy."  Both are viable strategies, but NOT both at the same time!!  "To be sure, the results of VARBusiness' 2004 State of Application Development survey indicates that Microsoft's strategy makes it the No. 1 go-to platform vendor among the 472 application developers participating in the survey.  In fact, more than seven out of 10 (76 percent) said they were partnering with Microsoft to deliver custom applications for their clients.  That number is nearly three times the percentage of application developers (26 percent) who said they were working with IBM ..."  Percentages as follows:  Microsoft, 76%; IBM, 26%; Oracle, 25%; MySQL, 23%; Red Hat, 17%; Sun, 16%; Novell, 11%; BEA, 9%.  I said BOTH, NOT ALL.  Think Microsoft and IBM.  However, a Java strategy could be BOTH a Sun AND IBM strategy (and even a BEA strategy).  See http://tinyurl.com/68grf .
 
There was another article I liked called, "How to Team With A Vendor," although it's not part of the app-dev special section per se.  This posting is too long, so I'll either save it for later or now note that it has been urled.  See http://www.furl.net/item.jsp?id=680282 .  Also a kind of funny article on turning an Xbox into a Linux PC.  See http://tinyurl.com/4mhn6 .  See also http://www.xbox-linux.org .
 
Quick note:  I'll be in SH and HZ most of next week, so I may not publish again until the week of the 23rd.
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
 
http://www.itestrategies.com (current blog postings optimized for MSIE6.x)
http://tinyurl.com/2r3pa (access to blog content archives in China)
http://tinyurl.com/2azkh (current blog postings for viewing in other browsers and for access to blog content archives in the US & ROW)
http://tinyurl.com/2hg2e (AvantGo channel)
 
 
To automatically subscribe click on http://tinyurl.com/388yf .
 

posted by David Scott Lewis at 11:26 AM

Thursday, August 12, 2004

[urls] Build a Better Enterprise Application

Thursday, August 12, 2004
Dateline: China
 
The following is a sampling of my top ten "urls" for the past week or so.  By signing up with Furl (it's free), anyone can subscribe to an e-mail feed of ALL my urls (about 100-250 per week) -- AND limit by subject (e.g., ITO) and/or rating (e.g., articles rated "Very Good" or "Excellent").  It's also possible to receive new urls as an RSS feed.  However, if you'd like to receive a daily feed of my urls but do NOT want to sign up with Furl, I can manually add your name to my daily Furl distribution list.  (And if you want off, I'll promptly remove your e-mail address.)
 
Top Honors:
 
* Build a Better Enterprise Application (on Web services and SOA; great review of all the pertinent issues)
 
Other best new selections (in no particular order):
 
* Adaptive Document Layout via Manifold Content (PDF) (another hit for Microsoft, this article proposes a user interface for authoring and editing Web content for different form factors; think formatting for ubiquitous devices and pervasive computing)
* A New View on Intelligence (on XML & EII, et al) (thoroughly enjoyable -- so good,  I almost blogged it; insightful perspective)
* InfoWorld Special Report: Has desktop Linux come of age? (IMHO, a resounding "No!!"  But there are other perspectives worth considering.  I still think it's a lot of wishful thinking.)
* Negotiating in Service-Oriented Environments (PDF) (A slightly annotated excerpt: "The concept of delivering software as a service is relatively simply: 'do not buy software, simply use it as and when you need it'.  Putting such a concept into practice, however, is far more complex and involves many issues.  In this article, we address the question: What are the characteristics of a market for software services?"  Hot topic, good paper.)
* Real Time Means Real Change (so much talk about the so-called "Real Time Enterprise"; this article takes a look at the realities behind the hype of the "RTE")
* Information Scent on the Web (PDF) (Courtesy of PARC, you need to read this for yourself; Google as The Matrix idea -- worse yet, The Time Machine Reloaded   In reality, useful perspectives for Web designers.)
* Offshoring/Outsourcing: Fragile - Handle With Care (a brief but rather comprehensive overview; points to the various aspects of ITO and BPO along the IT value chain)
* IT Spending For Comprehensive Compliance (original article linked; good review of the various opportunities "thanks" mostly to SOX)
* The Executive's Guide to Utility Computing - ROI of Utility Computing (a broad perspective on utility computing, different from what is usually published)
 
Examples of urls that didn't make my "Top Ten List":
 
