Tag: HPE

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Supplier Report: 10/8/2016

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Nobody wants to buy Twitter, but that isn’t stopping SalesForce, Google, and Microsoft with moving forward with their long term plans.

Internet of Things is trending this week as Microsoft is quietly shutting down their fitness band division, but will they buy FitBit (and what would they do with all of that data)? IBM is dropping $200M on a new IoT HQ in Germany.

There were also a few interesting team-ups this week: VMWare and Amazon on some potential VMWare options on AWS and IBM and AT&T deepening their relationship via cloud services.

Acquisitions

  • Plat.One acquisition marks start of $2B IoT investment plan for SAP

    SAP has bought IoT software developer Plat.One, marking the start of a plan to invest US$2 billion in the internet of things over the next five years.

    Some of those billions will be spent on the creation of IoT development labs around the world, SAP said Wednesday. It already has plans for such labs in Berlin, Johannesburg, Munich, Palo Alto, Shanghai and São Leopoldo in Brazil.

    The company is also rolling out a series of “jump-start” and “accelerator” IoT software packages for particular industries, to help them monitor and control equipment.

    http://www.pcworld.com/article/3124442/internet-of-things/platone-acquisition-marks-start-of-2b-iot-investment-plan-for-sap.html#tk.rss_all

  • Salesforce snaps up Krux for $700M on eve of Dreamforce

    On the eve of Dreamforce, his company’s annual developers shindig, Salesforce agreed on Monday to acquire Krux, a marketing-data start-up, for $700 million in stock and cash. Krux, which already has a partnership with Salesforce, is expected to bolster Salesforce’s ability to better identify and serve its cloud-software customers.

    http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2016/10/03/salesforce-snaps-up-krux-700m-eve-dreamforce/91490708/

  • Salesforce Investors Could Derail a Potential Deal for Twitter

    During a CNBC interview on Wednesday with Jim Cramer, Benioff neither confirmed nor denied Salesforce’s interest in Twitter, but didn’t exactly sound as if a deal is certain. “We have to look at everything, we’re going to pass on most things,” he said. Salesforce, which was down over 7% at one point, pared its losses a little following Benioff’s remarks.

    The fact that Twitter is already often used as a marketing and customer service vehicle by many companies — including, presumably, many Salesforce clients — probably isn’t lost on Benioff. Salesforce likely sees value in integrating Twitter with its Marketing Cloud (online marketing automation) and Service Cloud (customer service and enterprise collaboration) software. It also could leverage data on Twitter activity to give clients a better understanding of their customers, as well as engage with them more effectively.

    https://www.thestreet.com/story/13843028/1/salesforce-investors-could-derail-a-potential-deal-for-twitter.html
    Salesforce Should Leave This Bird in the Bush

    A Wall Street Journal report late Tuesday makes clear that Salesforce is still very interested. CEO Marc Benioff has reportedly been talking up Twitter behind closed doors—going so far as to describe the troubled microblogging service an “unpolished gem” at one gathering. Salesforce shares fell another 5% as a result. In all, the prospect of buying Twitter has erased nearly $5 billion in Salesforce’s market value.

    http://www.wsj.com/articles/salesforce-should-leave-this-bird-in-the-bush-1475696224

  • Should Microsoft Buy Fitbit?

    Fitbit isn’t for sale, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be bought. There wasn’t a “For Sale” sign hanging on Skype, Yammer, and more recently LinkedIn when Microsoft cracked open its huge pocketbook to snap up niche leaders. This makes Fitbit a logical target for a company with a history of multi-billion dollar purchases and a market leader that is attainable. Fitbit’s present enterprise value of $2.5 billion would be a light bite for Microsoft, even with a reasonable premium on top of that.

    http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/10/06/should-microsoft-buy-fitbit.aspx

  • Oracle Threatens to End NetSuite Deal

    On Friday, Oracle announced that it extended the expiration data of its tender offer for NetSuite to Nov. 4, having already extended the date to Oct. 6 last month “to facilitate the completion of outstanding antitrust reviews.” In September, Oracle received the final antitrust clearance needed, from the U.S. Department of Justice.

