cloud computing | Paul Wallbank - Communications Professional

Google’s lost Docs mojo

Has Microsoft seen off Google’s threat to their office suite dominance?

Last week I spent the day at Xero’s Australian convention speaking to various cloud service companies, bookkeepers and accountants.

One of the notable organisations missing in the conversations was Google – two or three years ago, Google Apps would have been at the front and centre of conversations about cloud services and integration. Yesterday the company was barely mentioned.

Part of the reduced buzz around Google Apps at XeroCon is due to Xero’s closer relationship with Microsoft, but it also betrays how Google Docs is no longer the smartest, newest product on the block.

“We tried to eat their dog food, but our staff rebelled,” one manager of a marketing agency who worked with Google told me. “We thought we’d go Google Apps for all the work we were doing with them but we just found the products lacked the functions we needed.”

The main problem for business users are Google Docs’ slimmed down feature. While most people don’t use 95% of the tools included in Microsoft Word or Excel, each person uses a different 5% and find something critical missing from the cloud based challenger.

For writers, Google Docs’ lack of a word count function is a deal breaker. Speakers find the Presentation function far too basic concerned to the Microsoft Powerpoint or Apple Keynote packages.

In the cloud computing industry, Application Program Interfaces (APIs) are all important as these allow other services to plug into data and enhance value for users. Over the last two years, Microsoft have done a good job in cultivating their developer community while Google have taken theirs for granted.

Most importantly though is that Google seems to have lost focus on their productivity suite, it may be another example of the company’s corporate attention deficit disorder, or it may be be that Microsoft have seen off another challenge to their dominance in that sector.

If it is the latter, then Microsoft have done a good job with Office 365 in seeing off the threat that Google posed.

Despite the company’s challenges in the post-PC, post- Gates era it would be dangerous to write Microsoft off.

Coffee machines, the Big Blue W and the barriers to new technology

All new technologies involve a learning curve and sometimes people don’t have time to gain that knowledge.

Last week my wife bought a new coffee maker, an impressive, all singing and dancing device that’s a vast improvement on the decade old machine it replaces.

Despite drinking three or four cups of coffee a day, for three days after the new machine arrived I didn’t make one long black or cappuccino. The reason was I didn’t have time to figure out how to use it or the high tech coffee grinder that it came it.

Being time poor is one of the greatest barriers in adopting new technologies as business owners, managers and staff often don’t have the time to learn another way of doing things.

The coffee machine reminded me of something I learned with a business I was involved in the early 2000s. We were trying to sell Linux systems into small and medium businesses.

We had some success selling into small service businesses like real estate agents and event managers where the owners could see the benefits of open source software and, in many cases, had a deep suspicion or resentment towards Microsoft’s almost monopoly on small business software.

Despite the success in selling the systems, the business though came undone because many of the clients’ staff members refused to use the Linux machines, as one lady put it to our frustrated tech “I want to click on the Big Blue W when I want to type a letter.”

That Big Blue W was Microsoft Word and no amount of cajoling could convince the lady to use any of the open source alternatives — she knew what worked in Word and she had neither the time or inclination to learn any thing different.

Eventually that customer gave up trying to convince their staff to use non-Microsoft systems and the computers were reformatted with Windows, Office and all the other standard small business applications installed.

This happened at almost every customer’s office and eventually the business folded.

For those of us involved in the business the lesson was clear, that time poor users who are content with their existing way of working need a compelling reason to switch to a new service.

In many ways this is the problem for legacy businesses — the sunk costs of software are more than just the purchase price, there’s the time and effort in migrating away from existing products and training staff.

When we’re selling new technologies, be it cloud computing services, linux desktops or fancy new coffee machines, we have to understand those costs and the fears of users or customers who’ve become accustomed to an established way of doing things.

In the eyes of many workers new ways of doing business are scary, challenging and often turn out to be more complex and expensive than the salesperson promised. In an age where marketers tend to over promise, that’s an understandable view.

