August 23rd, 2007

Podcast: Sun=Java, Facebook ads, Vista reboots and more...

Posted by Dan Farber @ 3:12 pm

Categories: Between the Lines podcast, ERP, Enterprise 2.0, Facebook, Microsoft, SAP, Social networking, Software Infrastructure, Sun, Web Technology

Tags: Facebook, Podcast, Advertisement, Stock, Sun Microsystems Inc., Microsoft Windows Vista, Dan Farber

This week on the Dan & David Show we discuss Sun’s transformation on Wall Street. The stock price hasn’t risen above $5 but the stock symbol changed from SUNW to JAVA. I can understand why salesforce.com took CRM as its ticker symbol, but it’s not clear what behind Sun’s move, other than trying to replace an image of Sun as hardware and chip maker with that of the software company that brings you Java.

We also talk about Facebook’s ad targeting effort, SAP’s social networking conservatism and spy agencies experimenting with social networks. David also Tech Shakedowns with Vista and Firefox, and beams about the audio/video studio he is building in the basement of his house (more pictures of the studio build out here).

This podcast can be delivered directly to your desktop or MP3 player if you’re subscribed to our podcasts (See ZDNet’s podcasts: How to tune in). For more the topics covered during the show, search our blog.

August 23rd, 2007

SAP's cautious Web 2.0 imagineering

Posted by Dan Farber @ 2:46 pm

Categories: ERP, Enterprise 2.0, General, IT Management, Innovation, SAP, Social networking, Web Technology

Tags: Social Networking, Web, Web 2.0, Network, SAP AG, Dan Farber

I met with Denis Browne, senior vice president of imagineering at SAP Labs. He isn’t on loan from Disney, which came up with “imagineering” portmanteau in the 1950’s. Browne is tasked with imagining, developing and evangelizing Web 2.0 innovations–social networks, widgets, RSS, blogs, wikis, SMS, virtual worlds, etc.–across various SAP’s various product divisions and 39,300 employees in 50 countries.

However, SAP takes a very conservative approach to commercializing and mainstreaming the imagineering from Browne’s group.

Widgets and social networking aren’t exactly revolutionary at this point, but Browne is cautious about introducing these tools to employees and customers, “We have to be careful how we introduce new technology. We don’t want to create a headache for IT organizations.” Headache meaning it’s not managed, secure and compliance. Yet, widgets are social networks flooding through the back doors of enterprises.

Browne’s time horizon for introducing new technologies is 18 to 24 months, which is a snail’s pace compared to companies addressing consumer audiences.

Browne’s group has made progress in developing Harmony, a social network behind the firewall. “The $64 million question is will social networks work in the enterprise and what is the secret sauce,” Browne said regarding social networks. Harmony was first introduced on April 10 to SAP Labs users in North America. So far, 1,000 of the 1,700 SAP Labs employees have signed up for Harmony and 10 to 13 percent use it every day.

“We need to weave it into the fabric of all mission critical applications in the enterprise, so its relevant and available when they need,” Browne said. He gave an example of integrating social networks with SAP’s CRM and HR applications, allowing employees to have more control over what information is propagated about themselves in the organization. Harmony, for instance, can surface more color about the person and their expertise, creating an interaction between Harmony and the HR system, with end user and company created content.

So far, Harmony usage is more social than professional. Members have created 136 groups, such as photography and yoga. The groups formed on Harmony led to the establishment of a quiet room for yoga and ping pong tables. “[Without Harmony] the company wouldn’t have know about those needs,” Browne said. “Now we are buying ping pong table for the Palo Alto campus.”

Ping pong tables is modest evidence of some utility for enterprise social networks, but it won’t sell any CEOs on the concept and neither is Browne. “We have a small team and we are in the imagineering phase. [Harmony] may never turn into a product. We are actively trying to roll it out globally to employees, but there are cultural, language, security and legal issues, such as does the company own data employees contribute.

Larry Dignan posted about his conversation with executives from Trampoline Systems, one of the companies that is commercializing social networking for enterprises while SAP imagineers. They agreed with Browne that culture, security, manageability, integration with group policies and privacy are challenges.

In addition, explaining social networking remains a hurdle to adoption. “From where I sit probably the hardest part is that there isn’t vocabulary to describe it really. Social networking for the enterprise makes most people in the enterprise cringe, but we also have to explain it more clearly than enterprise 2.0,” said Peter Biddle, vice president of development at Trampoline.

On the other hand, social networks offer a far better way to leverage resources within a company, such as finding people who have expertise in a particular area. It’s also a way to bridge the generation gap, giving those entering the workplace a familiar tool and interface and the older generation a way to connect and share knowledge.

SAP’s widget platform for delivering data on desktops, mobile devices and in browsers. Browne described SAP’s widget effort “iTunes for the enterprise.” The company plans to create a gallery of widgets interfaces and already has delivered an Eclipse plug-in for developing widgets to the SAP Developer Network.

Currently, SAP is testing widgets internally, but has no plans to roll them out to customers any time soon. “It takes a long time to navigate through SAP and determine if it’s a viable business for us to enter. We need to ensure that customers want it and understand the impact the environment, such as support, could have on us,” Browne said. “It doesn’t fit the norm in the way SAP has done business. The approach of an entire collection of componentry and elements is new to SAP as well as how we are going to market with it.”