    http://www.wsj.com/articles/oracle-to-call-off-netsuite-deal-unless-shareholder-support-increases-1475849434

Artificial Intelligence

Cloud

Datacenter

  • The Job Cuts Begin: Dell Confirms Layoffs

    “Most cuts are overlap, none strategic and/or not part of the new Dell EMC program. To me very normal and a must once the two firms begin to integrate, gel, morph and then execute as a new technology powerhouse with a focused team that [has] the ‘right’ skill sets to address this new world,” Shepard wrote.

    http://www.crn.com/news/channel-programs/300082351/the-job-cuts-begin-dell-confirms-layoffs.htm

  • Why Red Hat, Inc. Gained 11% in September

    The open-source software specialist saw second-quarter earnings rise 17% year over year, based on 17% stronger sales. Both of these figures were above Wall Street’s consensus estimates. Application development tools led the way with 33% higher sales, and Red Hat customers’ adoption of long-term support subscriptions is pacing ahead of the basic revenue growth.

    http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/10/07/why-red-hat-inc-gained-11-in-september.aspx

Software/SaaS

  • Oracle Will Keep Posting Growth in the SaaS Space

    As we discussed earlier in this series, Microsoft (MSFT) emerged as the leader of overall enterprise SaaS (software-as-a-service) space, and Salesforce (CRM) continues to rule the CRM (customer relationship management) space. It was the Oracle’s dominance in ERP (enterprise resource planning), the segment that grew the most in the SaaS space, that led it to register the highest growth in the SaaS space in 2Q16.

    http://marketrealist.com/2016/10/oracle-will-continue-post-growth-saas-space/

Other

  • IBM Brand Value Collapses 19%

    The failure of IBM’s turnaround continues to smother the business. IBM’s shares are off 17% in the past two years, against a 9% improvement in the S&P 500. IBM’s revenue in 2011 was $106.9 billion. In 2015, the figure fell to $81.7 billion.

    http://247wallst.com/technology-3/2016/10/05/ibm-brand-value-collapses-19/

  • SAS CEO Dr Jim Goodnight on the power of big data, literacy and philanthropy

    “We spend 25 per cent of our revenues on R and D every year, which is more than any other major software company,” says Goodnight, who was a statistics professor at the North Caroline State University when he started working on software for agriculture.

    http://www.cio.co.nz/article/607926/sas-ceo-dr-jim-goodnight-on-the-power-of-big-data-literacy-and-philanthropy/

  • Coupa up 87% in software IPO

    But they’re still not profitable. For the six months ending in July, Coupa lost $24.3 million, which compares to a loss of $25.1 million in the same period last year. Yet revenue is growing, up to $53.2 million from $31.6 million in the same time frames.

    CEO Rob Bernshteyn tells us they are more focused on their margins than profitability right now. “For every dollar we burned, we created well over a dollar in recurring revenue,” he told TechCrunch. He says he’s looking to “build this business for the long-term.”

    https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/06/coupa-up-87-in-software-ipo/?ncid=rss

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Supplier Report: 9/17/2016

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It is a dynamic time in the world of IT. Nothing is assured, nothing stays the same.

Dell Technologies announced a sell off of their enterprise content management unit to help pay off the massive debt incurred purchasing EMC. What does this mean for Documentum and the other products? Some experts think OpenText will invest in the product, more seem to think it is DOA.

As artificial intelligence becomes more wide-spread, IBM and Google, who at the moment are not really in competition with each other, will most likely find themselves as rivals. Not only in AI, but also in cloud hosting and blockchain solutions.

HP Inc had themselves a good week.  They purchased Samsung’s print division for $1.05B and also switched to a Microsoft CRM solution which the press can’t seem to stop talking about. How will Microsoft reward HPI for such an act?

Acquisitions

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Artificial Intelligence

  • The Growing Rivalry Between Google And IBM

    Today, IBM and Google are very different businesses. While Google offers products directly to consumers, IBM mostly designs powerful systems for enterprises. Google makes the bulk of its money through advertising, while IBM has a large and highly qualified sales force that can service demanding customers.