For those selling the new products, the key is to make them as easy to use and migrate across to. The less friction when making a change means the easier it is to adopt a new technology.

Dealing with the corporate digital divide

Does the real digital divide really exist in the business world between old businesses and new organisations?

It’s fashionable when talking about the ways different generations use computers to split users into two groups – the digital natives and digital immigrants.

Born after 1990, digital natives are believed to have an intuitive understanding of digital technologies born from never having known a world without computers.

Digital immigrants on the other hand are from an era where computers were not common outside big corporations and government departments, so most people born before 1990 had to learn to use computers.

like many similar demographic divides, the line between digital immigrants and natives is contentious and probably more unhelpful than useful.

A fascinating question though is whether corporations can be digital natives and immigrants.

One of the challenges for older corporations, the corporate digital immigrants, are the legacy business systems that have their roots in the pre-digital era. A good example of this is United Airlines which struggles under inflexible management and old aircraft which can’t provide the levels of service and reliability expected by modern customers.

A similar problem faces retailers who’ve haven’t invested in modern logistics, point of sale and online commerce systems – these businesses simply cannot compete with those who have up to date technology.

Part of this problem comes from the difficulties in upgrading both technology and management systems in complex organisations, it’s not an easy task and the cost of failure is high so it’s understandable that many businesses don’t attempt it.

In the meantime there’s the corporate digital immigrants, the more recently founded businesses that aren’t weighed down by legacy management and technology.

The problem for the legacy businesses is the digitally native companies are able to take advantage of cheap and powerful tools that older organisations struggle to integrate into their operations.

So the digital native-immigrant divide could be actually a business problem rather than one of how different generations discovered computers.

Mr Ballmer regrets

The successor to Steve Ballmer as Microsoft CEO has some major decisions about the company’s future.

Following the announcement of his pending retirement, Microsoft CEO Ballmer held his first interview for twenty years with ZD Net’s Mary-Jo Foley.

During the ZD Net interview, Ballmer and Foley ranged over subjects ranging from his possible replacement, reasons for retirement and his greatest highlight during his thirteen year tenure as CEO.

Foley’s asked Ballmer what was his greatest disappointment as Microsoft CEO and, not surprisingly, he nominated the development of Microsoft Vista.

I would say probably the thing I regret most is the, what shall I call it, the loopedy-loo that we did that was sort of Longhorn to Vista. I would say that’s probably the thing I regret most. And, you know, there are side effects of that when you tie up a big team to do something that doesn’t prove out to be as valuable.

Those side effects of Vista’s botched development were felt across the PC industry as the operating system’s overlong development and disappointing performance broke the three year upgrade cycle that underpinned the sector’s business model.

Unlike the similar debacle eight years earlier with Windows ME where Microsoft’s market position was unchallenged, Vista came along at the time the computer industry itself was being disrupted by smartphones leaving the entire PC industry exposed to a major shift.

Now Ballmer’s successor will have to deal with the industry’s broken upgrade model along with the post-PC era where desktop and server operating systems are no longer the key to controlling the market. Every option is a challenge to Microsoft’s existing businesses.

As discussed in Ballmer’s interview with Mary-Jo Foley, Microsoft still sees its future in consumer IT, whether that includes continuing the company’s three screen strategy of supplying Windows on the desktop, tablet and smartphone will be one of the early and critical decisions the next CEO will have to make.

While Microsoft Vista might have been Steve Ballmer’s biggest mistake as Microsoft CEO, the challenges ahead for the company’s board and management are great, it’s going to take strong leadership for the once dominant software giant to maintain its place in a radically changed market.

Song of the day – Ms Otis regrets by Kirsty McColl and The Pogues.

How Google Glass can change business and industries

Wearable technologies are more than just consumer devices and promise to change the workplace.

When we talk about new technologies we often focus on the consumer aspects, in many ways the business and industrial applications are far more exciting with a potential to save lives and change workplaces.

