SourceCast: Episode 45: What a difference a year makes
News You Can Use: 10/26/2016
- The Sobering Stats You Need to Know When Seeking Your Next Job
Don’t be discouraged by the “one-in-100” stat. According to Lever’s breakdown, your best bet is to be referred to a new company. Referred candidates have a one-in-16 chance of getting hired. Using a third-party agency can also better your odds — those submitted by an agency have a one-in-22 chance of being placed. Whatever you do though, forget about applying through a company’s careers site: only one in 152 candidates gets hired this way.
- Applying Deep Machine Learning to Spend Analysis
Not only can its deep machine learning identify tail spend suppliers, company specific categories, and even individual items coded in obscure ways, but it can learn over time and adapt to different data models, especially since it can use evolving knowledge bases. Whereas the majority of first generation classifiers used naive statistical classification that could not learn and had to map to a fixed (UNSPSC) model, Spend360′s uses deep machine learning (based on LSTM and encoder/decoder technology) that maps to custom data models using extensible knowledge bases (which can be created and maintained by the organization) that can encode organization and industry specific knowledge (and negate the need for custom mappings or override rules).
- In buyers’ market, acquirers look to lock in management teams longer
Steve Fletcher, a managing director at the global investment bank GCA, notes that it’s “hard to say” whether it’s universally the case that management teams are getting locked into longer contracts with acquirers in this market. “I don’t think anyone has a large enough sample size to say that,” he notes. But he adds that of the deals he is seeing, there is a move to sign on incoming talent for a longer period, sometimes “three or four years as opposed to [the previous standard of] 18 to 24 months.”
- A Reminder From Mark Zuckerberg: ‘Put People First’
Zuckerberg explained that the way in which tech tools are structured today — as suites of apps — will not last long into the future. When a group of people is communicating or working together, they often toggle between a chat app, a video call and a shared document interface, for instance. The need to switch from one app to another doesn’t produce a seamless experience, and it makes each interface the focus, as opposed to the people working within it.
- IT moves to open workspaces, but not everyone is happy
What’s needed, both sides agree, is a range of workspace options that address organizational goals while still meeting employees’ needs — meaning physical space that allows for private meetings and quiet concentration in addition to community seating. Even more important: Corporate culture likewise has to value collaboration and innovation if IT organizations are to truly reap the benefits of open space.
Photo: Paul Gilmore
Supplier Report: 10/22/2016
Big IT firms are clearly focused on the cloud, but as these companies grow out their infrastructure, we will focus on the differences between the cloud providers and try to find sweet spots.
SalesForce had some very sensitive M&A information leaked. Will Pega Systems and Tableau get bought or was this some kind of trick to drive up stock prices?
And are the days of the Chinese factory workers numbered?
Acquisitions
- Wipro To Buy Salesforce Superstar Appirio for $500 Million
Business process services goliath Wipro says it will spend half a billion dollars to purchase cloud services powerhouse Appirio so it can improve its market share and position around Salesforce and Workday.
The $500 million all-cash acquisition is expected to close by the end of the year, according to a statement. Wipro did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.
- Salesforce.Com, Inc To Buy Tableau Software Inc (NYSE:DATA) Shortly After Declining Twitter Inc Buyout
Tableau Software Inc. explored a potential sale in recent months, according to people familiar with the matter, as technology companies scramble for partners amid a wave of mergers in the industry.
The Seattle company was working on a potential sale as recently as this summer before the effort stalled, the people said.
The Wall Street Journal reported on the document in a front-page article Wednesday that pushed up shares of Tableau as much as 7%, giving it a market value of nearly $4 billion.
http://www.nasdaq.com/article/software-maker-tableau-explored-a-sale–wsj-20161020-00076
- HP Enterprise services merger with CSC could ‘mean more churn’ for company’s federal contractors
“The combination of these two companies will create a new company with billions in global revenue, including a sizable U.S. federal government business,” it added. “However, the government sector of the new, yet unnamed company may be impacted by the cost take-outs planned by the merger and the distraction of yet another major company reorganization.”
- Salesforce’s M&A Target List Had 14 Names, But Not Twitter Inc
Citing an internal presentation allegedly obtained from former Secretary of State and Salesforce Director Colin Powell the WSJ lists 14 companies, including Marketo, Adobe Systems, Hubspot, PegaSystems, Demandware, Tableau, and LinkedIn, as possible candidates.
According to the presentation, Box and Zendesk were mentioned as well, but their chief executives had less interest. The presentation, which was marked “draft and confidential” and titled “M&A Target Review,” is a 60-slide document which identified 14 possible acquisition targets.
http://www.valuewalk.com/2016/10/salesforces-list-14-names-not-twitter/
Artificial Intelligence
- DeepMind’s differentiable neural computer helps you navigate the subway with its memory
DeepMind’s technique merges notions of memory with more traditional neural networks using a “controller.” The controller saves information by either storing it in a new location or overwriting a previously occupied location. Throughout this process, an association between the information is formed via the timeline of when new data was written in.
The controller uses that same chronology along with the actual content of what has been saved to retrieve information. The framework created is navigable and proves itself effective for drawing insights from graph data structures.