    To be sure, in many ways, IBM and Google are at opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to focus, business model and operational structure. Still in conversations with both companies, I can’t help but feel them eyeing each other somewhat warily. After all, while their businesses may be far apart, they are both competing for the same technological high ground.

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregsatell/2016/09/11/the-growing-rivalry-between-google-and-ibm/#3fb871975947

  • War for Artificial Intelligence: IBM’s Blockchain Push May Anticipate Google’s Ambush

    The vocal advocacy of IBM in the Blockchain space stands in stark contrast to Google’s almost complete silence on the subject. Prussian military theorist Carl Philipp Gottlieb von Clausewitz in his treatise ‘On War’ wrote that “surprise plays a much greater role in strategy than in tactics,” and of course the famous 孙子 (Sun Tzu) is remembered by the words “when the enemy is close at hand and remains quiet, he is relying on the natural strength of his position.” To assume that Google is doing nothing in the Semantic Blockchain space is naïve. Let us look forward with anticipation, and, for some, perhaps dread, to what eventually Google plans to roll out.

    https://cointelegraph.com/news/war-for-artificial-intelligence-ibms-blockchain-push-may-anticipate-googles-ambush

  • AI can make your money work for you

    Advances in AI will create a robo-accountant that knows your spending better than you do. By analyzing your purchase history, it will constantly move money between your checking, savings, investments and credit cards. This way, your checking account’s balance is always in the narrow “sweet spot:” high enough to avoid fees, but not so high that you miss out on investment yield.

    Right now, finding that sweet spot is time-consuming and anxiety-inducing. In time, the robo-accountant will know when you’re likely to splurge. It will know when your car will need a repair, when your electric bill will spike. It will know when you’re actually better off carrying a balance on your credit card than paying your bank’s minimum-balance fee.

    https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/08/ai-can-make-your-money-work-for-you/?ncid=rss

Cloud

  • Blockchain: Transformational Technology for Health Care

    Take a standard health plan/provider agreement, or in risk-based relationships, provider/provider  agreements, where each provides the other with a paper contract. Each entity loads the agreement into their separate systems, and it defines their relationship. The payor also has a contract with each person who has purchased a health plan. Using Blockchain, the health plan and provider could translate the wide variety of agreements needed to contracts on the Blockchain so everyone has visibility, and clarity exists for both the provider and the member. So when a transaction is processed, the Blockchain checks the authorization, and everyone can view the status, history and next steps. This transaction payment information could also be connected with the clinical service details to provide a holistic view of the patient’s interaction. Storing the information to create this holistic view in Blockchain would create a foundation that enables interoperability and innovation across the industry.

    https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/blockchain-transformational-technology-health-care-bruce-broussard
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  • How Microsoft Is Winning the War in the Cloud

    In fact, it’s Microsoft’s forays into the cloud that will continue to generate its profit growth as things like traditional software and computer hardware sales fall by the wayside. The company has made big investments — as much as $10 billion on a data center for the development of its Azure cloud system. And these investments are going to pay off as the cloud continues to redefine how the world does business and stores its data.

    https://www.thestreet.com/story/13726671/1/how-microsoft-is-winning-the-war-in-the-cloud.html

  • Comparing Cloud Vendors: A Primer For IT

    But the Forrester authors, without commenting on the nature of the Google cloud (which launches two billion containers a week), said most enterprise developers “are not yet ready to ‘run like Google.’ They need more packaged data and database migration services, and more confidence that their core business apps are ready to run on the Google Cloud Platform.”

    http://www.informationweek.com/cloud/software-as-a-service/comparing-cloud-vendors-a-primer-for-it/d/d-id/1326848

  • Does Oracle’s Cloud Growth Come at a Cost?

