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Microsoft FUD vs IBM Customer Value Antony Satyadas (Chief Competitive Marketing Officer IBM Software Group-Lotus, IBM Senior Certified Executive Architect, IEEE Senior Member) leads strategic competitive initiatives for IBM WPLC and Lotus. He has 22 years of worldwide consulting, marketing, and research experience with expertise on intelligent systems, knowledge innovation, workplace solutions, and enterprise service oriented architecture.
He has 50+ publications and is a member/program chair for 30+ international scientific/advisory committees and IBM business partner advisory boards/architecture boards. His education is in marketing, computer/cognitive science, and electrical engineering. This blog focuses on the technical value, and dispels the myths and FUD introduced by Microsoft around IBM software products.
Email FUD alerts to antony_satyadas@us.ibm.com
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Project Liberate consulting and alternatives
Check these out:
- Project Liberate consulting: http://www.ibm.com/software/info/liberate
- A video in Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4ZhPI1eic4
- What IT analysts and press got to say: http://www.ibm.com/lotus/reducecost (select License analysis)
Customers with Microsoft Enterprise Agreements might be able to save up to 40% or more on the cost of their renewal through this "no-charge" evaluation of their current Enterprise Agreement.
And then the alternatives...
- http://www.ibm.com/lotus/openclient
- the solution with Novell: http://www.ibm.com/lotus/opencollabclientwithnovell
- and the one with RedHat: http://www.redhat.com/partners/partnerspotlight/ibm/lotus/
- stay tuned for more details on the Ubuntu based solution and Lotus Foundation announced this week...
Categories
: [ agreement | enterprise | liberate | microsoft ]
Jan 23 2008, 03:38:06 AM EST
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IBM Open Collaboration Client Solution momentum
Check this out: http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/23370.wss
On a roll. Great momentum with Open Collaboration Client Solution (OCCS -- Lotus Notes, Lotus Symphony, etc.)
1. OCCS powered by SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop from Novell: More Customers, Value Added Resellers like Arrow in USA, Avnet in Italy generating leads for their partners. Live DVD from Novell: https://www14.software.ibm.com/webapp/iwm/web/preLogin.do?lang=en_US&source=sw-pprod05&S_PKG=SW-LN8betaSUSElinux
2. Red Hat offering OCCS powered by RHEL from Red Hat: Marketing initiative for Business Partners
http://www.redhat.com/about/news/prarchive/2008/lotusphere.html
http://www.redhat.com/partners/partnerspotlight/ibm/lotus/
and Live DVD: http://rhx.redhat.com/rhx/support/article/DOC-2050
3. Lotus Notes support for Ubuntu (limited 8.0.1, full 8.5)
and this:
Lotus Symphony beta 4, Lotus Notes features, etc.: http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/23366.wss
and
Lotus Foundations: http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/23326.wss that leverages the Net Integration Technologies acquistion: http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/23325.wss runs on SLES from Novell.
and
Bluehouse SaaS suite of collaboration features: http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/23326.wss
and more...
Categories
: [ arrow | client | csscorp | domino | hat | ibm | linux | notes | novell | open | red | ubuntu | vads ]
Jan 22 2008, 09:39:01 PM EST
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Desktop of the future Club at Lotusphere 2008 Orlando
Are you attending Lotusphere 2008 in Orlando?
Visit Desktop of the future Club
Check out the sessions in Swan Peacock 2 room starting Monday afternoon (Jan 21st) thru Wed evening (Jan 23rd). The schedule is in a one pager in your attendee bag.
Learn all about the IBM Open Collaboration Client Solution, activities with Linux distros. such as Novell, Red Hat, and other business partners such as Mainsoft, Csscorp, Ericom, Win4lin, Diamondedge, Cashal, etc. Learn about migration strategies.
Value for Customers, Business Partners, ...
