The MSA Lab at UTSA selects the OMNITROL appliance for research, education, and training

I always believed in winning the developers' hearts and minds by starting with universities. There are no dogmas, no NIH syndrome there. New technology is not seen as a risk but as an opportunity to do things better. The team at the University of Texas San Antonio is working on some really interesting projects involving supply chain visibility, manufacturing and the aerospace industry. Read more here.

Google To Bid For Wireless Spectrum

I'm still having trouble putting my hands around this one. Last week, the Wall Street Journal confirmed that Google was going to apply to bid for wireless spectrum in a January Federal Communications Commission auction.

Why would they want to build their own mobile network? It will squarely run against the interest of their current mobile partners (AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile), and if they join forces with one of these companies, they are sure to alienate other partners. The Feds will not like the fact that they would own content, advertising and network. Maybe Google wants to put some pressure on the FCC to make sure carriers won't be able to block Google's content on the airwaves. Companies are evolving to take more control of the consumer around the network triangle.

Social Network Benefits to the B2B World

I've just read with great interest this article about B2B and social networking. I'm hearing the same things from friends in the marketing area. This is clearly changing the landscape of outbound marketing. And in turn, this is going to turn the flow of money from traditional web advertising towards more targeted social networking advertising. This is a short article but very much to the point.

Sun unveils Virtualization Hypervisor

I'm very bullish on virtualization as the next evolution in the data center environment. Here's a very interesting announcement from my former company Sun Microsystems. VMware and Microsoft are the leaders but it's good to see convergence between software and hardware vendors in that space. As a start-up, we see very clearly the benefits of server virtualization for our development efforts. This is giving us a tremendous leg up to get our product out of the door while keeping our IT costs under control.

Google announces Android

Last week, Google announced an open-source mobile operating system called Android. There is no doubt that this will change the way that mobile applications are developed.
As much as I like the people at RIM, they have no innovation on the application side that can resist what Apple and Google are doing to them right now. Ask people why they have a Blackberry today and the answer will be: push email. Messaging was a great differentiator 3 years ago, but for iPhones and Android-based phones, this is not even a table stake anymore.

Operating systems that can accommodate a rich and vibrant developer community will allow the creation of many small innovative applications that will drive revenue for carriers, handset manufacturers and developers. The more revenue they will generate with the platform, the more new developers will invest in this technology. Microsoft's response will be interesting, since they would be the only other serious contender in this battle.

Control of the user is achieved through control of the device, network and content. Google is becoming quite dominant here.

SAP Buys Business Objects for $6.78B

This is a surprise move that breaks with SAP's strategy of avoiding large company acquisitions. But this is a bold move that could pay off as business intelligence and analytic applications are raising to the top of executive lists. Good analysis article here which can be summarized by the customer value of integrating BI tools and vertical industry knowledge.

Managing Automation selects Omnitrol Networks as one of top 10 companies to watch in 2008

The momentum continues with more recognition from the industry. More on the announcement here. Although the manufacturing industry is hurting from outsourcing to China, we are finding more and more customers looking for cutting-edge innovation to create unique value. This industry epitomizes the arms race going on.

CNN-YouTube Primary Debate

A few days ago, democratic presidential hopefuls took the stage in South Carolina for a debate sponsored by CNN and YouTube in which all of the questions were submitted by users of YouTube. I wonder if this is a one off or if we are going to see more of these web/TV join activities. The quality of the videos were not good, this will be fixed next time in 4 years for sure. By then, the entire debate might be only on YouTube. In the meantime, YouTube could become the media of choice for developing democracies as a platform for expression. You can block a website, but you can't block a wireless network without significantly impacting your own communications and economy. Digital content will find a way out to the open.

Apple reinvents the phone

People have lined up in front of Apple stores all around the country to get their hands on Apple's new device, the iPhone. There are many things that make the iPhone a truly innovative device and much has been written about it already. I'm really interested in seeing how Apple can work with the developer community to create new applications for the iPhone. This has the potential to create a significant ecosystem and get innovative applications quickly. What Apple has been able to achieve with the iPhone is no small feat. It is incredibly hard to line up gorgeous design, cutting edge hardware, and flawless software together. Apple has been able to achieve this because they control all the elements. It is even harder when you only control software for instance.