    On the flip side of the strong growth in cloud, the company has been seeing a slowdown in its software licensing business. So the question in investors’ minds that management will have to answer is whether the company is sacrificing the higher-margin licensing business with the focus on growing its cloud business. If so, will cloud margins down the road be sufficient to offset the declines in licensing? If not, why is licensing slowing as cloud picks up? Tough spot for Oracle management, any way one looks at it.

    http://realmoney.thestreet.com/articles/09/15/2016/does-oracles-cloud-growth-come-cost

Datacenter

  • Oracle Killer, New Threat Face Database King

    Oracle was initially slow to jump into the cloud industry because it contradicted what it was doing, which was offering businesses the hardware and software solutions to manage their own IT infrastructures. Cloud is essentially antithetical to that business model – even antagonistic, one might say. But after it realized its mistake it quickly ramped up its cloud business and is now strongly in the SaaS and PaaS segment, although not as much in the infrastructure game where Amazon is the undisputed leader.

    But Amazon was having none of that. Consequently, it launched Amazon Aurora in late 2014, also known as the Oracle Killer. Aurora is a relational database engine that directly competes with Oracle’s database products. If Oracle is the king of databases, then Aurora is the mysterious assassin whose only job is to take the king’s life.

    To make Aurora’s job easier, Amazon structured the service so no upfront license fee needs to be paid. In effect, it made it a pay as-you-go service.

    http://www.gurufocus.com/news/441918/oracle-killer-new-threat-face-database-king

  • Chinese Giant Huawei to Attack Server Market

    To be fair, Huawei is not “new” to servers: it’s been building them for years and is ranked as the fourth largest server provider as measured by units sold by Gartner IT . What’s different now is that, on August 31, the company said it will build servers targeting the public and private clouds, as well as telecom-focused data centers.

    http://fortune.com/2016/09/12/huawei-to-attack-server-market/

  • Dell Technologies ‘to cut up to 3,000 jobs after $67 billion EMC deal’

    PC and cloud vendor Dell will reportedly slash between 2,000 to 3,000 jobs after acquiring data storage company EMC.

    Most of the job cuts will be in the United States and will happen later this year, according to Bloomberg, which cites people familiar with the company’s plans.

    Dell did tell sister site Channel Pro this week that it would merge its sales channel with that of EMC’s. Tim Griffin, VP & GM UK at Dell EMC, said: “Today we have two channel programmes. The intent is to have a single channel for February 2017.”

    Dell is hoping the cuts will help create cost savings of about $1.7 billion in the first 18 months after the transaction, but is largely focused on using the deal to boost sales by several times that amount.

    The new company has 140,000 employees.

    http://www.itpro.co.uk/strategy/27215/dell-technologies-to-cut-up-to-3000-jobs-after-67-billion-emc-deal

  • Cisco exec churn: Enterprise chief Soderbery out

    Soderbery said he has no current plans and Cisco said of his departure: “We thank Rob for his important role helping Cisco identify Enterprise needs and address them with world-class networking products and solutions, and we wish him all the best for the future.”

    http://www.networkworld.com/article/3118251/cisco-subnet/cisco-exec-churn-enterprise-chief-soderbery-out.html

  • Why Meg Whitman is breaking the one-time symbol of Silicon Valley into pieces

    These spinoffs have provided needed capital as Hewlett-Packard Enterprise realigns itself with a narrower focus. Last year it bolstered its hardware business by acquiring for $3 billion Aruba Networks, the second-largest provider of company Wi-Fi networks behind Cisco. And last month HPE announced a $275 million purchase of Silicon Graphics, which sells fast servers and storage systems.

    http://www.salon.com/2016/09/09/the-fast-and-furious-fall-of-hp-why-meg-whitman-is-breaking-the-one-time-symbol-of-silicon-valley-into-pieces/

Software/SaaS

Other

  • Despite all the trash-talking, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff says he still loves Larry Ellison

    “Business is a lot like tennis. You get on the court with your friends, you play as hard as you can, you get really upset, you say crazy things, you go off the court, you go and have lunch and have a glass of wine and remember how much you love them.