- Fighting Diabetes with Watson: Medtronic and IBM Health
- No More Humans: Foxconn Deploys 40,000 Robots In China
Dai said currently Foxconn can produce 10,000 robots annually. In the future, those robots are all potential replacements for human labor. For the Kunshan factory alone, Foxconn has cut 60,000 employees.
Prior to this, labor costs in mainland China were lower than robots; therefore, Foxconn maintained nearly one million workers. However, with the increase of labor costs and the younger generation’s lack of interest in production line work, many companies have launched huge investments in automation.
https://www.chinatechnews.com/2016/10/13/24329-no-more-humans-foxconn-deploys-40000-robots-in-china
What I predicted in this post is starting to come true - IBM Watson Will Run On IBM and IBM Alone
You’ve got to give UBS analyst Steven Milunovich major props. During IBM’s earnings call on Monday, he asked whether IBM Watson, the company’s golden child, will run on rival Amazon Web Services—and he was promptly shot down. “No. Watson runs on our cloud, and our technology will run on IBM’s cloud,” IBM chief financial officer Martin Schroeter responded tersely.
Cloud
- Cloud Pricing and Performance Questions Add to IT Buyer Uncertainty
The RBC test results come as IT executives face confusion over exactly what constitutes “cloud” and how different providers account for it. “If you’re trying to figure out which vendor to go with for cloud services, claims about being number one in the market or having high cloud revenue should be ignored,” Gartner Vice President David Mitchell Smith told a group of CIOs gathered in Orlando for the researchers annual enterprise IT convention. “You can’t compare these things because there are no standards.”
- What’s better: Amazon’s Availability Zones vs. Microsoft Azure’s regions
AWS uses what are called Availability Zones (AZs) as the basis for its cloud. Each region in AWS is made up of at least two AZs. Microsoft, instead, just uses regions; it does not guarantee that each region will have multiple data centers. It’s a fundamental difference in the way these IaaS platforms are constructed. And it begs the question: Is one way better than the other?
Also:
AZs come with some downsides though, Wray adds. If an AZ has an outage, many customers have designed their workloads fail over to another AZ in that same region. If all of the customers in the downed AZ transfer workloads to the healthy AZ, that could theoretically create a crowded AZ, which could impact performance.
- Rival tech companies trade hostility for hugs
The cloud storage market is dominated by a few major firms: AWS, Microsoft, IBM and Google collectively control well more than half the worldwide cloud infrastructure services market, Synergy Research Group estimates. Analysts at Forrester predict that AWS will produce $12 billion this year, more than half of all the revenue the entire public cloud market is expected to generate.
- CIA CIO: Amazon Web Services is key to developing secure apps
In time, the migration to cloud storage is expected to decrease DHS’s reliance on in-house data centers. This shift is also augmented by a growth in effective security technology layered over those same vendor-built cloud systems, said Edwards, who specifically referenced Amazon Web Services’ increased ability to meet the agency’s high bar for defenses.
https://www.cyberscoop.com/cia-cio-amazon-web-services-key-developing-secure-apps/
- The downside of the cloud: Netflix is down, so is Spotify and Twitter
Netflix and Twitter were amongst an array of websites and services taken down this morning by a DDoS attack. This list of sites and services also appears to have included SoundCloud, Disqus, PayPal, Spotify, and Reddit. Spotify reported issues to the public starting at 8AM Central time this morning, the 21st of October, 2016.
http://www.slashgear.com/netflix-is-down-so-is-spotify-and-twitter-21461133/
Datacenter
- IBM and other giants to reform servers and make them faster
Servers current circuitry is not fast enough, and International Business Machines Corp. has promised to speed the data transfer in servers up to ten times. The group hopes more companies will be part of the team to improve servers speed. Standard microprocessors are getting faster, but their performance is usually delayed because they need to fetch data from nearby memory chips, graphic chips or other elements used to handle certain tasks.
http://www.pulseheadlines.com/ibm-giants-reform-servers-faster/52692/
- Lenovo’s attack plan against Dell EMC? A partnership with Nimble Storage
The Chinese company, which has what it calls its “dual” headquarters in Morrisville and its server division in Research Triangle Park, just signed a deal with Nimble that allows it to sell Nimble’s all-flash array technology, as well as to use the firm’s predictive analytics capabilities.
Also:
And it’s a segment of the business that has seen major change, particularly as its relationship with longtime partner EMC severed completely when rival technology firm Dell acquired it. Since Dell announced the buy last year, Lenovo has been working to fill the gap. McRae says it’s been a systematic effort.
http://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2016/10/17/lenovo-nimble-storage-partnership.html
Other
- IBM Shares Fall Despite Higher-Than-Expected Sales
Revenue from those areas, which the company calls “strategic imperatives,” rose 16% to $8 billion in the third quarter. Cloud revenue jumped 44% compared with a 30% rise in the second quarter, it said. However, shares of IBM, which reported its 18th straight quarter of declining revenue, were down 3.1% at $150.60 in after-market trading.