Categories
: [ canonical | client | collaboration | csscorp | desktop | linux | lotusphere | lotusphere2008 | mainsoft | microsoft | novell | occs | odf | open | redhat ]
Jan 20 2008, 08:30:58 PM EST
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Acer president's Vista concerns
After Dell and HP, here is yet another concerned Microsoft partner and PC manufacturer: http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,134962-pg,1/article.html
"Acer president Gianfranco Lanci today became the first major PC manufacturer to openly attack Microsoft over the Windows Vista operating system. He was quoted in the Financial Times Deutschland . Lanci said the operating system was riddled with problems and gave users and businesses no reason to buy a new PC, according to the report."
Business 2.0 blog provides more links on this topic: http://blogs.business2.com/smallchange/2007/07/windows-vista-c.html
Jul 25 2007, 12:00:00 AM EDT
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Forrester Report: Only 11% of customers will definitely renew Microsoft Enteprise Agreement
Check this out: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/323025_msftcontracts10.html , http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,42562,00.html and this one too: http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/operating_systems/software_assurance_storm_warning.html
Per a recent Forrester report, only 11% of the 61 will definitely renew Microsoft Enterprise Agreement. 26% have decided NOT to renew. 86% (more than 3000 user organizations) have the agreement up for renewal in 2007.
"Julie Giera, the Forrester Research vice president who wrote the report, said she speaks with hundreds of Microsoft Software Assurance customers each year, and the findings from the formal study are consistent with what she has been hearing from many of them."
Apparently the Microsoft response did not address the point that was being made in the report: http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/business_applications/microsofts_licensing_response.html
So folks, if you have a Microsoft enterprise agreement up for renewal or considering to sign a new one, think twice or thrice... Get to the facts. Figure out how you can free up quite a lot of money in your IT budget. See http://www-142.ibm.com/software/sw-lotus/lotus/general.nsf/wdocs/license .
Let me know if you need more guidance on this.
Categories
: [ agreement | enterprise | forrester | microsoft | microsoft-watch | report ]
Jul 10 2007, 12:00:00 AM EDT
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Microsoft Desktop - FUD vs Reality
Customers, Vendors, Analysts form the Market. I have been noticing more facts based trends on Microsoft Desktop and its alternatives including Linux. Lets take a look at some:
1. Various companies/governments worldwide are moving to desktop alternatives
February 2007 - Brazil
Linux arrives on 50,000 government desktops in Brazil: http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2094861,00.asp
February 2007 - USA
"By all appearances, the migration from Microsoft Windows to Novell SUSE Linux on the server and the desktop at the Windsor Unified School District in Northern California has been almost as pain-free as any IT professional could hope for. By this summer, all 5,000 students and 250 teachers will be working off of a Linux-based thin client running OpenOffice.org, and the majority of the district's servers will be running Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server." http://searchenterpriselinux.techtarget.com/originalContent/0,289142,sid39_gci1245710,00.html
March 2007 - France
"When French MPs and their assistants return from their summer break this June, they will conduct parliamentary business on PCs running Ubuntu. From the next session of parliament, 1,154 desks will feature the Linux-based PCs. At the time of the latest IT refresh for parliamentary assistants, France's parliament, the National Assembly decided to switch from Windows to Linux, allowing the 577 MPs to switch to non-proprietary software for the first time."
http://software.silicon.com/os/0,39024651,39166298,00.htm
June 2007 - India
"Shiva Ramani, Co-Founder and CEO Cybernet-SlashSupport(CSS) said, "As a fast-growing provider of technology infrastructure support to multinational clients around the world, we have a tremendous focus on collaboration and on open standards. IBM's new open client solution offers the best combination of functionality and flexibility at a fraction of the cost of proprietary solutions. In line with our philosophy of practice what you preach, we are implementing the new IBM open client offering across our organisation."
http://www.thebusinessedition.com/ibm-offers-new-open-client-solution-for-enterprise-pcs-698/
2. Top Microsoft Desktop Vendors/Partners are signing up for alternatives
March 2007 - USA
"Hewlett-Packard is closing custom deals for thousands of desktop PCs running Linux, which has the company assessing the possibility of offering factory-loaded Linux systems, an HP executive said. "We are involved in a number of massive deals for Linux desktops, and those are the kinds of things that are indicators of critical mass. So we are really looking at it very hard," said Doug Small, worldwide director of open source and Linux marketing at HP."
http://www.crn.com/hardware/197800591
July 2007 - UK
"Upgrading from Windows XP to Vista poses significant challenges for IT departments warns Dell, as it softens its sales stance on the OS"
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,39287855,00.htm
July 2007 - USA
"VARs and system builders said the Vista issues are so significant that they are simply ripping Vista off most systems.