This week on my regular tech spot with Ed Cowlishaw on ABC Riverland we explained Google Glass and speculated on what some of the applications for listeners could be.

During the discussion we ranged across the uses we might see for wearable technologies like glasses watches, jeans or even embeddable, vibrating tattoos. With electronics smaller and cheaper than ever, we’re at the stage where putting computers into almost anything is feasible.

Most of the focus around these technologies has been on the consumer aspects, but wearable technologies like Google Glass probably have more immediate uses in industrial applications ranging from transport and medicine across to farming and emergency services.

Emergency services

For emergency services devices like Google glass can be the difference between life and death, first responders at a road accident can quickly evaluate damage and the best course of action for rescuing survivors.

In firefighting, these technologies become incredibly valuable with protective suits being able to warn when conditions are becoming dangerous or the presence of hazardous materials and heads-up displays – which could be a Google Glass type device or a projection onto a firefighters visor – can be monitoring weather conditions, the safety of buildings or the state of supplies.

Police forces are already some way down the path of using these technologies with patrol cars and roadside detectors already monitoring number plates for unregistered and uninsured vehicles. Devices like Google Glass are going to help law enforcement use those technologies, particularly when coupled with facial and voice recognition.

Medicine

The use of wearable technologies in the medical industry is fascinating. We’re already seeing smart dressings that alert nurses and doctors to critical conditions and the increased network of devices is making it easier to monitor patients.

With a Google Glass type device, surgeons and physicians can be receiving real time information on their patients while carrying out procedures and recognition software can help doctors identify the nature of a symptom such as a rash or swelling much earlier. At a hospital triage this can help nurses make quick, life saving decisions as people arrive.

Farming

One of the big frontiers of the internet of machines is the agriculture industry. With projects like Tasmania’s Sense-T monitoring natural resources and smart farm equipment reporting the state of soil and crops, a Google Glass type device gives farmers much more information about the paddock or cattle they are looking at.

Farming is also a hazardous occupation and wearable technologies can also warn agricultural workers of hazards as well as alert family, colleagues or emergency services when a farm worker is in trouble. Occupational health and safety is going to be one of the driving forces for the adoption of these devices.

Transport

Safety is one of the key factors of technology adoption in the transport industry and it’s interesting how quickly transportation agencies and police forces have started discussing banning Google Glass.

While checking your twitter feed or surfing for LOLCats while driving is undoubtedly dangerous, having a heads up display could actually improve the safety of truckers, taxi operators and other professional drivers as they aren’t being distracted from the road by dispatch messages, GPS directions and vehicle warnings.

As monitoring devices, wearable technologies could also help warn drivers or their employer about looming fatigue or illness.

In the logistics field, it’s not hard to see warehouse workers using wearable devices to warn them where robots are or to find stock items deep in the shelves.

Like the tablet computer, it’s easy just to think of Google Glass and other wearable technologies as being solely consumer devices without considering how these devices will change the workplace.

As the internet of everything and easily accessible broadband – both wireless and wired – becomes pervasive we’ll see most industries adopting these technologies making business more efficient and the workplace safer for the workers.

Is Australia falling behind on the internet of everything?

Australian businesses are falling behind the rest of the world in using the Internet of machines says Cisco

Last Friday Cisco Systems presented their Internet of Everything index in Sydney looking at how connected machines are changing business and society.

Cisco Australia CEO Ken Boal gave the company’s vision of how a connected society might work in the near future with alarm clocks synchronising with calendars, traffic lights adapting to weather and road conditions while the local coffee shop has your favourite brew waiting for as the barista knows exactly when you will arrive.

While that vision is somewhat spooky, Boal had some important points for business, primarily that in Cisco’s view there is $14 trillion dollars in value to be realised from utilising the internet of machines.

Much of that value is “being left on the table” in Boal’s words with nearly 50% of businesses not taking advantage of the new technologies.

Boal was particularly worried about Australian businesses with Cisco lumping the country into ‘beginner’ status in adopting internet of everything technologies along with Mexico and Russia, with all three lagging far behind Germany, Japan and France.

