Over the past two years, there have been a number of important changes in social networking applications, some of which are of particular importance to business. Among these are increasing development of mobile social networks and links to mobile social networks; integration of content and access between networking sites, as between Facebook, WordPress and Twitter; and greater use of social networks by advertising and marketing.

Consolidation has been particularly important. Social networking sites are now linked to wikis, blogs, and instant messaging, effectively making older applications that simply provided these collaborative features somewhat redundant. Microsoft’s Sharepoint application remains strong in the enterprise space, but it is being used for document management and limited document-oriented collaboration rather than for more flexible social networking.

Concepts are still being defined, and social networking heavily overlaps with enterprise collaboration, Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0. Many of the same facilities are on offer, though branded differently aimed at different audiences. Different ways to present material are also being explored.  Social networking sites are used to build community, to interact with associates, and to share material of interest that can be placed in digital form. They permit people to expand personal networks through broadcast messages (personal status, public comments, shared material, etc.) that provide personal social information in between direct contacts.

Social Networking is creating fundamental new ways of communication. While the providers struggle with ways to make it profitable, it is important to consider the impact on business. Changing the way people communicate has enormous implications both for how people work and for what products can be sold to consumers.

This is the subject of a recent Executive Update that I wrote for Cutter Consortium. It  can be found at http://cutter.com.

Market conditions and technology have created a need for changes in the way that BI is delivered, and cloud-based services occupy a central territory—both in describing an infrastructure for internal deployment and in defining an array of service offerings that play to these trends. Public cloud-based BI has now been made available by a number of vendors, including a significant offering from SAP in the form of its Business Objects platform. These SaaS BI solutions are of greatest importance to smaller businesses and departments of larger enterprises. Private cloud infrastructure is also being promoted as a means of improving BI operations within internal infrastructure.

Trends in the evolution of BI and Analytics favoring cloud-based approach include a move toward real time analysis, an increasing requirement for business process analysis to improve ongoing processes, a move toward sophisticated predictive analysis, and a need to extend analytic capabilities toward better usability in the front office . These trends  put pressure on older Data Warehousing solutions based on batch processing. Although these older systems are still necessary to handle the diversity of data available in the enterprise, they must coexist with real time analytics. Together, the trends favor a cloud approach, where resources can be allocated on an as-needed basis and access is through a flexible, browser-based interface..

Cloud-based BI is not without its own issues, many of which remain as yet unresolved. Data storage, data transfer, and integration rank among the top infrastructure issues, while security remains a prominent concern for early adopters, particularly of public cloud or SaaS BI solutions. There are also the usual teething problems of new technology, such as uncertainty as to the stability of newer providers, and lack of established best practices.

Use of BI from the cloud imposes new architectural concepts that need to be considered to ensure that accurate analytic results are obtained. With the private cloud, these issues remain the same as with previous solutions, in that data marts are likely to continue to proliferate and users will increasingly require integration of data from beyond the firewall. With public and hybrid cloud solutions, the impact is likely to be considerably greater, and very careful planning will certainly be required.

I have recently published a major report on this topic that is now available from Cutter Consortium (http://cutter.com).

The economy has brought about industry consolidation and re-evaluation of expenditure which have, in turn, affected corporate spending plans, upgrade cycles,  interest in new technologies, and willingness to undertake new projects. Cloud computing can be viewed in the broadest sense as an evolution in data centre infrastructure and in how services are delivered both internally and externally–including virtualisation, Software as a Service (SaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and other types of service provision. The trend toward mobile data services, most evident in the consumer space, includes the mobile internet, apps, and location based services.

We spoke with a number of different companies to gain a local perspective on 2010, including Ovum, Telecom’s Gen-i data division, HP,  Juniper Networks, and Revera. All agree that these are trying times, but there are also new opportunities opening up as the technology revolution continues. There is broad agreement on the major trends, but it is interesting to note that each company also sees a variety of follow-on ramifications within its own sphere of interest.

This feature is available at http://reseller.co.nz.

Outsourcing of innovation is a growing trend, and it provides numerous advantages, particularly in being able to resource R&D on an ad-hoc basis depending upon immediate need. Acquisition of innovation goes a step farther, and involves merger or acquisition of a firm that has the desired expertise, or acquiring a product or service outright from its developer. This has special advantages and an impact that can go well beyond outsourcing. Acquiring a start up provides both a tested product and expertise in a desired area. But it can be expensive, and there are often problems in integrating the acquisition into the other business of the firm.

