Nearly a year ago, I mentioned a wonderful product called PDF X-Change, from Tracker Software, in a post. It allows me to annotate PDF files, which many vendors maddeningly insist on using for briefings. Why “maddeningly”? Because for me at least, the best place for my notes is in the presentation – it provides theContinue reading “PDF X-Change – Still The One”
Category Archives: Vendor image and communications
IBM Software Results Continue To Validate Strategy
Another strong year from IBM demonstrates that its relentless software portfolio build-out has succeeded in its goal of grabbing ever more customer logos, share of wallet, and partners. Growth is a complex challenge at this scale – every acquisition brings revenue, but also staff and technology integration challenges, more complexity for Marketing and Sales to dealContinue reading “IBM Software Results Continue To Validate Strategy”
Informatica Passes Half-Billion Mark, Buys Siperian, Targets Cloud
Informatica has announced another, long-rumored acquisition: Siperian, thus continuing a steady march toward a comprehensive portfolio play. In 2009, its strong growth path made it the clear independent leader in data integration. With Release 9, its vision of a data integration platform grew to providing a comprehensive approach to everything from data discovery services to data quality.Continue reading “Informatica Passes Half-Billion Mark, Buys Siperian, Targets Cloud”
IT Marketers: Oversold Announcements Weaken Your Story
Microsoft and HP’s recent announcement highlighted some of the ways in which poor announcements strain credulity and make it harder to get attention when you do have something worthwhile to talk about. Some errors crop up repeatedly in IT marketing communications, and this one suffered from several of them.
Microsoft and HP Announce New Application-to-Infrastructure Model/Partnership [Yawn]
(Co-authored with Charles King of PUND-IT, Inc.) Microsoft and HP announced a new investment of $250M into their Frontline Partnership, designed to deliver integrated stacks supporting applications from Microsoft’s Exchange and SQL Server and beyond into the cloud. As part of this effort, the companies plan to deliver solutions built on what they defined asContinue reading “Microsoft and HP Announce New Application-to-Infrastructure Model/Partnership [Yawn]”
Sybase Will Step Up In-Memory Message With New Release
Sybase has quietly racked up a string of successful growth years, riding its pioneering status in commercial analytic databases (ADBMS) and holding on to its loyal base in everyday DBMS after being elbowed aside by Oracle a decade ago. Its steady market performance has not been driven by dramatic innovations: Sybase has seemed to lag the Big Three (Oracle,Continue reading “Sybase Will Step Up In-Memory Message With New Release”
Additional Caveats Obscure Oracle’s TPC Benchmark
Since my piece on Oracle’s recent TPC-C was posted, interesting emails have pointed me to additional price/performance data, and I thought I’d offer a bit of that to my readers. One of the more interesting came from the admittedly biased Conor O’Mahony, a DB2 product manager for IBM. In his blog, Conor points out some interestingContinue reading “Additional Caveats Obscure Oracle’s TPC Benchmark”
IBM’s “Smarter Planet” Will Capitalize on HW, Analytics
Rod Adkins, the SVP and Group Executive of IBM’s Systems and Technology Group (STG) took the time to engage the influencer community quite early in his tenure for a well-run event at the Watson Research Lab in Yorktown Heights. “I’ve been in this position for 38 days,” he reminded us, as STG’s AR team widenedContinue reading “IBM’s “Smarter Planet” Will Capitalize on HW, Analytics”
Oracle’s TPC Assertions Don’t Help Its Credibility
Oracle has been making much of its recent benchmark results. Its new TPC campaign may backfire, however; its deceptive assertions do it no credit, and obscure some interesting technical advances (such as its first use of flash technology) behind mislabeling and deliberate omission of important facts. The “benchmark wars” are far less active than theyContinue reading “Oracle’s TPC Assertions Don’t Help Its Credibility”
SAP Promises Acceleration on a “Clear Path” – Will it Be Enough?
The economic slowdown was not kind to SAP in 2009, and as it launched the annual Influencer Summit on December 8th, change was in the air. Messages were shifting. “Sustainability” got a big push, and there was a ringing commitment to substantial, dramatic product change to be delivered in 2010. Different faces were on display: there was no Leo Apotheker or BillContinue reading “SAP Promises Acceleration on a “Clear Path” – Will it Be Enough?”