"We are ripping it off systems 99 percent of the time," said Jay Tipton, vice president of Technology Specialists, a Fort Wayne, Ind., Microsoft Gold partner."
http://www.crn.com/white-box/200900857;jsessionid=XIE0XNLOEVTLAQSNDLPCKH0CJUNN2JVN
3. Analysts report that many organizations are NOT taking up Vista/Office 2007 and more on FUD
June 2007 - Australia
"Analyst firm Gartner has expressed surprise at the number of Australian organizations reluctant to upgrade to Vista and Office 2007 without exploring alternatives. According to the results of an online Computerworld poll, a mere four percent plan to upgrade this year, while 77 percent plan to explore alternative solutions before making their move. Gartner research director, Martin Gilliland, said the results are unexpected. "I'm surprised that so many think there is an alternative," he said adding that the only options are Mac, Linux or skipping Vista altogether."
http://www.arnnet.com.au/index.php/id;634523134;pp;1
July 2007 - USA
According to Joe Wilcox of eWeek: "Microsoft has a long history of saying stuff (expecting people will believe) that wasn't true then or didn't turn out to be true in the future. I've grabbed some random examples:
* Software Assurance: In its May 10, 2001, press release announcing the program, Microsoft claimed: "The improvements to Microsoft's volume licensing offerings are designed to match the current acquisition behavior of the majority of Microsoft's enterprise customers, and should result in a reduction or no change in licensing costs for approximately 80 percent of Microsoft volume licensing customers." In reality, based on research from Gartner and other analyst firms, only a minority of customers—those upgrading every two years or less—would realize cost savings. The program raised most customers' software acquisition costs, as much as 107 percent, according to Gartner."
http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/corporate/say_it_aint_so.html
I will end with some fun reading from eWeek - check it out: http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2148775,00.asp
"Bad, Bad Reasons Not to Buy Open-Source Software "
Categories
: [ agreement | australia | brazil | client | crn | dell | enterprise | eweek | france | hp | india | linux | microsoft | microsoft-watch | novell | open | redhat | searchenterpriselinux | silicon | solution | thebusinessedition | uk | usa | vista | zdnet ]
Jul 10 2007, 12:00:00 AM EDT
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Looking for "Desktop of the future" solutions, today?
If your organization can relate to any of these top reasons, read further
- Want flexibility and choice in your environment/purchasing decisions
- Exploring "Desktop of the future"
- You are an ISV/VAD/SI/Solution provider exploring new ways to drive customer value
- You need alternatives for migrating your applications based on user needs/segmentation For example:
- Have Microsoft Visual Basic applications; still running Windows 2000; have .Net applications
- Interested in server managed clients and "hands free installation and support" model
- Need "Rich Client" support (i.e., "fat client" functions at browser client price)
- Cost, TCO
- Want to lower your TCO by exploring Linux and other low cost applications
- Challenged with Vista upgrade costs – software, hardware, training, deployment
- Concerned about Microsoft Office 2007 costs (software, training, deployment, value) - 80% of your users leverage only 20% of the functionality offered in Microsoft Office 2007
- Want to explore the possibility of saving a large amount off the cost of Microsoft Enterprise Agreement by taking alternate procurement strategies
- Looking into the increasing number of government policies and supporting laws on adopting open standards, ODF, and Linux
- Want to innovate, leverage new innovations like Web 2.0 on the desktop
The "desktop of the future" concept is driven by the following needs
- ease of use (leverage Web 2.0, SOA) drive innovation on the desktop
- reduce cost - hardware, software, maintenance/support, management (http://www.ibm.com/lotus/reducecost)
- support mass collaboration and organizational productivity
- mobility, smartcard, biometrics, appliances - anyplace, anywhere, connected/disconnected
- unified collaboration, communication, and socialization (http://www.ibm.com/lotus/collaborate)