Acquisition of innovation through M&A has gone in and out of favor, with a great deal of activity in the 1990s and early 2000s. Recently, it is on the upswing as companies that have cash seek to acquire assets that are suffering in the current recession. It has been the preferred growth path of a number of firms, particularly in the high tech sector, with examples including Cisco, IBM, and Microsoft. The start up company undertakes the risks of vetting the idea, developing the product, testing it and bringing it to market. The larger company pays a higher cost, but avoids the costs of development and the costs of acquiring essential expertise. Unlike in-house development, too, the cost is predictable, which can be all-important.

Acquisition provides immediate access to new thinking and to innovative new employees, but the M&A can create a range of problems. Complexity and uncertainty are introduced that can create significant issues if they are not addressed throughout the acquisition process. Acquisition never provides new technology alone. It introduces a range of effects that may impact other products, branding, and internal innovation processes.

The best results are likely to be found if the acquisition process is carefully managed. Acquisitions should be purchased early enough that they are not too expensive, but late enough that their technology and markets have been demonstrated. Then there must be a  clear plan for integration of the target company. Personnel issues need to be carefully considered, as well as the numerous areas in which the acquisition might affect ongoing business.

In today’s business environment, opportunistic mergers and acquisitions are inevitable. But, what appears superficially to be a good idea, might well bring along too much unwanted baggage. Acquisition may, indeed, provide a good route for innovation, but it must be carefully done.

This is the subject of a recent Executive Update that I wrote for Cutter Consortium. It  can be found at http://cutter.com.

The current economy has accentuated the trend towards SaaS and Cloud Computing by SMEs as well as larger businesses. They provide IT solutions funded from operational rather than capital expenditure budgets. This is coupled with easy pay-as-you-go subscription services that eliminate costly maintenance and IT spend, and can be implemented painlessly. Impediments to growth have been partly based on issues such as security. There are also perceptions that need to be overcome, mainly arising from the newness of the technology and lack of established best practices.

Cloud-based Point solutions such as CRM,  payroll, and accounting, have spearheaded the current SaaS market—particularly, Salesforce’s offerings. Greater variety and more complex solutions are now starting to appear.  The key to successful offerings ultimately lies with delivery of usable service to the user. In  New Zealand this is an area that service providers are just beginning to invest in. There are opportunities for small and medium businesses to benefit from savings that can be provided. For resellers, the benefit of SaaS is that it delivers recurring revenues from customer subscriptions on a continuous basis.

Cloud-based SaaS is still in its infancy. Currently,  there is a lot of media attention, and this is likely to continue over the coming year. Actual growth rate is difficult to predict, but it is certain that this is a trend for the future. Resellers that focus on older outsourcing models, such as only providing on-premise infrastructure support are likely to find their opportunities diminishing e over the coming years.

For this NZ Reseller News feature, we spoke with Telecom’s Gen-I data division, Microsoft,  NetSuite, IBM, Citrix, Datasouth and Revera.

This feature is available at http://reseller.co.nz.

Security ranks as the top concern, but there are also issues of performance, compatibility, integration, control and vendor lock-in that can pose substantial risks by threatening operations or capability to achieve an optimal IT solution.

Key areas of concern are contract and relationship issues, data security and liability, and service/integration issues. The concerns are generally around problems that have surfaced in other types of outsourcing and service provision, with a few new characteristics from the Cloud. For example, use of cloud services is not well fitted to management frameworks, so auditing and compliance issues can be problematic.  There are also contractual risks regarding normal outsourcing issues such as data ownership, penalties for nonperformance, remedies, procedures for terminating the relationship, and the like. At the present time, major cloud providers are unlikely even to produce an adequate SLA.

Risk assessment has been established and is embodied in standards. The primary requirement for evaluating Cloud Computing is the same as with other types of services: assess the assets that might be attacked, the threats faced within the environment, specific vulnerabilities to those threats, and the consequences should those vulnerabilities be exploited. When risks have been identified, it becomes possible to evaluate and develop a remediation plan.

Risk from various models of Cloud Computing is real, and needs to be carefully considered. Although the new infrastructure and services provide great advantages, and are evolutionary rather than revolutionary, it is a mistake not to consider the new risks carefully, particularly as these services become integrated into the enterprise IT environment.

This is the subject of a recent Executive Update that I wrote for Cutter Consortium. It  can be found at http://cutter.com.

New devices and new applications have provided a wide range of capabilities for the mobile workforce, from improved access for that old stalwart, the laptop-on-the-go, to social network updating and tweeting on the fly. But mobility also creates new management and security issues.  A smart phone might attach to the network, access corporate data, run applications–and be subject to hacker exploits, malware, viruses and the like. Notebooks might be simple and convenient, but also carry valuable passwords and data, and will be vulnerable to theft.