> Benchmarking Study Shows 75 Percent of Enterprises Deploying Web Services (need I say more?; includes stats on ebXML and grid computing, too)
> Probabilistic Model for Contextual Retrieval (PDF) (a sneak peek at Microsoft's emerging search technology?)  See also Block-based Web Search, courtesy of Microsoft Research Asia (Beijing) and Tsinghua University, arguably China's best (the latter article is not urled; from the recent SIGIR conference).  If you think Google is the last word in search, think again.
> Where To Find New Growth Prospects And What Challenges Need To Be Overcome (necessary action items and preferred geographic regions; China <not Russia, Brazil or the Czech Republic> comes in the number two slot after North America)
> CIO Magazine: Are We Happy Yet? (on ITO and BPO) (dumb article title, but smart content; good metrics to consider, including a take on SLAs)
> Developing Killer Apps for Industrial Augmented Reality (restricted access) (this page provides some complimentary information to the restricted access selection, although it's not urled).  I just noticed something:  The apps section of IEEE CG&A is edited by two mil guys, one from the (U.S.) Office of Naval Research and the other from the U.S. Army simulation and training office.  Hey, who says all the good engineering jobs are outsourced!?    Frankly, I believe that the best American engineers can always find jobs within DoD or the intelligence community.  Besides, they do all the truly fun computing stuff!!  Trust me, there isn't so much fun stuff done at Oracle.
 
and many, many more ...
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
 
http://www.itestrategies.com (current blog postings optimized for MSIE6.x)
http://tinyurl.com/2r3pa (access to blog content archives in China)
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posted by David Scott Lewis at 9:44 PM

Monday, August 09, 2004

[news] Excerpt from a McKinsey Paper on IT Spending Trends

Monday, August 9, 2004
Dateline: China
 
I recently urled the abstract for this paper, but CNET and McKinsey were kind enough to post the full-text of the paper on the CNET news site (which downloads at glacial speed, at least from China).  Now that the article from the current issue of The McKinsey Quarterly is in the public domain, I'd like to include an excerpt in this posting.  (Bolded and colored notations are MY emphasis.)
 
"Although IT customers also want to improve their software, they are wary of big-bang packaged applications--purchases that are just now rolling off accrual budgets.  This time around, CIOs are shunning expensive panaceas, especially large-scale customer relationship management (CRM) systems.  Many tech executives lost face (or jobs) when the promised benefits didn't materialize, often because the technology demanded difficult-to-realize changes in processes and in employee behavior.  Even worse than buying packaged applications, CIOs told us, was buying applications and then customizing them, for this strategy made it necessary to reinvest in customization with each subsequent upgrade.  CIOs now favor narrower, more-targeted, less-ambitious improvements that mitigate the risk of organizational rejection.  Custom software that closely adheres to a company's existing processes (and therefore requires little or no process change) is popular, and so is software developed for a specific industry.  Meanwhile, integration--a higher priority now than it was during the boom--is generating demand for enterprise application integration (EAI) technologies.  Web services are gaining traction faster than anticipated, especially in small telecom and other companies at the forefront of IT innovation.  Of the CIOs we interviewed, 8 percent said that Web services were their primary integration strategy.  Despite these inroads, most companies are still at the experimental stage with this technology, which demands advanced skills and a high degree of commitment from the IT organization.  Others are choosing a different path:  Roughly half of the CIOs we spoke with have been (or are thinking about) investing in integration broker software, often combined with Web services.  Adoption is strongest among telecommunications and financial-services companies, whose technical complexity makes the software especially attractive.  The third-party services market could feel the pinch, however.  Many companies, spurred by lower IT salaries after the economic slowdown, hired talent and brought IT development in-house.  These new hires often support and develop the more-customized applications that today's IT budgets favor.  But this move could boomerang on companies in the future:  The absence of vendor support could reduce economies of scale and push up costs.  Offshoring in less-expensive labor markets could, of course, offset them."
 
ADDENDUM: Seeing Beyond "Traditional" Market Research ...
 
I've already received a few messages regarding my "Seeing Beyond" posting.
 
One of the questions was very simple to answer.  The question:  Can you name a few ISVs in China which could develop a hosted version of their packaged software?  Certainly.  Simple answer:  Bamboo, Kingdee, UFSoft (all three are in the ERP space).
 