- client middleware with one open programming model
- flexibility and choice - open client capabilities (http://www.ibm.com/lotus/openclient)
- mashup and application composition capabilities
- the smarts - speech, vision, touch, awareness, context, insights
Want to get a briefing, IBM point of view? Contact kamererr@us.ibm.com
Want to play around with Notes 8 beta client? download from here: www.ibm.com/lotus/getnd8now
Want to get a whitepaper on this? Contact me antony_satyadas@us.ibm.com
Categories
: [ 2.0 | agreement | biometrics | desktop | enterprise | future | isv | linux | microsoft | office | smartcard | tco | vista | web ]
Mar 21 2007, 11:28:26 AM EDT
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US Federal Government: last week it was DoT and FAA. This week its NIST - Windows Vista ban expanding
Last week I blogged about US Federal government organizations Department of Transportation and FAA banning Windows Vista, Explorer 7, and Office 2007 upgrades.
Its the turn of NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology), part of US Department of Commerce, this week. According to InformationWeek (http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=198000229 ), "NIST has banned Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system from its internal computing networks".
Categories
: [ 2007 | dot | faa | federal | government | microsoft | nist | office | usa | vista ]
Mar 16 2007, 10:50:32 AM EDT
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US Department of Transportation bans Windows Vista, Explorer 7, and Office 2007 upgrades as more countries adopt open standards and ODF
See this article in Informationweek: http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=197700789
"Citing concerns over cost and compatibility, the top technology official at the federal Department of Transportation has placed a moratorium on all in-house computer upgrades to Microsoft's new Windows Vista operating system, as well as Internet Explorer 7 and Office 2007".
"The DOT's ban on Vista, Internet Explorer 7, and Office 2007 applies to 15,000 computer users at DOT proper who are currently running the Windows XP Professional operating system. The memo indicates that a similar ban is in effect at the Federal Aviation Administration, which has 45,000 desktop users."
Meanwhile, the State of California legislature is considering has drafted legislation that would mandate adoption of ODF (http://news.com.com/California+may+adopt+OpenDocument/2100-7344_3-6163186.html)
And the IT Director for Germany's Foreign Ministry reports in Heise magazine that per-user licensing costs for its employees, who all use Open Office, is only 1,190 Euro. Other German ministries, which use Microsoft Office, tend to spend more than double that amount, or even as much as 5000 Euro. http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/85977/from/rss09
And South Africa government is moving to open source: http://www.tectonic.co.za/view.php?id=1377
Interested in IBM open client solution? Check this out: http://www.ibm.com/lotus/openclient
Categories
: [ 2007 | DOT | FAA | ODF | africa | california | federal | germany | government | microsoft | office | south | vista ]
Mar 05 2007, 03:35:16 PM EST
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IBM's open client solution - Why customers and ISV/SIs care
You might have seen the IBM announcement of its open client solution (http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/21060.wss ) - Lotus collaboration software (Lotus Notes 8 and IBM productivity tools with ODF support, Domino, Sametime, WebSphere Portal, Expeditor) and associated software services to support flexibility and choice for the customer around operating systems (Windows from Microsoft, Linux from Red Hat and Novell, Mac OS 10 from Apple - planned for Lotus Notes 8), platform devices, productivity editors (Microsoft Office on Windows, IBM Productivity Editors or open source products on Linux and Windows), alternatives for application development on thin/rich client (leverage Eclipse RCP). See IDC News Service: http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/02/12/HNibmlinuxopenclient_1.html
However, some are reporting that Microsoft is not very happy with this http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/operating_systems/microsoft_is_not_very_hapy_about_ibms_new.html
Well....
