Will Iceberg Sink Traditional Software Development Phil Butler believes that traditional software development is soon to be usurped by Enterprise Mashups. According to Iceberg CEO; Wayne Byrne, Iceberg will do most of the usurping because it “Can do everything your average enterprise mashup can do (like Kapow for example) + everything Salesforce can do in one application.” Wow….
In the three months since I posted an initial Review of Business ByDesign in the OnDemand Beat, there has been a flurry of announcements and activity relating to the roll out date of the product.
Larry Dignan and Dennis Howlett broke the news the week before the annual SAP Sapphire event, that the planned 2009 rollout of Business ByDesign was to be delayed by up to 18 months.
Vinnie Mirchandani and a few of the other Enterprise Irregulars had a chance to meet with SAP Co-CEO’s Henning Kagermann and Leo Apotheker at Sapphire 08 and found out that there were a couple of key reasons why SAP pulled back on the original planned release date.
These are valid reasons indeed to delay Business ByDesign’s launch and might in this case actually help lead to a better product.
But in the meantime one can be certain that Netsuite (with its recent OneWorld release) and other OnDemand ERP competitors wont sit still during the next 18 months and SAP will have quite a bit more work to do to gain market share and partner acceptance of Business ByDesign once released.
One of the factors that has so far hindered wider adoption of Cloud Computing and Software as a Service in the US is a lack of consistent and inexpensive broadband service throughout the entire US.
A new report from the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation ranks the US 15th (Yes that’s right 15th) globally for broadband adoption. The US ranked number 4 in 2001 so this drop off in adoption is very alarming considering that we are in the midst of a major fundamental change in enterprise computing with Cloud Computing and Software as a Service becoming more prevalent.
The ITIF broadband policy report measures 3 major factors; price, speed, and availability to come up with its rankings.
The report has numerous recommendations to improve US broadband adoption and also has case studies from countries that rank both above and below the US in terms of adoption.
Three recommendations that I think may have an impact in the short term if adopted include:
Enact more favorable tax policies to encourage investment in broadband networks, such as accelerated depreciation and exempting broadband services from federal, state, and local taxation. (This will help immensely with making broadband less expensive for SMB customers and start-ups and give the incumbent Telco and Cable providers incentive to modernize their aging infrastructure)
Continue to make more spectrum, including “white spaces,” available for next-generation wireless data networks. (This is critical as has been proven in Korea…more and more Enterprise 2.0 and Saas applications will be available via mobile devices)
Expand the Department of Agriculture’s Rural Utilities Service Broadband Program and target the program to places that currently do not have non-satellite broadband available. (For the US to be more competitive in the future, Broadband access has to be universal throughout the US. Satellite broadband is relatively expensive and Satellite service is a still a bit spotty)
Unfortunately many of the recommendations in the report are based on government policy and that policy is always up to change depending on who occupies state and federal government positions.
But alas, a government broadband policy is crucial as the higher broadband adoption rates in countries like Sweden (pdf) South Korea (pdf) and Japan (pdf) were achieved via strong and focused government broadband policies.
Interesting video from a recent CIO magazine retreat that seems to indicate that a large percentage of CIO’s think Enterprise 2.0 is Hype and is Not Happening.
Either this shows that the Enterprise 2.0 vendors have to begin doing a much better job educating potential customers at the C-Level about the ROI and benefits of Enterprise 2.0 technology or CIO’s are a bit out of touch with what is happening in the industry and within their organizations.
What is your opinion, Is Enterprise 2.0 Hype or Happening?