Apple is moving in the same direction as Google to better control the user experience.
At the same time RIM, the smart phone leader, hasn't come up with anything close to this kind of innovation. A blackberry phone with a simple messaging application is going to look very bad very quickly compared to an iPhone. RIM and Nokia should be afraid, very afraid of this new product.

Frost & Sullivan Acclaims Omnitrol Networks

Based on its recent analysis of the North American RFID middleware and software market, Frost & Sullivan has presented Omnitrol Networks with the 2007 North American Frost & Sullivan Award for Product Innovation. This is a significant recognition from a leading influencer in the industry.

It feels good to see our value proposition resonate with customers (i.e. Boeing) and industry subject matter experts as we are building the Ubiquitous Network infrastructure. Here are a few quotes from their press release:

• "The OMNITROL was designed as a Telco-grade network appliance with as many applications and standard protocol options as possible, giving it unique versatility compared to other products in the market," notes Frost & Sullivan Research Analyst Brendon Ouimette.


• "The Omnitrol EASE software platform is built to be able to create and manage business process applications and to be able to develop and implement new ones from a Web-based interface," stated Ouimette.


• "When new applications for RFID technology become available, the OMNITROL is capable of being quickly upgraded to meet these new business demands by virtue of its devices adaptation and services deployment software application layers and its panoply of I/O hardware interfaces."

Facebook Launches Facebook Platform

I haven't had the time to cover much of the social network phenomenon, but I believe it's part of the ubiquitous network as it allows people to communicate. This announcement probably marks the end of MySpace or any other web property who wanted to capture some big slices of the social media pie. I always believed in finding application innovation outside of the four walls. Trying to innovate and build your own application, like MySpace has done so far. So unless MySpace is already working on such an open platform, they can kiss their leader position good-bye.

Facebook could easily become the most important portal for your internet experience as Yahoo or MySpace were. I would call them the internet operating system.

Boeing Phantom Works uses Omnitrol Networks' Open Application Network Appliance

As Boeing has transitioned to being a leader in systems integration, it has created an extensive network of internal and partner manufacturing operations. The cognitive factory includes a complex global supply chain, numerous Boeing sites, and interaction with multiple customers’ logistic locations. A network-enabled manufacturing approach will minimize infrastructure needs, ensure rapid deployment of productivity enhancements, and provide for unlimited incremental expansion through the newly-created lean supplier network. Read the complete news release here.

Cisco to Acquire WebEx

This is a very bold move from the networking giant. Cisco is not only dominating the network corner of the triangle, they are looking at owning the content side (or supply side). How serious are they? Well, $3 billion looks like serious to me. What better strategy to sell more of their routers and Unified Communications products than to provide applications that will create a demand for higher bandwidth (voice and video) and quality of service. Microsoft will have to respond and will probably lower their prices or bundle office and VoIP applications with their Live Meeting offer.

What is the play for the Service Providers? Will they just resell either webex or livemeeting? The center of gravity of the network triangle is clearly shifting on one side away from them.

Evolution of the Data Center

As I am looking at the triangle to explain the transformations happening around content, networks, and devices I can't help thinking about the other changes happening in the IT industry. Is one driving or enabling the other?

In the past, I talked about utility or cloud computing and it seems that cloud computing is becoming the new buzz word. It is true that content providers, service providers and network infrastructure manufacturers believe in the same shared network service architecture. Cloud computing meets all the scalability, reliability, flexibility and performance (one could argue with this last one :-) required to deliver these services over the web.

Big players like Sun, Microsoft, IBM, HP, Oracle and Amazon are already offering cloud computing services to other companies to run their software. Like email and web hosting in the past, this is not for everyone. Large companies still see their data centers as a competitive weapon and won't let anyone running it outside their four walls. They are using the same convergent infrastructure (server, storage, software) to make their own data centers much more flexible but it will be a while before they transition. This explains the success of VMware ($700M of revenue can't lie).

In the meantime, more cash-sensitive companies will buy computing resources on the web to run some of their software (or buy the service outright from salesforce.com). The data center is evolving to better server the business model outlined in the triangle.

EMC to spin off part of VMware in IPO

EMC's CEO is probably getting pressure from shareholders to get the share price up from where it is right now and he's parting with a very valuable asset (or fraction of). I'm very impressed with what VMware has achieved in a very short period of time. In a few years, they (and their competition) have made virtualization a top priority for all IT managers.