1. IBM financials for Y2006 show 30% revenue growth for Lotus software in Q4 and also 9 consecutive quarters of growth.
2. Open standards based software does provide flexibility and choice to the customer, ISVs, and Systems Integrators. Flexibility and choice is about operating systems, platforms, productivity editors, applications, collaboration software, application development, and rich/thin client. Microsoft products runs on Windows only, and often have complicated product inter-dependencies. According to Avinash Singh, COO of Birlasoft (http://www.birlasoft.com ), a Systems Integrator based out of New Jersey, "IBM's open client solution is very timely. It allows us to offer more value to our customers who either want to move to Linux desktops or drive a heterogeneous client strategy. This solution can help them reduce costs while increasing organizational productivity. It is all about offering flexibility and choice for our customers."
3. Customers are being Vista "challenged" in terms of cost of software, hardware, deployment, falling short of security features (http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2007/01/vista_firewall.html?chan=search ), printer and device drivers (http://www.enterprisenetworksandservers.com/newsflash/art.php?698 ). "MIT flunked Vista" recently (http://www.varbusiness.com/sections/news/breakingnews.jhtml;jsessionid=RLEG1GEALNJJIQSNDLOSKHSCJUNN2JVN?articleId=197004760 ). Office 2007 requires end user training. Customers are also concerned about "after Vista what" -- I spend all this money and cant get locked out of innovation -- do i move to "Live"? when? Why not continue to stay on Windows XP or the like. Others say: I have to "migrate" anyways, so why not leverage Linux? As you may know, many experts are "OOXML challenged" also (http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog/article.php?story=20070117145745854 )
4. Customers are also figuring out a way to free up lots of money in their IT budget by deciding to take alternative procurement strategies instead of renewing/signing Microsoft Enterprise Agreement - "a la carte vs buffet". So says several analysts and press (http://www-142.ibm.com/software/sw-lotus/lotus/general.nsf/wdocs/license )
So despite any criticism out there, my take is that the open client solution is real and deep and its all about bringing value, flexibility, ease and choice to customers.
Categories
: [ apple | client | domino | eclipse | expeditor | hat | linux | mac | microsoft | notes | novell | odf | open | portal | red | sametime | vista | websphere | windows ]
Feb 13 2007, 12:00:00 AM EST
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FUD v. FACT: Microsoft ends up reissuing press release, removing reference to IDC data
Think paying bloggers to edit Wikipedia entries or handing out free laptops to bloggers is on the cutting edge of marketing communications? How about inventing IT industry analyst market share figures for a market segment that hasn't even been measured? Case in point: A reader of Microsoft's Sunday, Jan. 21 press release paragraphs could conclude that Microsoft already dominates the Unified Communications integrated collaborative market segment with 52% share, according to IDC, a reputable IT research firm. Trouble is, IDC has not yet determined vendor market share for this segment, nor has estimated the size of the "integrated collaborative" market. To top it off, IDC hasn't even established a taxonomy for the "integrated collaborative" market segment! (Microsoft even mixed in Social Software capabilities into the same paragraph, just to sound trendy, I guess.)
See Microsoft's original press release, that issued on Sunday Jan 21st 2007 at midnight, at http://news.morningstar.com/news/ViewNews.asp?article=/PR/20070122SFM051_univ.xml&pgid=qtqnPress5
So did Microsoft fix their "error?" Rather than distributing a new version of its press release over PR Newswire (which distributed the original press release) to correct these innaccuracies. Microsoft simply updated a copy of the press release posted on its press room web site, with the words, "Editors’ update, Jan. 24, 2007 – This press release has been edited since original publication." -- without any explanation about what was wrong. See: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/jan07/01-21LotusDominoTransitionPR.mspx
Of course, journalist don't check press releases on vendor press sites to see if they've changed. Then again, Microsoft could again be blazing a new trail in marketing communications ; )
Categories
: [ collaboration | communication | fud | idc | market | microsoft | morningstar | press | unified ]
Jan 26 2007, 03:41:26 PM EST
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