In Boal’s view, Australian management’s failure is due to “the focus on streamlining costs has come at the cost of innovation.”

This something worth thinking about; in a business environment where most industries only have two dominant players and the corporate mindset is focused on maximising profits and staying a percentage point or two ahead of the other incumbent, being an innovator itsn’t a priority – it might even be a disadvantage.

For Australian business, and society, that complacency is a threat which leaves the nation exposed to the massive changes our world is undergoing.

IT industry feuds are buried as business models collapse

The collapsing personal computing and server markets are forcing once powerful competitors to bury animosities and feuds as industry giants face a troubled future.

Samsung’s exit from selling desktop computers illustrates how quickly the PC industry is collapsing which underscores Michael Dell’s urgency in his attempts to take Dell Computer private along with the spectacle of once hostile competitors like Oracle and Microsoft embracing each other.

Earlier this week Microsoft Australia hosted a briefing at their North Ryde office to show what the company is doing with their Azure cloud computing service, which is part of the company’s quest to find revenues in the post-PC world.

Microsoft are quickly adapting to the new marketplace. This week in Madrid, the company hosted their European TechEd conference where they showed off their Cloud First design principles of software built around online services rather than servers and desktop PCs.

One important part of Microsoft’s cloud strategy is establishing pairs of data centres to provide continuity to the various zones, including China, across the globe. Each individual centre is at least 400 miles apart from its twin to avoid interruptions from natural disasters.

Interestingly, this is the opposite of Google’s data centre strategy and quite different from how Amazon offers its data services where customers can choose the zones and level of redundancy they want.

There’s no real reason to think any of these three different philosophies are flawed, it’s a difference in implementation and each approach brings its own advantages and downsides which customers are going to have choose between.

While Microsoft is showing off its new direction, HP CEO Meg Whitman was in Beijing proclaiming that “HP is here to stay” and laying out the company’s path to survival in the post-PC world.

Like Microsoft, HP is putting bets on cloud computing and China, Whitman emphasized the work she’s been doing engaging with Chinese companies while promising “a new style of IT” and that “HP is in China for China.”

A key difference to Microsoft and Dell is that HP is doubling down on its desktop and server businesses with a focus on selling into the Chinese market. This is a high risk move given China’s investment into high speed networks and the global nature of the cloud computing movement.

One of the boasts of Whitman and her management team is that HP have added a thousand Chinese channel partners over the last twelve months, this is an effort to replicate Microsoft’s market strength in mature markets which has given the software giant breathing space against strong, cashed up competitors like Google and Apple.

Whether this works for HP in China remains to be seen, in the meantime Microsoft are trying to move their huge channel partner community onto the cloud with various offerings that give integrators who’ve traditionally made money selling servers and desktops some opportunity to sell online services.

A selling point for Microsoft is yesterday’s announcement they will offer Oracle databases on their Azure platform. The ending of animosities between Microsoft and Oracle is an illustration of just how the collapse in the PC and server markets is forcing market giants to forget old feuds and build new alliances.

With the server and personal computing markets being turned upside down, we’re going to see more unthinkable alliances and pivoting corporations as once untouchable industry giants realise the threats facing them.

The PC industry’s search for new directions

Microsoft and Dell struggle to reinvent themselves in the post PC era

All Things D reported over the weekend that Microsoft executives are fretting over a major restructure being planned by CEO Steve Ballmer. This is part of the fundamental changes challenging the entire PC industry.

Ballmer is dealing with massive changes in Microsoft’s core business as PC sales decline with customers moving to smartphones, tablet computers and cloud computing so finding new markets is a priority for the company’s board and senior management.

The same problems are facing all the major players in the PC industry and it’s the main reason why Dell is in the throes of a battle to take their business private, what’s fascinating is the different ways these companies are responding to these changes.

In Dell’s case the company’s looking at becoming “an Enterprise Solutions and Services (ESS) focused business” – essentially copying what IBM did a decade ago in moving from hardware and focusing on consulting and services to large corporations.