A reader also asked me about Fisher-Pry, having heard of this technique but not really familiar with it.  In simple terms, Fisher-Pry functions best as a substitution model.  I'm not thrilled about using it to predict end of life and market size issues per se.  Where I find it useful -- EXTREMELY USEFUL -- is in determining when a NEW technology is likely to EMERGE.  I then put on my Geoffrey Moore glasses to look at the technology from a chasm crossing perspective.  And, if I'm really interested, I'll put on my Ed Roberts and Gordon Bell glasses -- and will evaluate the technology using other techniques as well.  But Fisher-Pry itself is extremely simple to use and a Geoffrey Moore analysis is also a no-brainer.  (Ed Roberts' -- and I'm the unofficial president of the Ed Roberts fan club -- various approaches to evaluating new markets and technologies requires me to fire a lot more neurons than Moore's approach.)  To me, Fisher-Pry is all about inflection points and EMERGING markets.  To see an application of Fisher-Pry, read an A.T. Kearney report on wireless futures at http://tinyurl.com/4zcas (and it's an excellent report, too).  See also a recent evaluation of the remote sensing market at http://tinyurl.com/6zxqm .  For a brief review of Fisher-Pry and a couple of related techniques for technology trend analysis, see http://tinyurl.com/4hf7t .
 
Finally, another reader questioned whether MIT's Innovation Futures market was doomed to focus on short(er)-term "bets."  My answer is that MIT may need to repackage Innovation Futures for addressing long(er)-term issues.  Many of us in America can remember playing the stock market in one of our classes.  For me, it was in my eighth grade government class.  We had to pick stocks and trade them through the course of the year.  Unfortunately, the very nature of this learning experience put a premium on trading versus investing.  In other words, picking stocks which might be solid over a three-plus year time horizon simply wouldn't work; it was much better to "gamble" on high Beta (i.e., higher volatility) issues.  Innovation Futures suffers from the same "need" to determine winners and losers on a relatively timely basis.  Probably time horizons of three or more years won't suffice, at least not from a "gamblers" perspective (sans venture capitalists).
 
I'd like to see their system changed to allow different types of "players" and "traders," namely the crop I had suggested in my last posting, but also another class of "all others."  Think of this as an experiment in social computing among technophiles, not online gambling.  In some ways, it could reveal the type of knowledge that is found in the blogosphere.
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
 
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posted by David Scott Lewis at 5:53 PM

Sunday, August 08, 2004

[commentary] Seeing Beyond "Traditional" Market Research + A Golden Opportunity for China's ISVs

Sunday, August 8, 2004
Dateline: China
 
More general commentary than news commentary per se; let's dig in ...
 
Seeing Beyond "Traditional" Market Research
 
We're all familiar ad nauseum with market forecasts by firms such as Gartner, Forrester, IDC and even i-bankers (albeit i-bankers tend to have a shorter time horizon).  I've always been a bit suspect of IT market forecasts and was delighted that the META Group (where I was VP, Electronic Business Strategies) focused on qualitative and consultative approaches to serving our end-user and vendor clients.  We were more like a SWAT team version of McKinsey:  Get in, get it done, get out, move on.  The Kensington Group, an IT advisory services industry watchdog firm, has found that most forecasts are simply dead wrong.  Frankly, it's hard to blame the IT advisory services:  Forecasting is tough stuff!!  Some of the firms claim that they are not producing forecasts, but are producing projections.  Call it what you will:  It's a forecast -- and it's usually wrong.  (In defense of the IT advisory services, often the commentary which accompanies a forecast is quite useful.  The forecast may be wrong, but often other issues are adequately -- and usefully -- addressed.)
 
I've been a long-time proponent of more "advanced" forecasting techniques ranging from Delphi (pioneered by the RAND Corporation) to cellular automata to Lotka-Volterra (which in a plain vanilla and watered-down form was the basis of a lead article in an issue of Harvard Business Review) to the good 'ol Fisher-Pry technique -- and just about every flavor of forecasting in between.  Not only do I read Technological Forecasting & Social Change, but I annually read numerous papers published in a few hundred engineering journals and in all ACM, IEEE and SPIE conference proceedings which cite a paper published in TF&SC.  (Think CiteSeer.)  And something relatively new has captured my attention; I want to share this with the readers of this blog/e-newsletter.
 
