SourceCast: Episode 06: Sharing is Caring
Supplier Report: 11/28/2015
Sometimes this supplier news cycle feels like this Ferris wheel, it keeps going around and around, but nothing is moving forward. And that is to be expected during a holiday week, but there were a few interesting gems that stood out.
Dell continues to have issue with the EMC acquisition. VMWare stockholders are not pleased with the financial engineering happening to make Virtuastream a reality… and they are starting to make demands.
HPI is having some growing pains in the printer market while sister company HPE is doing… ok (they found a new dance partner at Microsoft).
Big Blue had 17% growth in the security products market this year and Ginni is letting customers know what a grave threat hackers are.
IBM
- IBM’s CEO On Hackers: ‘Cyber Crime Is The Greatest Threat To Every Company In The World’
We believe that data is the phenomenon of our time. It is the world’s new natural resource. It is the new basis of competitive advantage, and it is transforming every profession and industry. If all of this is true – even inevitable – then cyber crime, by definition, is the greatest threat to every profession, every industry, every company in the world.”
- IBM: A Heavyweight in the IT Consulting Space
IBM (IBM) is a global leader in the IT consulting space. It was founded in 1911 and is headquartered in New York. In 2012, Fortune ranked IBM as the second largest firm by number of employees and the fourth largest in terms of market cap. It was also rated the ninth most profitable firm and the 19th largest firm in terms of revenues. In the last few years, IBM shifted its focus on high-profit segments such a data analytics, business intelligence, cloud computing, and green solutions. It currently has a market cap of $133.8 billion.
http://marketrealist.com/2015/11/ibm-heavyweight-consulting-space/ - Why IBM spent billions buying technology it already had access to
“A couple of clients talked to IBM about weather data. If you think of the insurance industry as one example, one client told us that a single hail storm in the middle of Phoenix one year, and a hail storm that lasted only a few hours, caused more than $20 million in damages,” Suh said.
- IBM’s Watson Won’t Be Predicting Eruptions Anytime Soon
Unlike the weather analogy given in some of the articles reporting on IBM’s plans, geologic prediction isn’t going to be as easy as reading a bunch of sensors, because those sensors need to capture events going on deep underground. We might be able to add a pile of sensors at the surface, but in order to really understand (and then predict) the behavior of magmatic systems, those sensors will need to be put closer to the magma itself as it percolates kilometers underground. Throwing up a weather station, this is not.
http://www.wired.com/2015/11/ibms-watson-wont-be-predicting-eruptions-anytime-soon/
Hewlett Packard Enterprises
- HPE storage financials: Meh. Meg Whitman needs to make this right
Within HP’s* revenues for the fourth fiscal 2015 quarter, converged storage product revenues (3PAR, StoreOnce, and StoreAll) grew nine per cent while the traditional ones (EVA, MSA, & Tape) declined 19 per cent compared to the year-ago quarter.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/11/26/hp_results_q4_fy2015/ - HP Enterprise will maximize opportunities as Azure reseller
This certainly makes sense considering they gave up on their own cloud platform…As announced in the company’s quarterly earning call, the plan is to have Microsoft and HPE be “preferred” customers of each other’s products. HPE will likely sell server hardware to serve as on-premises nodes in the hybrid fabric that Microsoft has in mind for Azure.
HP Inc
- Lackluster Results Fueled Concerns Regarding Its Ability To Weather A Slowdown In The Printer And PC Markets
Dion Weisler, Chief Executive of HP stated that the printing business is much greater challenge than the PC business. The firm has been lowering printer prices to tackle stiff rivalry, particularly from Japanese printer makers Epson and Canon. However, the price reductions, coupled with the effect of a stronger dollar, have reduced the value of income from foreign markets. Weisler stated that the unintended result is that they are not getting the yield per unit they would have expected. HP revealed that revenue from printer supplies such as laser toner and ink cartridges fell 10% in the period. Supplies account for most of the profits for HP Inc.
- HP Inc reaches new low as shares slump
“We do not expect the landscape to improve in the near future and we will constantly assess how the market evolves,” he said. “In any case our market leadership and scale serve us well, but we have much more work to do on many dimensions.”
http://www.channelweb.co.uk/crn-uk/news/2436670/hp-inc-reaches-new-low-as-shares-slump
EMC
- Repercussions of the DELL-EMC Deal
Investors are demanding:EMC and VMware should withdraw the joint venture of Virtustream, given that VMware’s price has fallen since the announcement. This is damaging the implied value of the proposed stock, which Dell will use to pay for the deal.