Microsoft on the other hand sees the future in devices and cloud computing with Ballmer telling shareholders last year that becoming a “devices and services company” is the future.

It’s important to recognize a fundamental shift underway in our business and the areas of technology that we believe will drive the greatest opportunity in the future.

In Ballmer’s view those opportunities lie in cloud computing services and devices like the Windows Surface tablet computer and the smartphones, products which Dell struggled with during the 2000s.

These are two very different directions and it illustrates just how the major players in the PC industry are searching for new business models as the old one collapses.

How many of them successfully make the transition will be for history to examine; it’s easy to see Microsoft surviving given its massive financial reserves and market power, although nothing can be taken for granted as we could have said the same about Kodak twenty years ago.

Dell on the other hand is far weaker being smaller with a narrower product base and currently has the management distraction of competing buyout offers. Dell’s survival is far from certain.

Others, like HP, seem to be slipping into obscurity as management flip-flops from one scheme to another. The takeover of EDS as part of HP’s move into enterprise consulting does not seem to have gone well and the company is wallowing.

What we’re seeing is the rapid disruption of an industry that itself was the disruptor not so long ago. It reminds us that even the corporated giants of today are as vulnerable as the stagecoach companies of yesteryear in the face of rapid change.

Michael Dell’s struggle to transform his business

The Rationale for a Private Dell states some stark truths about the PC manufacturing industry and global management in general

Michael Dell continues to press on with his buy out bid for the computer manufacturing giant he created with a presentation to shareholders stating his case why Dell Computers would have a better future as a private company.

Dell’s assertion is the company has to move from being a PC manufacturer to a Enterprise Solutions and Services business (ESS) as computer manufacturing margins collapse in the face of a changing market and more nimble, low cost, competitors.

What’s telling in Dell’s presentation is just how fast these changes have happened, here’s some key bullet points from the slide deck.

Dell’s transformation from a PC-focused business to an Enterprise Solutions and Services (ESS) -focused business is critical to its future success, especially as the PC market is changing faster than anticipated.

The transition to the “New Dell” is highly dependent on challenged “Core Dell”performance.

The speed of transformation is critical, yet “Core Dell” operating income is declining faster than the growth of “New Dell” operating income.

Dell’s rate of transformation is being outpaced by the rapid market shift to cloud.

The market is shifting quickly against Dell’s core PC manufacturing and sales business and the company’s founder is under no illusions just how serious the problem is.

Should Michael Dell succeed, the challenge in transforming his business is going to be immense – Dell Computing was one of the 1990s businesses that reinvented both the PC industry and the vast, precise logistics chain that supports it.

It was PC companies like Dell and Gateway who showed the dot com industry how to deliver goods quickly and profitably to customers around the world. Businesses like Amazon built their models upon the sophisticated logistics systems and relationships the computer manufacturers created.

A lesson though for all of those companies that followed Dell and Gateway is that those supply chains may turn around and bite you in the future, as Michael says in his presentation;

Within the PC market, Dell faces increasingly aggressive competition from low cost competitors around the world and shifts in product demand to segments where Dell has historically been weaker.

Those low cost competitors were many of Dell’s suppliers as over time the company’s Chinese manufacturers, Filipino call centres and Malaysian assemblers have developed the management skills to compete with the US retailers rather than just be their contractors.

Something that’s being missed in the debate about globalisation at present is that its not just low value work that can be done offshore – increasingly sales, marketing and legal are moving offshore along with programmers and engineers. Now the same thing is happening with management.

The same thing is also happening with corporations as Asian giants like Samsung, Huawei, Wipro and others displace US and European incumbents.

Dell Computing has been a much a victim of that move as it has been of the decline in the PC market which means its more than one battle Michael Dell has to fight.

It may well be that Dell can survive, but we shouldn’t underestimate just how great the challenge is as the company faces major changes to its markets and the global economy.