MIT's Technology Review has embarked on a interesting project called "Innovation Futures".  (They may not view this as a "project," but it feels like a "project" to me.)  There is a fair amount of history behind the project -- and some may recall the related DARPA fiasco last year -- but I'd like to stick specifically to the MIT project.  To quote Technology Review, "Innovation Futures is a predictive market system that enables technologyreview.com users to predict the outcome of events related to emerging technologies."  Think of it as a futures and options market for emerging technologies -- NOT about companies, but about the underlying technologies.  For example, rather than betting for or against Nanosys as a pure-play nano firm, a "player" (think "trader") can bet for or against a definable nano event (e.g., commercial devices produced using molecular self-assembly techniques with combined annual sales of at least $100 million by 2006).  Something "easier" to phantom might be a bet that VoIP will be implemented in some form by at least 75% of G2000 companies by 2007.  Think about this:  Which would give a better indicator of buying intentions, the MIT predictive market system or an IT advisory service forecast?  I'll put my money on Innovation Futures or a clone.  (Frankly, I'd put my money on other technological forecasting techniques.  But if the choice is between the MIT system or Gartner, I'll go with MIT.  And the MIT market is a lot easier to follow than building a nonlinear model.  Leave the tough stuff to Pugh-Roberts; leave the everyday stuff to Innovation Futures.)
 
At this point, the MIT site doesn't have very much and most of what they have is focused on short(er)-term bets.  But this will be very interesting to watch, especially as broader -- and long(er)-term -- issues are market tested.  What happens when the marketing folks at IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, HP, Accenture, CSC, TCS, Infosys and SAP play?  And when the members of the Global Business Network and their brethren play?  And when IT advisory services analysts play?  And, perhaps most importantly, when CIOs representing companies of all different sizes and from all parts of globe start to play?  Food for thought.  I'll keep this readership posted:  I plan to have several long discussions with the folks running Innovation Futures.  I have many specific ideas to share with them.  For more information, see http://tinyurl.com/5bevb .
 
A Golden Opportunity for China's ISVs
 
In the past I've talked about the opportunities for SIs (systems integrators) in China to work with utility computing vendors in the States.  Well, I've given this a lot of thought and have another idea:  What about ISVs (independent software vendors) in China floating utility computing offerings in the States?  As one example, let's take Free CRM (see http://www.freecrm.com/ ).  The totally free version seems a bit worthless, but gives a smaller firm a chance to play with the idea with very little risk.  However, the "Professional" version is only $10 per month per user, far less than Salesforce.com's average of $70 per month per user.  Okay, the "Professional" version of Free CRM (maybe they should call it "Cheap CRM" -- or some B-school grad might name it "Value-Driven CRM") certainly doesn't have the industrial strength features of Salesforce.com.  However, think a modified Pareto strategy:  A good chuck of the functionality, but at a fraction of the cost.  Add a few zingers like syncing for a PDA/smartphone and/or pages automatically "modified" to fit any form factor (see the current issue of CACM for a great article on this; hot research area and tomorrow's urls listing will include a link to a downloadable paper on this subject) and the offering from the ISV in China becomes incredibly -- perhaps irresistibly -- enticing.  And guess what:  At least in theory the platform could be leveraged for both the market in the States and in China.  (I have some reservations about this, but it's theoretically doable.)  BTW, the Free CRM solutions are NOT hosted, but for in-house initiatives.  However, the same marketing principles apply in this analysis.
 
Bottom line:  This is truly a golden opportunity for ISVs in China.  Don't target the F1000; go after SMEs, perhaps the same firms that are normally targeted by the largest ISVs using telemarketing.  (I'm not suggesting a telemarketing strategy; I'm simply segmenting the market in Oracle fashion.)  Think of a U.S. company with less than 500 employees.  The world (well, at least the U.S. part of it) will be your oyster ...
 
China: A Hotbed for Management Consulting?
 
An interesting article published on the China Economic Net site (in Chinglish, no less) kind of uses the phrase "management consulting" in a rather broad way.  But when it gets to specifics, it's illuminating.  First, there is the claim that "China has become the management consulting market with the most rapid growth rate."  Not sure if this is really true, but it's certainly one of the more interesting markets. 
 
For specifics, BearingPoint is cited.  Basically, they're bursting at the seams and projecting growth from about 1,000 today to 6,000 in 2008.  CapGemini went the acquisition route.  The average annual salary of a "good management consultant" is about US$40,000 -- a far cry from what a "good management consultant" makes in the States.  And what do the consultants bring to the table?  Well, this is where the article went from being written in English to Chinglish.  But if I can make out what they mean, it's the ability for management consultants to help with implementation and operational issues.  See http://tinyurl.com/43hlr .
 