Lastly, institutional investors have asked for an adjustment to the tracking stock rights. Tracking stocks are an equity offering issued by the parent company (Dell) to sell the minority interest in one of its profitable divisions (VMware) to the public.
http://marketrealist.com/2015/11/repercussions-dell-emc-deal/
- EMC to take a majority stake in Virtustream – report
Earlier this week Re/code reported that VMware and EMC shareholders have asked for Virtustream to be unwound, as it has been responsible for “further dragging down VMware shares”. Now, according to the Reuters report, which cited people familiar with the matter, EMC is going to take a majority stake in Virtustream and VMware would only have a minority share. This would mean EMC would assume Virtustream’s losses, the report said.
Other
- Where Are All The Enterprise Tech Buyers?
With Dell/EMC/VMware busy in their own deal, the number of smaller enterprise tech acquisitions will shrink even further. CB Insights points out here that, “There have only been 45 $100M+ exits in the first three quarters of 2015, which puts it on track to be the first year with less than 70 $100M+ exits since 2010.”
http://techcrunch.com/2015/11/22/where-are-all-the-enterprise-tech-buyers/
Photo: Adrianna Calvo
News You Can Use: 11/25/2015
- Why Your First Generation Sourcing Platform Is Not Ready For Modern Sourcing
Many organizations that acquired these suites and applied them successfully saw year-after-year returns of 10%+ on the spend brought under management. And a few are even seeing some savings today, but just like the second auction saw little savings and the third auction saw a price increase, the year-over-year return is dropping. Why? Because while these first generation platforms were infinitely more powerful than anything that had come before, they weren’t designed to capture the full extent of complexity in an average category — complexity that has been considerably increased since the early days of sourcing due to increased outsourcing, increased globalization, increased regulation, and a constantly evolving global marketplace.
- How to Be Promotable
Anybody (well, almost anybody) can do what they’re told. To get promoted, you have to go above and beyond. Taking on additional responsibilities without being asked is not only a great way to demonstrate your work ethic, energy, and skills, but it also lets your boss know that you’re ready (and able) to expand your scope. When you take on more than the norm, your boss can’t help but think that you’re capable of a bigger role. This includes showing that you’re willing to take risks by making innovative suggestions.
- Third of supply chain processes ‘inadequate’
The findings also revealed that Europe and North America appeared to lag behind the developing world in terms of “process maturity” when comparing weighted averages, with fewer companies reaching the basic competency level. Some 32 per cent of firms’ processes in Europe and North America were found to be inadequate compared to 22 per in developing countries. This “surprising result” could reflect the tendency of processes to get worse over time and may also be a result of the move of manufacturing out of the old markets and the removal of good process discipline from those markets, the research suggested.
http://www.supplymanagement.com/news/2015/third-of-supply-chain-processes-inadequate
- Paris attacks demand ‘wake-up call’ on smartphone encryption
“A lot of people in these terror groups have developed encryption techniques, and France has one of the most sophisticated systems for monitoring communications. If France didn’t pick up this attack in advance, it’s a wake-up call for all of us,” said Darren Hayes, assistant professor and director of cybersecurity at Pace University.
Encrypted messages reportedly helped ISIS hide communications prior to the attacks, keeping security agencies from any advance warning of what was being planned. Some experts have blamed the attacks on the growth of cheap or free smartphone apps like WhatsApp or Chatsource that encrypt messages.
- How to Power Through the Day Without Any Sleep
Hanging around the coffee machine all day isn’t going to do much to give you sustained energy to make it through the day. While you may think gulping down caffeine will help you feel more alert, too much caffeine can cause you to feel jittery and anxious rather than focused. Dr. Lichten says 50mg to 100mg of caffeine is the optimal dose for alertness and focus. Opt for a short cup of coffee every four hours during the day, stopping at 4pm to prevent another poor night of sleep.
- A Race To The Bottom Or To Strategic Business Partner?
This reaches far beyond top level competitor intelligence. This is the granular level information that can directly impact the financials of your organization. A good example of this would be working with sales teams. They will generally know the strengths and weaknesses of key competitors and their products. They may even know recent wins/losses of the key competitors. However, when you can work with them and let them know which individuals have recently left or are looking to leave the competitor and how this could impact the competitors delivery, this could have a genuine impact on the business. For example, if a Program Director has recently left a competitor, what was their succession plan? How will this impact the competitor’s delivery on future programs?
