Filed under: Apple, Corporate Desktop Futures, PC, Smart Phone, Tablet | Tagged: Apple, HP | 1 Comment »
Comparetheware – A Comparison Site For IT Purchasers
Posted on January 23, 2012 by Martin Hingley
Comparetheware Highlights
- Opens a comparison site for IT purchasing
- Generates qualified leads priced at £25 each for resellers
- Charges suppliers £5k per year for basic inclusion, more for premium status
- Will open to users in a few months time
- Borrows techniques from consumer financial comparison sites
- Needs strong momentum to build critical mass
- Is a genuinely new go-to-market approach for the IT business purchasers
Filed under: comparetheware.com, Computerlinks, Software | Tagged: comparetheware.com, Computerlinks, Craig Moody, Mike Worby | Leave a Comment »
RedHat RHEV3 – Alternative Virtualisation And Ecosystem
Posted on January 20, 2012 by Martin Hingley
RedHat RHEV3 Highlights
- Launches RHEV3
- Has an Open Source approach – going against the tide of vertical integration
- Offers lower-cost alternatives in the virtualisation market
- It is not the hub of an ecosystem in the way Vmware, Microsoft and Citrix are
- Is now a billion dollar software company
- Has strong opportunities as users turn to KVM and Linux in database and Cloud Computing areas
Filed under: Cloud Computing, Hypervisor, Red Hat, Server | Tagged: CLoud Forms, Gluster, KVM, Phil Andrews, RedHat, RHEL, RHEV3, server hypervisor | 2 Comments »
IBM’s African Successes With Kenyan Banks And Safari.com
Posted on January 18, 2012 by Martin Hingley
More On IBM In Africa
We’ve discovered more IBM reference customers to add to those we featured in our recent article. In particular with 5 banks in Kenya:
- Credit Bank (core banking including IT Services in implementation, integration and maintenance of the system)
- Co-operative Bank (power systems, storage and software)
- Family Bank
- National Bank of Kenya (IT Services, hardware and software to help with business transformation)
- National Industrial Credit (NIC) Bank (core banking).
It also announced its contract (along with Vodafone) to help Safari.com offer its M-PESA mobile money service to over 15 million customers in East Africa.
These reinforce its targeting of banking and telecoms as two of its three selected industry sectors to address, as well as its high-end server product strategy. For Africa it also indicates changes to accommodate the needs of the growth of the middle class.
Please read our earlier analysis of its strategy.
Filed under: Africa, IBM | Tagged: Africa, Co-operative Bank, Credit Bank, Family Bank, IBM, Kenya, National Bank of Kenya, National Industrial Credit, Safari.com | Leave a Comment »
IBM Mainframes – Integrating Business Analytics With zBX
Posted on January 18, 2012 by Martin Hingley
IBM System Z Update
- Shipped 800 zBX with 450 blades
- Signed 80 new System z customers
- Encourages new mainframe participants with education and recruitment support
- Has added Windows to the supported platforms on zBX and URM
- Focuses on business analytics workloads with Smart Analytics System 9700 and 7100 alongside its Smart Analytics Cloud
- We expect to see Security Analytics addressed in future through its Q1 Labs acquisition
Filed under: Cloud Computing, IBM, Server | Tagged: business analytics, Cloud Computing, IBM, Ray Berard, System z, URM, zBX | Leave a Comment »
IBM Invests In Africa – ‘The Next India, The Next China’
Posted on January 16, 2012 by Martin Hingley
IBM In Africa Highlights
- Increased its presence from 4 main offices to over 20 today
- Established a number of new locations to service Bharti Telecom
- Has a high-end systems strategy
- Sees Government, Banking and Telco as the strongest industry sectors
- Runs regional management from Morocco, Tunis, Cairo, Nairobi and Johannesburg
- We see Africa as a small region with tremendous growth prospects, dependent on long-term socio-economic trends
Filed under: Africa, Cloud Computing, IBM, Server, Storage Systems | Tagged: Africa, Bharti Customs Directorate and Ministry of Finance Senegal, Cairo, Casablanca, Commercial Bank of The National Microfinance Bank in Tanzania, Gauteng Fire and Disaster Management Centre in South Africa, IBM, Johannesburg, Ministry of Finance in Cameroon, Takreem El-Tohamy, The First Nation Bank Namibia, Tunis | Leave a Comment »
Dell Storage Systems – Big Hat, Good Cattle
Posted on January 13, 2012 by Martin Hingley
Dell Storage Systems Highlights
- Has shifted from a reseller to an IP-based supplier status
- Is integrating 4 acquisitions into its Fluid Data architecture
- Is moving towards a common DFFS file system
- Maintains PowerVault, EqualLogic and Compellent brands
- Has to make up for the loss of EMC reseller business a year ago
- Sees established storage systems suppliers as ‘Big Hats, No Cattle’
- Will need to increase research, development and engineering spending to maintain innovation
Filed under: Cloud Computing, Compellent, Dell, Digital Content, EqualLogic, Ocarina, Storage Systems | Tagged: #Compellent, #Equallogic, Cloud Computing, compression, Darren Thomson, de-duplication, Dell, Exanet, Ocarina, Phil Soran | Leave a Comment »
HP’s Adds Autonomy And Vertica To Its Information Optimization Strategy
Posted on January 9, 2012 by Martin Hingley
HP Information Optimization Highlights
- Vertica adds real-time parallel processing of structured data
- Autonomy adds an analytics platform for all data (including unstructured sources from monitoring and social feeds)
- Quotes scary market numbers for data growth, but claims it can help manage all enterprise data
- Proposes an Information Optimization architecture, encompassing information use cases, sources management and optimisation layers
- A valid start, but over-productises a services business
Filed under: Autonomy, Digital Content, HP, Vertica | Tagged: Autonomy, Big Data, business analytics, HP, June Manley, Vertica | 3 Comments »
How R&D, Innovation And Integration WIll Help Reverse HP’s Market Share Decline
Posted on January 3, 2012 by Martin Hingley
HP Market Share Highlights
- Declined from 4.9% to 3.4% between Q1 2003 and Q3 2011 in the IT market
- Fell in IT Service and Hardware categories, while growing slightly in Software
- Fell continuously in the Americas and EMEA and despite growth, remains small in Asia Pacific
- Has not recovered from 2008’s step decline in large accounts
- Has done badly in Finance and Transport/… sectors
- Has been maintained in Manufacturing and Health sectors
- Should consider investing more than 2.6% of its revenues in R&D
- Should focus on breaking internal silos by training and redeploying smart managers
- Should build more integrated solutions with less dependence on broad horizontal partnerships
Filed under: HP, Surviving The Downturn | Tagged: #HP.Meg Witman, IT, Market-Share | 2 Comments »
IBM And VMware Find Common Ground In Storage And Server Hypervising
Posted on December 30, 2011 by Martin Hingley
IBM and VMware Highlights
- IBM is VMware’s biggest customer
- Enhances IBM’s role as a storage hypervisor vendor
- Matching approaches to server and storage hypervisors
- 20k common customers
- IBM addresses multiple APIs to make its storage hypervisor relevant within the VMware ecosystem
- IBM Stretched Cluster extends vMotion usage to 300km
- Work together on addressing the cost and latency issues of VDI
- A potentially strong common go-to-market approach
Filed under: Cloud Computing, Corporate Desktop Futures, IBM, Server, Storage Systems, VMware | Tagged: #Cloud, #storagehypervisor, Clud Computing, IBM, VDI, Vmware | Leave a Comment »
