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1. Suppliers declare
new battle fronts.
Cisco has launched a vision which builds on the network centricitiy of future
ICT models aggregating a value chain around a network and collaborative web
application architecture. This is clearly in sharp contrast with the legacy
approach of the computing centric model of HP and IBM.
With VMware and Cordys clearly positioned to enable this acceleration of
virtualization of both hardware infrastructure as well as software
infrastructure, Cisco is focusing all its considerable resources to launch what
it describes as "Unified Computing".
In what amounts to an apparent declaration that the network centric application model is far more efficient, effective and more responsive to today's business needs than yesterday's computer centric application models, Cisco has now challenged the traditional application development and deployment framework so common to the IBM and HP ecosystems. From Oracle to SAP to Microsoft, the virtualized application utility heralded by Webex and Salesforce.com is far more at home with the Cisco vision of ICT than either IBM's or HP's. And the software industry has been served a formidable challenge greater than the one which the Web served Microsoft in the 1990s.
2. Time is the
ultimate challenge.
The new race to the post credit-crunch / economic meltdown world requires
companies of all sizes to reinvent themselves, merge, reorganize, acquire,
divest, change business and regulatory operating mechanisms on the fly and with
full involvement of business leaders' decision making authorities at all
levels.
The legacy model of designing in detail the specification requirements of the
business process and having specialists with application platform proprietary
languages know-how (4GL) to translate the requirements into a technical
customization of the traditional platform is now simply too onerous and long
winded.
The time to transform a complex business process, introduce
a new application process or modify existing ones,
needs to be counted in days if not in real time. This is in sharp contrast with
the months and years required to develop and deploy through the traditional
models of ERP and SCM to name a
few.
Furthermore the prison of the single application, the single data model and the
single enterprise can no longer restrict the ability for enterprises to
collaborate with speed, simplicity and scale across value chains. The world in which
we live changes more dramatically and faster than ever before in history.
New models for competitive responsiveness and governance require a new model
for ICT.
3. Integration
becomes innovation. The rise of Cloudsourcing.
No one can afford to spend any money on integration services to just enable
the association of data and processes from one application to another. The
speed and degree of integration needs is just too large to be addressed through
a service model with variable costs associated to the number of people-days
required in traditional application infrastructures. The business operating
platform used must be able to integrate any structured and non structured data
and application to any defined process in real time. The Cordys Enterprise
Cloud Orchestration System has created a new benchmark in the execution of the
people intensive services that need to be concentrated on innovation of
businesses processes, not integration. This is changing the profile and
business models of Professional Services companies and outsourcing companies
which now need to create more value for companies than just cost arbitrage on
system integration or skills availability.
Professional Services companies are increasingly dealing
with how to accelerate the transformation of businesses and the step between
the design of new business models and the deployment of the new processes,
related information and organizational roles. What customers are looking for is
to rapidly move from the design of the new business model to the execution in
one seamless and rapid execution.
Increasingly the delivery will come through what we at Cordys have defined Cloudsourcing™
where part or all of the delivery will come through a Cloud Service or in fact
a set of Cloud Services which are seamlessly orchestrated with legacy
enterprise Information systems and even non structured Web data.
4. Lower investments
and lower operating expenses.
Every senior executive is now asking for less expense at both Capex and
Opex levels. Furthermore whatever project is selected, the need for the payback
to be within a quarter so as to be able to have a maximum deployment time of a
quarter, a payback of a quarter and two quarters of improved operating
performance. This new framework cannot be realized with the traditional models.
The new model is a combination of Cloud Services and seamless business
operation platform orchestration of processes across legacy environments.
The new financial situation cannot be addressed through the same software
development and deployment models. Every executive needs to investigate new
players and new models.
5. Today’s titans or
Tomorrow’s?
History is being written very fast. The safety net and safety blanket of
large companies whose cost structures are huge and whose revenue streams are
stalling may no longer provide the same kind of security as to prior to this
inflection point. Companies like Cordys whose revenues are on a 100% growth
curve can provide the needed jolt for questioning the viability of betting on
the past alone versus a risk-adjusted model of investing with an eye to what
new model will eventually become predominant in the new equilibrium.
If dominant software channels like the Microsoft one or the IBM one need to respond by re-inventing themselves, it will be extremely painful for those customers who have all their architectures completely dominated by the historic model just chosen 36 to 24 months ago. 2009 is not 2007!
6. A small matter of
leadership
Christensen’s innovation dilemma is being put to the test at an even more
radical pace by the hypercompetitive world we are about to be part of. Leaders
who thrive in extreme competition are those who can intercept the changing
models while avoiding to destroy the ones which
currently run their companies. They understand what needs to be done, pick some
important battles, put their best talent behind it and give them the resources
required to drive the changes.
2009 will require a lot of leadership from companies’ CEOs, CIOs, COOs, CFOs and their board of directors. The Cloud model is one which leaders can no longer afford not to experience.
Cordys is helping all leaders who want to take their game to a whole new extremely competitive level thrive.
If you want to be one of them, please contact us!