    I love Larry Ellison, he’s a great mentor to me, he’s been a great friend, and probably there is no one in the industry who has done more for me than Larry Ellison, and I’m very grateful to him.”

    http://www.businessinsider.com/marc-benioff-loves-larry-ellison-2016-9
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  • It is official: HP buying Samsung Electronics’ printer business for $1.05B

    HP Inc. said Monday that it is the largest print acquisition in the company’s history and will help it go from traditional copiers to multifunction printers. HP also said the deal will strengthen its position in laser printing, which it established with Canon.

    http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/HP-buying-Samsung-Electronics-printer-business-9216916.php
    Samsung had a printer unit? And does HPI really need to buy their 4% market share?
    Oh wait… CRN has an answer for me:

    An HP acquisition of the Samsung printer business would take out a competitor and give HP strength in different geographies, said Martin Wolf, president of martinwolf M&A Advisors of Walnut Creek, Calif., one of the top channel investment advisory deal makers.

    http://www.crn.com/news/components-peripherals/300082020/report-samsung-is-considering-selling-printer-business-to-hp-in-1-8b-deal.htm
    And then there is this news…
    HP Inc. Goes Old School With Plans to Sell Copy Machines

    Still, Enrique Lores, HP’s president of imaging and printing, voiced optimism for the initiative. Copy machines still account for $55 billion in annual sales, which could be lucrative if the company gained a sizable share.

    http://fortune.com/2016/09/12/hp-printer-copier/

  • Wells Fargo fires 5,300 employees for opening 2M fake accounts in customers’ names

    Wells Fargo says that it has been rooting out employees who ran this con for the past two years, having caught 5,300 of them so far (the bank employs 265,000 people). The fake accounts — savings, checking, credit/debit cards — were opened in the names of existing Wells Fargo customers, who had their accounts raided to create balances in the new accounts, and were then hit with fees that cleaned them out.

    http://boingboing.net/2016/09/09/wells-fargo-fires-5300-employ.html

Photo: Ryan Johnston

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Supplier Report: 9/10/2016

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I am trying something new this week by focusing on topical categories instead of sections categorized by supplier.  Please let me know if you like it or don’t.

As there are changes with this blog, there are changes to IT suppliers…

EMC is officially no more, long live Dell Technologies? As expected, Dell has formally closed on the EMC acquisition and the timing could not be more ironic.  While Dell becomes enormous, Hewlett Packard is ever shrinking. This week, HPE announced they are “spin-merging” their software division with Micro Focus.

This is the second spin-merge HPE is attempting this year (the other being the sell off of consulting services to CSC expected to close in March 2017).

While Dell grows and HPE shrinks, Google and IBM are trying to cure cancer.

Acquisitions

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Artificial Intelligence

  • Hospital to use IBM’s Watson for cancer care (Korea)

    IBM Watson for Oncology, a cloud-based machine-learning platform, was designed to provide physicians with evidence-based medical treatment options. The supercomputer analyzes large volumes of medical information and references available to help doctors offer individualized, data-driven treatment options for cancer patients.

    http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=3023649

  • Google is using AI to speed up cancer treatment

    DeepMind recently announced a partnership with the Radiotherapy Department at University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. The department provides world-leading cancer treatment, but there’s one area in particular where Google’s AI could help speed up the process.

    When it comes to certain types of cancer in areas like the head and neck doctors need to plan carefully to avoid damaging important organs and body parts. The process, called segmentation, can take four hours to complete. DeepMind says it can get that down to just one hour.

    http://www.technobuffalo.com/2016/09/04/google-deepmind-ai-cancer-treatment/

  • New IBM Linux servers custom-made for AI, deep learning and data centre efficiency

    “NVIDIA NVLink provides tight integration between the POWER CPU and NVIDIA Pascal GPUs and improved GPU-to-GPU link bandwidth to accelerate time to insight for many of today’s most critical applications like advanced analytics, deep learning and AI.”

    https://thestack.com/data-centre/2016/09/08/ibm-power-systems-s822lc-data-center-servers/

Cloud

  • What to do when the cloud eats your hardware vendor

    In the first quarter of 2016 Amazon reported that revenue for its Web Services division grew 64% from the same period a year earlier. Salesforce.com reported a 33% increase in revenues compared to a year earlier.