Supplier Report: 11/21/2015
Michael Dell made an interesting comment this week stating that he does not plan to sell of EMC products or split the company up. It also doesn’t sound like he is going to sell of existing Dell assets either…makes you wonder how they are going to pay down that $49B in debt.
IBM wants you to use Watson to buy your children’s holiday gifts (and give them more information to learn about your own buying habits). They are also quietly focusing on processor chip sets.
HPE is trying to make a few friends while the Splunk CEO says goodbye to his.
IBM
- I was going to avoid posting this one, but there are so many articles about it:
Watson can help you find Christmas gifts…
The iOS app IBM Watson works by analysing millions of reviews, blogs and social media conversations on sites like Twitter to curate lists of the top trending products in gift categories such as toys, electronics, health and fitness.
- Is It Time to Buy IBM, or Is Big Blue Cutting Too Deeply?
The company has repurchased about 40% of its shares since 2005 and implemented numerous cost reduction efforts, including substantial layoffs in recent years, to grow earnings. For a while, these actions looked to be working. Diluted earnings per share nearly tripled from 2005 through 2013 and operating margins doubled to hit 20%. Even IBM’s stock was a winner, significantly outpacing the S&P 500 from 2005 through 2011.
Gauging innovation and company culture is difficult, but a Web site called Glassdoor.com aggregates employee reviews for thousands of companies. As seen below, IBM ranks low in overall stars, the percentage of employees who would recommend the company to a friend, and the percentage of employees who approve of the CEO.
- IBM Taps Nvidia Tesla GPUs to Speed Up Watson
IBM said that by using the Nvidia Tesla K80 GPUs—the flagship offering of the Nvidia Tesla Computing Platform—coupled with Watson’s Power-based architecture, Watson’s retrieve and rank API capabilities increased by 1.7 times its normal speed. This speed-up can further improve the cost/performance of Watson’s cloud-based services, IBM said.
http://www.eweek.com/database/ibm-taps-nvidia-tesla-gpus-to-speed-up-watson.html
- IBM Announces Strategic Collaboration With Xilinx To Take On Intel
The two companies have signed a private multi-year agreement through OpenPOWER Foundation, which will enable Xilinx programmable chips known as FPGAs to work with IBM’s Power processors and hence promote the IBM product. The move will also help develop open acceleration infrastructure, software and middleware, high performance computing (HPC), network functions virtualization (NFV) and big data analytics.
EMC/Dell
- Dells says there will be no EMC sell-off
“The portfolios of products are highly complementary. There are some overlaps in storage, but Dell product lines and EMC storage product lines are somewhat different. We are going from seven to nine [product lines], which is not a problem, and we’ll continue to enhance them.”
http://www.fudzilla.com/news/39265-dells-says-there-will-be-no-emc-sell-off
- How VMWare and EMC could dictate Dell’s federal future
This report reinforces what is already known: This merger has very little to do with Dell’s federal business. EMC and VMWare provide an almost infinitesimally small contribution to Dell’s contract mix and offer Dell no compelling reason to retain the services side it inherited when it bought Perot Systems in 2009.
What it does go onto reveal is that while Dell adds virtually nothing to its federal services offering with the merger and likely wouldn’t affect a decision to spinoff, it does open Dell up to broader federal market opportunity to sell products and solutions.
- Dell-EMC deal will ‘set back innovation,’ Sun co-founder Vinod Khosla says
EMC and Dell merging is a really good financial move for Michael, but it will set back innovation and distract from innovation,” said Khosla, now a prominent venture capitalist, in an onstage interview at the Structure conference in San Francisco on Wednesday.
Asked about the future for old-line technology companies like Cisco, IBM and Dell, Khosla was pessimistic. In his view, only about half of those tech titans will stick around in the future. What’s more, he said, innovation from those companies has been seriously lacking.