Management issues to be considered include not only security, but also issues of access, data storage, integration and the like. Then there are concerns regarding device usage, including capability to take photos, record data, access social networks, and access SaaS applications. Mobile devices can actually be used as hacker tools, and use of social networking can create issues of appropriate usage and time management.

Mobility requires policy to ensure that the technology is used appropriately, and it requires careful examination of security issues that might arise from specific aspects of usage. For resellers, this means that there is a growing area of peripheral issues to explore.

For this feature, we spoke with HP, EMC,  Juniper Networks,  and M86 Security.

This feature is available at http://reseller.co.nz.

In the infrastructure area, virtualisation and Cloud computing can have important repercussions for security requirements, creating new issues such as security control in the hybrid cloud, data location issues, and security of virtual servers. While these issues have caused enterprises to re-evaluate their security solutions,  smaller businesses with less in-house expertise and less available money are faced with the same threats. The result has been a proliferation of Unified Threat Management (UTM) appliances and managed services.

The global economic crisis has created a range of new attacks in 2009,  included phishing and Spam attacks targeting the unemployed.  Social networking is opening new territory for phishing, and the usual Web-based malware attacks continue. Spam is an ever growing problem, particularly as it becomes increasingly necessary to store, filter, and control email to meet regulations and protect against litigation.

For resellers, security remains  a tricky area. It can be complex, and requires special expertise. But there are opportunities to develop a consultative relationship that will lead to continued business. And one thing is certain: the need for security is unlikely to go away soon.

We spoke with a number of suppliers, including Symantec, Fortinet, Astaro, RSA (part of EMC), and Blue Coat. You can read about it in Reseller News.

This feature is available at http://reseller.co.nz.

In response, outsourcing companies such Wipro and Tata are now busily developing their own Cloud capabilities and exploring Cloud requirements among their clients. Meanwhile, Cloud providers such as Amazon, Google, and Salesforce.com are extending and diversifying their offerings. Other companies are also rapidly entering all areas of Cloud services, from infrastructure to applications.

Cloud-based outsourcing introduces a new type of environment that changes the risk/benefit profile of outsourcing. Some issues are similar, but with a changed emphasis; some are different due to issues such as data location, size of providers, maturity of processes, and scope of the outsourcing project.  Currently, disruption to outsourcing is minimal because Cloud computing has important issues that remain unresolved. But there are major changes afoot in infrastructure and service provision, and it is essential to consider the implications of the Cloud in any discussion of outsourcing.

For outsourcing vendors, the results of Cloud-based outsourcing are likely to be revolutionary.

This is the subject of a recent Executive Update for Cutter Consortium, which can be found at http://cutter.com.

Mashups are lightweight integrations of Web applications that combine results delivered through the Web. While use of data from Web sources has existed in a variety of forms and formats since the earliest days, mashups represent a new level of functionality characterized by ease of use, programmatic access, combination of data from multiple sources, and sharing of results. Mashup applications support needs which are typically envisioned by the user rather than by the IT community, and many of the early examples are found in the consumer space. A typical use would be mapping of real estate values to Google Maps to create an application where individuals can look at the map and see the values assigned to houses as they are viewed.

As an evolution of technologies, mashups extend SOA by making it possible to “borrow” functionality from diverse sources on the Web rather than from applications strictly designated for SOA usage. Within the enterprise, mashups represent a method by which technically savvy individuals can design their own applications by combining elements from a variety of different sources and creating something which is on value to them and to their colleagues.

As mashups continue to enter into the enterprise there are many opportunities for individuals to create important and serviceable applications that meet their needs without involving the IT department. This means that the so-called “long tail of development” can be eased. The long tail represents those projects which, although deemed to be valuable, will never reach a point of value to the corporation where they will actually become IT projects. Such applications can, however, be of great value to individual users and classes of users, and development is likely to yield opportunities for expansion and new concepts of how applications can be developed to aid a firm’s processes.

Because mashups enter “under the radar” they are not subject to to the usual controls — there may be no ownership, data sources may be suspect, accuracy or operation be incorrect, extension may be impossible, and the mashup itself may create risk because the applications upon which it is based remain unexamined. It is important to develop policy to ensure that mashups do not create risks. Processes are required to ensure that there is ownership, to provide for change, and to ensure that the mashups are reviewed by the IT department to determine at the very least if they create issues with other software or security problems that may not have been anticipated by the mashup creator.

This is the subject of my most recent Executive Update for Cutter Consortium, which can be found at http://cutter.com.