    Meanwhile, global storage revenues declined 32% between 2007 and 2015 and server revenues dropped 13%, according to research firm Forrester. The trend is clear: Cloud revenues are up, on-premises hardware revenues are down.

    http://www.networkworld.com/article/3117325/cloud-computing/what-to-do-when-the-cloud-eats-your-hardware-vendor.html

  • Box and IBM just rolled out the first product they built together since making last year’s blockbuster deal

    On Tuesday, Box rolled out a new product called Box Relay which helps users custom build workflows so they can automate and track their whole work process.

    For example, a salesperson may have a work process that involves four or five steps, including approvals from the sales manager, finance and legal departments. Instead of having to pull up different documents through multiple software apps, Box Relay allows the user to automate everything within Box.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/box-and-ibm-first-product-built-together-since-partnership-2016-9

  • Is Microsoft building a Slack killer?

    A few months ago, rumors circulated that Microsoft considered buying the cloud-based team collaboration tool Slack for a generous $8 billion. Overpaying again, it seems, as Slack’s last known valuation was $2.8 billion.

    Now it seems that Microsoft has decided to build rather than buy, using its own Skype messaging service as the basis for a new product. According to the site MSPoweruser, Microsoft is coming for the Slack market with a product called Skype Teams.

    http://www.networkworld.com/article/3117609/microsoft-subnet/is-microsoft-building-a-slack-killer.html
    sn_gilmorefight

Datacenter

  • HPE sues high-flying ex-exec after defection to EMC

    In a complaint [PDF] filed to the Delaware State Chancery Court, HPE alleges that KC Choi, the departed Vice President of Global Solutions Architecture, violated a 12-month non-compete agreement when he fled to EMC just before its acquisition by Dell.

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/09/06/hpe_sues_former_exec_over_dell_defection/

  • The New Dell Stops Trying To Be The Old IBM

    Both IBM and HPE are willing to shrink their supply chains in exchange for focus and the prospect of higher profits in the datacenter. Dell, for its part, is still clinging to clients and wants to have leverage in the supply chain (particularly with processor, memory, and storage suppliers) that it believes it will not have if it exits the PC business. We will be able to tell who is right with this. If HPE starts losing share to the new Dell Technologies in servers and storage, and is able to extract more profits, too, then Dell is right. Time will tell.

    http://www.nextplatform.com/2016/09/08/new-dell-stops-trying-old-ibm/
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Software/SaaS

  • Microsoft Dethrones Salesforce As Top SaaS Provider

    The worldwide software-as-service (SaaS) market grew by 33 per cent in the second quarter of 2016 and Microsoft’s SaaS business experienced significant growth as well. So much so, it has overtaken Salesforce as the number one enterprise SaaS provider, according to Synergy Research Group.

    http://www.lifehacker.com.au/2016/09/microsoft-dethrones-salesforce-as-top-saas-provider/

  • OpenOffice could shutter due to lack of volunteer developers

    From Joey:
    Alot of people are talking about OpenOffice support shutting down, but the headline is misleading.  OpenOffice became part of Oracle as part of the Java acquisition. Oracle hasn’t done much to support the product over the years, and the opensource support groups forked the community.

    OpenOffice is alive and thriving in the form of LibreOffice.  The only reason I am mentioning this is because this is a great example of what happens when a for-profit company like Oracle takes over an open-source project.

Other

  • Microsoft’s tin ear for privacy

    Another potential privacy danger is more hidden than Cortana, buried deep in Windows 10 — what’s called telemetry data. Telemetry gathers detailed information from every Windows PC, laptop and device about how Windows 10 is being used. So it tracks, for example, what software is installed on the system, what crashes occur, when and how they occur, and more. And there’s no way to turn that off, unless you use the enterprise edition of Windows 10 and your IT department essentially flips the “off” switch.

    http://www.computerworld.com/article/3117343/data-privacy/microsoft-s-tin-ear-for-privacy.html
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Photo: Khusen Rustamov