Hewlett Packard Enterprises
- Microsoft And HPE Team Up, Announce CPM Offerings
The tech giants announced the availability of their Cloud Productivity and Mobility Solution Offerings (CPM), which will create transformational consulting services and business applications for Windows 10. In particular, CPM will provide consulting services for Windows 10, new cloud and mobility consulting services and industry-specific vertical applications.
http://www.econotimes.com/Microsoft-And-HP-Team-Up-Announce-CPM-Offerings-118600
This is interesting: HPE is the business arm moving away from the desktop experience, yet they get the consulting partnership instead of HP Inc who is building machines with Windows 10. - HP Enterprise, Intel come together to deliver IoT solutions
Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s IoT solutions combined with the Intel IoT Platform and product portfolio will deliver new products that will sit at the edge and collect, process, as well as analyse data from sensors and devices. These new systems are designed to sit outside of the traditional data centre and will feature Intel Core” i5 and Intel Atom. processors.
- HP Enterprise launches all-flash datacentre storage
HP Enterprise claimed the new line-up can improve Oracle workload database performance by up to 75 per cent without the need for companies to switch architecture, making it a flexible addition to a company’s network. Additionally, HP Enterprise said the new tools will cost half the amount of some unnamed rival products, making them an attractive option for businesses wanting to make the move to all-flash arrays without high outlays.
http://www.itpro.co.uk/server/25607/hp-enterprise-launches-all-flash-datacentre-storage
Other
- Splunk CEO resigns on back of strong Q3
Godfrey Sullivan has resigned as Splunk CEO. Sullivan ends his seven year reign in charge of the Big Data software company on the back of its Q3 2015 financial results. Although he is stepping down as CEO, he will remain nonexecutive chairman, with Douglas Merrit operating as its new president and CEO.
http://www.cbronline.com/news/big-data/software/splunk-ceo-resigns-on-back-of-strong-q3-4733124
News You Can Use: 11/18/2015
- Provider Damnation 66: Tier 1 Suppliers
A contract locks you in until an exit clause is hit, which, in an average contract in an average organization, typically is only invokeable when a supplier fails to deliver a significant portion of the contracted goods after a significant amount of time has passed (and your organization has been stocked out for weeks and lost millions of dollars), the quality gets abysmal and the warranty return rate hits the double digits, they violate a federal safety or import regulation, or they commit a crime — assuming you have a well drafted contract.
http://sourcinginnovation.com/wordpress/2015/11/05/provider-damnation-66-tier-1-suppliers/
- Technology is Harming Our Relationships, and We Can Stop It (the paradox of choice)
- This is how millennials will change management
Emotional intelligence is the new buzzword among millennial managers. Concepts of self-awareness, self-regulation, and relationship building will be key to millennial-managed workplaces. “Millennials are highly relational,” says Espinoza. While you may hear the old generation of managers say, “I don’t want to be friends with anyone who works for me because one day I might have to fire them,” Espinoza says millennial managers would never take that attitude. This generation of managers will put people and relationships first.
The blend of work and life for these relationship-oriented millennial managers also means that the relationships they have at work won’t just be considered work relationships, but are likely to extend beyond working hours.
http://www.fastcompany.com/3052617/the-future-of-work/this-how-millennials-will-change-management
- If Coupa goes public, will it ruin the company? – YES
In what many consider to be a controversial article titled The Myth of Ariba, a former executive for the company said the following; “Ariba was a real company with a real product that got swept up in its own hype, with unfortunate consequences,” and that “Ariba was basically a fraud . . . creating [the impression that Ariba was constructing a global marketplace]. . . even though this was seen as being “a rather impossible task.”
According to the article and related book, they “went through the motions” of building this marketplace because “the stock was the only thing that mattered. A valuable stock gave Ariba currency it could use to buy other companies.” In the end, “Ariba started out very much as a real company, but was actually blindsided by the Internet boom.”
- Is It time to re-evaluate your BYOD policy?
That said, it may surprise you to find out that a growing number of security experts believe companies should follow the second option. Too many employees are skirting the policies to begin with, so you may be better off forbidding personal devices to connect to the network all together, especially if your industry is highly regulated.
- Is the IT offshore industry’s business model illegal?
There is a “widespread practice in high skilled workplaces,” wrote Morrison, “by which jobs of United States citizens and lawful permanent residents are terminated, often in large groups, and whose work is transferred to contract workers who are present in or brought to the U.S. as employees of firms providing these contract services.” These workers are predominantly on H-1B visas.
The use of contract workers on temporary visas “is not incidental to the process,” wrote Morrison. “Rather, it is the explicit business model of the contracting companies to staff their contracts with such temporary workers.”