Bottom line:  SIs in China should look to adding so-called "management consulting" services to their offerings.  I am NOT suggesting a massive move in this direction, but a selected approach.  Also, China's SIs should look to partner with Western management consulting firms already in or planning to enter China.  On the one hand, the BearingPoints of the world make good partners, especially for sub-contracting work.  On the other hand, the BCGs of the world are more complimentary and not directly competitive.  Have a strategy and plan for dealing with both types of management consulting firms, i.e., the strategy firms with a stake in IT (e.g., @McKinsey) and the IT consultancies/SIs with a strategy play (e.g., IGS, Accenture, ...).
 
What I'm Reading (and Why I Didn't Post as Often as Usual Last Week)
 
The new proceedings for SIGIR04 are out and I've been sifting through dozens of papers.  Google seems like child's play compared to what is brewing.  However, I have it on good authority that Google is brewing many of the same things.  But so is Microsoft.  In the future, we all benefit.
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
 
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posted by David Scott Lewis at 11:58 PM

Monday, August 02, 2004

[urls] Top 10 Urls: 25 July-1 August 2004

Monday, August 2, 2004
Dateline: China
 
The following is a sampling of my "urls" for the past eight days.  By signing up with Furl (it's free), anyone can subscribe to an e-mail feed of ALL my urls (about 150-350 per week) -- AND limit by subject (e.g., ITO) and/or rating (e.g., articles rated "Very Good" or "Excellent").  It's also possible to receive new urls as an RSS feed.  However, if you'd like to receive a daily feed of my urls but do NOT want to sign up with Furl, I can manually add your name to my daily Furl distribution list.  (And if you want off, I'll promptly remove your e-mail address.)
 
Best new selections (in no particular order):
 
* A Web Services Choreography Scenario for Interoperating Bioinformatics Applications (SUPERB, covering all the bases; might serve as the foundation for a blog posting)
* ICC Report: Software Focus, June 2004 issue (if you're not familiar with this monthly newsletter from Red Herring, it's worth scanning; this particular issue is their "annual" on enterprise software)
* Northeast Asia: Cultural Influences on the U.S. National Security Strategy (this might serve as the basis for a blog posting; EXCELLENT, broad-based review of cultural issues)
* Economics of an Information Intermediary with Aggregation Benefits (think B2B and e-markets, although the implications are wide-ranging)
* How to Increase Your Return on Your Innovation Investment (provides a link to an article published in the current issue of Harvard Business Review; good food for thought)
* Why Mobile Services Fail (insights from Howard Rheingold)
* Anything That Promotes ebXML Is Good (lots of good links; I'm an ebXML advocate, so the tone of this article is one which I fully support)
 
Examples of urls that didn't make my "Top Ten List":
 
> RightNow, Sierra Atlantic Announce Partnership to Deliver Enterprise CRM Integration (a trend in the making; I've talked about this quite a bit, i.e., systems integrators working with utility computing vendors)
 
and many, many more ...
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
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posted by David Scott Lewis at 8:54 PM

[news] Cognizant & the "Intelligent Internet" + a Peek at 2005 IT Budgets (Part 2 of 2)

Sunday, August 1, 2004
Dateline: China
 
Ah, the World Future Society.  Much to say about the WFS, but I'll save it for the end of this post.  An article which appears in the March-April 2004 issue of The Futurist was reprinted in a recent issue of Government Computer News (see http://tinyurl.com/yrp2w ); the original paper which was the basis for The Futurist article is also available (see http://tinyurl.com/5ymos ).  The article focuses heavily on findings from the TechCast Project at George Washington University (see http://www.techcast.org ; BTW, they're seeking beta testers).
 
The article acknowledges hype during the bubble, but goes on to indicate that 20 commercial aspects of Internet use should reach 30% "take-off" adoption levels over the next several years -- and will rejuvenate the (American) economy.  One area of particular interest is a "conversational" human-computer interface, called "TeleLiving," based on advances in speech recognition, AI, hardware/grid computing, virtual environments and flat wall monitors.  (Sounds like stuff out of PARC and Microsoft Research.)
 
Their Project results "portray a striking scenario in which the dominate forms of e-commerce - broadband, business-to-business (B2B), online finance, entertainment-on-demand, wireless, e-training, knowledge-on-demand, electronic public services, online publishing, e-tailing - grow from their present 5%-20% adoption levels to 30% between 2004 and 2010.  TechCast considers the 30% penetration level significant because this roughly marks the 'take-off point' when technologies move from their early-adopter phase into the mainstream, where they permeate economic and social life."  (Think of chasm crossing.  Also think of expeditionary marketing within the context of broadband.  BTW, bolded and colored items are MY emphasis.)
 