http://fortune.com/2016/10/18/ibm-shares-fall-beat-estimates/
- HP: We’ll Put Laid-Off Workers on Contract
In light of massive job cuts, HP Inc. has indicated to Business Insider that it may offer affected workers the opportunity to continue their roles as employees at contract agencies. The company stated, “HP has a strong record of success in placing employees in outsourced roles to mitigate the headcount number.” HP has a track record of shifting employees to positions as contract workers from before its 2015 split with Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.
http://www.investopedia.com/news/hp-well-put-laidoff-workers-contract-hpq/
- HP Enterprise announces more layoffs as cloud business struggles
The layoffs in the Stackato may indicate HPE is further retreating from the ultra-competitive cloud market amidst tough competition from AWS and Microsoft. Last year, HPE pulled the plug on its Helion hybrid cloud offering. In August, Bill Hilf, HPE’s current cloud leader,announced he was leaving the company to “pursue other opportunities.”
http://www.ciodive.com/news/hp-enterprise-announces-more-layoffs-as-cloud-business-struggles/428563/
- Microsoft employees love Satya Nadella a lot more than they did Steve Ballmer
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella looks especially good, by the report’s reckoning. At the close of 2013, the final days of former chief executive Steve Ballmer’s reign, Microsoft only gave a 51% rating for CEO approval. Nadella took the reigns in February 2014, and the CEO approval rating hit 88% by the end of 2015.
http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-employees-love-satya-nadella-2016-10
- Broadcom, Harris Vet Bill Miller Joins NetApp as CIO
Bill Miller, former senior vice president and chief information officer at Broadcom, has joined NetApp in the same role of CIO and will be responsible for both the company’s information technology organization and ongoing transformation initiatives.
http://www.govconexecutive.com/2016/10/broadcom-harris-vet-bill-miller-joins-netapp-as-cio/
Photo: Rob Roy
News You Can Use: 10/19/2016
- 6 Ways to Convince Your Boss That Traveling is Important
The potential ROI gained from the trip is greater than the trip’s cost:
For anyone who wants his or her boss to approve a business trip, it’s a good idea to map out the specific costs in advance, then estimate the potential ROI that could be garnered if you attended the event.Ensuring you keep all your business expenses related to the trip low — though many trips are tax deductible — will help create an optimistic view of the revenue potential and what positive gains could occur that could become the leverage for future business trips.
- Rock ’em Sock ’em Telecom Services
In telecommunications, acquisitions have strong influences on pricing structures, service offerings, and overall capabilities. The competition for these services continues to boom with more localized suppliers playing against the big wigs. Going for the “popular” name does not always result in the best fit for your company. When choosing a provider whether through a formal sourcing engagement or going to the market direct, you need an unbiased opinion and should focus on the facts versus fiction.
http://www.strategicsourceror.com/2016/09/rock-em-sock-em-telecom-services.html
- How To Manage Your Anxiety During Tough Times At Work
When paranoid thinking creeps into your work life, you tend to look for evidence to prove your thinking right. It’s a cognitive function called“confirmation bias.” When you have a belief, for example, that someone is trying to keep you from getting promoted, you look for evidence that confirms that belief. In this case, you believe your colleague is blocking your promotion. When he doesn’t respond to your email, you see that as evidence of your belief.
Instead of jumping to this conclusion, ask yourself, “What if the opposite were true?” What if he wasn’t blocking your promotion? What other reasons could there be for not responding to you?
https://www.fastcompany.com/3063975/work-smart/how-to-manage-your-anxiety-during-tough-times-at-work
- How Wells Fargo’s Work Culture May Have Cleared The Way For Scandal
The key ingredients that foster a hostile work environment, according to Faas, are unreasonable expectations put on employees, an acceptance of questionable practices, and reluctance to complain out of fear of retaliation. “If what we hear in the media about the treatment of whistleblowers is true, Wells Fargo has a much bigger issue than the fraudulent accounts—they have a culture of fear,” he says. “If this is validated, it puts to question the credibility of their leadership’s response.”
- New Ernst & Young Report: Supply Chain Data “Overwhelms” Businesses, Stunting Automation, Efficiency
Managing the data growth dilemma: The growing tsunami of data is both a boon and bane to businesses in the digital age. Limitless oceans of data, often reflecting customer experience as it happens, have the potential to remake supply chains and business models. These models can and should be more efficient, productive, flexible and responsive. But right now, data is a mess. The current period of hyper data growth leaves most companies in a position where their ability to uncover business insights is effectively hidden within an increasingly complex and often unfathomable amount of data.
- Supply Risk and Compliance are Disconnected — That’s a Problem and an Opportunity
So, you’re stuck in the supply risk swamp and bogged down by compliance regimes. And you know there is waste everywhere and opportunity all around. So, as a supply professional, what should you do? You need to align risk management and compliance management with not just each other but with performance management (including continuous improvement) — and tie them all into your value chain processes. As those processes go upstream and external, this is where procurement and supply chain groups feel this problem — and need for alignment — more than anyone in the enterprise.
http://spendmatters.com/2016/09/27/supply-risk-compliance-disconnected-thats-problem-opportunity/
Photo: JD Weiher
SourceCast: Episode 44: They took our jobs
