Aha--TYS™

From time-to-time, we provide links to eclectic topics that might provoke an Aha!... moment in you.  Since these are external links to published information, they may require you to subscribe to the information source or register to view the information.

SaaS

• SaaS revenues will reach more than $19 billion by 2011 from $6.3 billion last year, according to Gartner, and will account for 25 percent of the total software market.
  A recent survey by McKinsey found the proportion of CIOs considering SaaS adoption jumped to 61 percent this year from 38 percent in 2006. The survey also found that, of 34 software application areas examined, only nine, including financial change and configuration management, are unlikely to see SaaS adoption by 2008. "It is clearly a disruptive force causing virtually all software players to provide some type of service solution," Gartner analyst Robert Desisto says. Indeed, industry software giants Microsoft, Oracle and SAP have either added an on-demand element to their portfolios or will soon enter the SaaS market.
  
  CIO Insight, June 7, 2007 Full Article

Technology

• Lawsuit Settlement Opted Over Email Recovery and Search Costs
  The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) govern the conduct of all civil actions brought in the U.S. Federal district courts. Although they have been in place for a long time, FRCP amendments came into effect December 1, 2006. These rules require companies to retain all corporate records, including email and data compilations, and make them available to the court as soon as there is a reasonable expectation that a lawsuit might occur, without the court having to specifically make a discovery request. We are now approaching the one-year anniversary of the amendments introduced last year.
  
  Messaging Newswire, November 29, 2007 Full Article
• Companies Falter at Aligning IT to Business
  According to a new study, most companies find their IT to be ineffective and poorly aligned to their business.
  
  CIO Insight, September 10, 2007 Full Article
• Why "Good Enough" Is Good Enough
  Imperfect technology greases innovation--and the whole marketplace
  
  Business Week, September 3, 2007 Full Article
• Gambling on tomorrow
  Modelling the Earth's climate mathematically is hard already. Now a new difficulty is emerging
  
  The Economist print edition, Aug 16th 2007 Full Article
• RIM Launches Dual-mode BlackBerry 8820
  In Motion says the BlackBerry 8820 is the first dual-mode BlackBerry to provide wireless voice and data access over both cellular and Wi-Fi wireless networks.
  
  PC World, July 17, 2007 Full Article
• Most of what IT does has nothing to do with innovation, but it should, writes CIO Update columnist Patrick Gray of the Prevoyance Group.
  
  CIO Update , July 16, 2007 Full Article
• Vista plodding along six months after release
  Market research indicates that businesses have been slow to adopt Vista. Forrester predicts that only 31% plan to upgrade within a year, and 22% more within two years.
  For companies that have committed, there is no need to hesitate or slow down – we believe that our concerto of platform capabilities based on PointCross’ Orchestra, Solo, Vista and MOSS (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server) will provide a game changing strategic advantage to enterprises. This offering delivers information security, compliance, business process automation, and search + discovery services in a unified framework. Our concerto can go live in a matter of weeks with minimal impacts on corporate IT infrastructure”
  
  CNN, July 16, 2007
• The Future of Technology
  A Web that thinks like you
  

  And unlike today's search engines, Semantic Web technologies are designed not simply to look up information but to understand its meaning.

  It's a daunting challenge, and one that's being pursued by such big companies as IBM, Google, and Oracle, as well as tiny startups. Experts predict that in the next 5 to 10 years, companies will use the Semantic Web to build smarter search engines, automate everyday Web tasks such as comparison shopping, and identify connections between information stored in far-flung corporate databases. In 2004 a consortium led by Web architect Tim Berners-Lee set Semantic Web standards, such as how to tag information.
  
  Business Week, July 9, 2007 Full Article
• As traditional corporate software has grown complex and expensive to maintain, Web services are getting more capable and reliable every year.
  
  Business Week, February 12, 2007, Full Article
• Among the more interesting statistics from a Secret Service study of insider attacks, some 80% of insiders who launched attacks on their companies had exhibited negative behaviors before the incident.
  
  Information Week, August 25, 2006, Full Article
  

Business Strategy & Innovation

• Innovation and Six Sigma are different methods that beget different types of results and require different management styles. Companies don't have to choose between the two—innovation and Six Sigma can coexist.
  

  
  Business Week, February 27, 2007, Full Article

• Corporate war gaming simulates the interactions of multiple actors and provides a better way to forecast competitor responses in a dynamic market. 
  Interaction - which creates knowledge networks in companies - is the best way to win support for a new strategy.  Really, the key take-home message is that war gaming encourages managers to think differently about the consequences of their actions since they take a broader view of both outside and inside drivers and forces.  In short, as the famous Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu (author of  "The Art of War", circa 500 B.C.) would say, “To know your enemy, you must become your enemy!"
  
  Economist, May 31, 2007 Full Article

E&P

• Latin America – Beating the Oil Curse.
  Pemex is Mexico's piñata. With 60% of its reserves in deep water, Mexico needs Brazil’s Petrobras' knowhow. The companies signed a broad cooperation agreement last year that may give Pemex a helping hand. "The situation in Mexico is desperate—they are losing their reserves very quickly," says Guilherme Estrella, Petrobras' chief of exploration and production.
  

  
  Business Week, Full Article

Pharma

• The Tufts CSDD report estimates that 15% of global drug development spending has gone to contract clinical services since 2001. In addition, sponsor spending on outsourcing has increased beyond the 12% growth in overall global development.
  

  
  actmagazine.com, Mar 1, 2006 Full Article