The authors discuss the notion that many think that the Internet is already mainstream, yet challenge that notion by stating that this is true only for nonpaying use, citing surfing for free information as one example.  "As of 2003, commercial operations involving monetary exchange were limited to about 23% for broadband, 10% for e-tailing, 12% for B2B, 10% for distance learning, and 5% for music.  And these are the most popular Internet applications.  Others hardly register in adoption levels at all."  Bottom line:  It's all about e-commerce, I guess.  Jerry Maguire said it best. 
 
A Look at 2005 IT Spending
 
Not as much as I had originally hoped for in the Forrester glimpse at 2005 IT budgets, but some things to note.  (See http://tinyurl.com/67pse .)  Example:  52% of finance and insurance firms -- led by insurers -- will spend more on IT in 2005.  Okay, sounds like an opportunity for SIs (systems integrators) building .NET solutions.  (For those who don't know, Microsoft has fairly strong solutions for the insurance vertical.)  At the subvertical level, media and nongovernment public sector plays look good, whereas the utilities and transportation sectors look weak.  Also, Siebel and PeopleSoft customers are planning to spend more on IT relative to customers of other key vendors, most notably SAP.  (I don't see this, but I don't dispute their data.  Frankly, I think we'll see a lot of activity for SAP SIs in 2005.  P'Soft is too hard to tell, especially with the confusion caused by Oracle.  Oracle benefits whether the acquisition goes through or not!!  It's the FUD factor.)
 
Not to be outdone, AMR came out with their peek at 2005 budgets for SMEs (small and medium enterprises).  (See http://tinyurl.com/5vlvo .  I got a lot more out of the AMR report.)  Something that is rather common knowledge among IT analysts, but may not be known by those not involved in the IT budgeting process, is that a typical large U.S. manufacturer spends 2% of its annual revs (i.e., revenues) on IT and a large service firm spends 5%.  However, the average for U.S. SMEs is 6.4% of revs, although a good chunk is for basic IT infrastructure.
 
CRM looks like a hot item for U.S. SMEs and the AMR report makes an interesting comment about the perceived need for other countries to implement a "keeping up with the Joneses" strategy.  This being said, then domestic firms in China may follow suit.  As far as operating systems are concerned, there is only one:  Windows.  And U.S. SMEs spend about 20% of their IT budget on software and software maintenance, with discrete manufacturers outspending process manufacturers or retailers.  Typical apps are for financial management and customer management, although expensive CRM suites (think Siebel or Oracle) are rare.  Sounds like an opportunity for utility computing vendors.  Bottom line:  If the SMEs market is your key market (by size), then go with Microsoft CRM solutions!
 
Fast Forward Over Three Decades
 
At this point, I'm going to get a bit personal.  If you're not interested, simply skip the remainder of this message:  It briefly covers three decades and my so-called "futurist" origins.
 
The first "adult" organization I ever joined was the World Future Society.  (Remember, the basis for the first section of this posting was an article published in their flagship publication, The Futurist.)  The year was 1971.  I had been an adolescent "futurist" since March 1968, the month that my father bought me a copy of Sky & Telescope magazine.  Although the Vietnam War was on the news each night, I was simply too young for it to really matter.  Both the war and protests against the war were merely uninspiring TV images.
 
But something caught my imagination and that "something" was the space program.  I can still recall the liftoff of Apollo 11 on July 16, 1969 at 6:32 am PDT.  Believe it or not, I can still recite the countdown.  I can also recite part of the landing sequence of the Eagle -- the Lunar Excursion Module housing Neil Armstrong and Edwin E. "Buzz" Aldrin.  And, of course, I can remember Neil Armstrong stepping off the foot of the LEM on July 20th, probably around 7 or 7:30 pm.  Two movies also inspired me toward a "tech" future:  The obvious, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and the not-so-obvious, The Andromeda Strain.  (My parents didn't let me stay up to watch Star Trek, so Star Trek didn't have any impact on my life during my early adolescence.)  Although I have been a member of the L-5 Society and the British Interplanetary Society (anyone remember Project Daedalus?), the World Future Society was the most influential organization in my life during my high school years.  Well, a wee bit of personal history.  Those were the good 'ol days ...
 
Cheers,
 
David Scott Lewis
President & Principal Analyst
IT E-Strategies, Inc.
Menlo Park, CA & Qingdao, China
 
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posted by David Scott Lewis at 1:13 PM