He went on to explain that SAP cannot “disrupt the core” of 40,000 customers where SAP is deeply embedded with next generation applications and technologies. “No company could do it in a swift manner. It would be dangerous for the user base.”

It’s understandable that SAP should be cautious in introducing new technologies, especially concepts like social networking that are early in their maturation phase and difficult to explain to executive management, unless they are under 30 years old. Yet, I can’t help but think that SAP has its head partially in the sand. It certainly has the resources to be at the forefront of the next generation of applications, just not the mindset. It makes you wonder how revolutionary SAP’s A1S product can be given the conservatism of the company.

August 23rd, 2007

Sun: We're a Java company, just ask our ticker

Posted by Larry Dignan @ 10:30 am

Categories: General, Software Infrastructure, Sun

Tags: Java, Sun Microsystems Inc., Larry Dignan

Sun Microsystems said Thursday that it’s changing its ticker from “SUNW” to “JAVA” effective Aug. 27.

While this move is largely a gimmick–Is any institutional investor going to push Sun over $5 over a ticker?–the new ticker is an interesting message. The message: Sun is more than storage systems, servers and UNIX–in other words all the stuff that accounts for most of the company’s revenue.

In a statement and blog post, CEO Jonathan Schwartz outlines the rationale:

“The Java brand and technology have evolved to be among the most pervasive on the internet, yielding extraordinary awareness for Sun and opportunity for the community that leverages it. More than a billion people across the globe, representing nearly every demographic, market and industry, rely upon Java’s security, innovation and value to connect them with opportunity. That awareness positions Sun, and now our investor base, for the future.”

All true. But there is one minor detail: Sun doesn’t break out Java revenue. We have no idea how Sun monetizes the technology or makes its quarters with it. Ed Burnette notes that Java is programming heaven, but show us the money.

Sun’s Java spiel is sort of along the lines of its old Webtone pitch in noting that Java is everywhere. Every PC and most embedded systems. Sun adds:

Sun today generates license revenues from Java technology, but more significantly derives revenue from the software, storage, servers, services and microelectronics that power the datacenters behind global Java deployments — whether on handsets, personal computers, or in the network. Sun believes its business is advantaged by such exposure, and the change in ticker symbol more effectively connects it with the marketplace.

In other words, Java is the pulse of Sun. I’d still like to see a Java revenue breakdown though.

August 23rd, 2007

Palm Foleo delayed: Anyone notice?

Posted by Larry Dignan @ 7:47 am

Categories: General, Mobile, Palm

Tags: Palm Inc., Palm Treo, Larry Dignan

Deutsche Bank reports that Palm is delaying the Foleo companion device, which was supposed to hit stores this week. The big question: Does anyone (outside of the three of you that are going to buy one) care?

One issue: The Foleo had trouble working with Palm’s Treo. Go figure. Sounds like a good reason to delay to me: The Foleo is a doorstop without a Treo. Now the Foleo is expected to appear in early September.

In a research note Aug 21, Deutsche Bank analyst Jonathan Goldberg wrote (TechTrader Daily has more):

In a round of checks yesterday we learned that the Palm Foleo will be delayed. The product was supposed to hit Palm stores this week, but was delayed when software bugs were detected. These apparently included an inability to synchronize the Foleo with most models of the Treo, in particular the nominally high-volume Treo 680. Our contacts indicate Palm now expects the device will ship in late September/early October.

Goldberg didn’t sound too broken up about it since the Foleo has no effect on Palm’s financials. The analyst, which rates Palm a “sell,” sounded moderately more optimistic about new Treos and new form factors. But overall, Goldberg said these Treos will “at best keep Palm in the game.” Matthew Miller has also been lukewarm on the Foleo. Matthew adds that the mobile companion category is doomed. David Berlind has been a little more optimistic about the Foleo.

Oppenheimer analyst Lawrence Harris echoed the Deutsche Bank comments, and noted that reviews for Palm’s new device, the Centro, have been mixed. The keyboard is apparently smallish.

August 23rd, 2007

Intuit chock full of moving parts

Posted by Larry Dignan @ 7:23 am

Categories: General, Intuit

Tags: Intuit Inc., Larry Dignan

Intuit reported its fiscal fourth quarter results and detailed more than a few moving parts.

Moving part 1: CEO Steve Bennett is stepping down. Little explanation was given other than he wanted to “take some time off and explore the next challenge in my life.” Worth noting: Bennett has been at the helm for 8 years and given CEOs work on dog years that comes out to be about 56 years for you and me. He posted stellar results while leading Intuit.

Moving part 2: Brad Smith takes over as CEO January 1. Smith is current vice president and general manager of Intuit’s small business unit. 

Moving part 3: Intuit also said it will spend $300 million in capital expenditures in fiscal 2008 with a big chunk of that spending going to new data centers.

As far as the results go, Intuit delivered a solid fourth quarter, generally its weakest. Intuit reported fourth quarter revenue of $432.7 million, up 31 percent, with a net loss of $13.6 million. Those results were better than expected, but the outlook was light relative to estimates. Intuit projected earnings excluding charges of $1.59 a share to $1.61 a share on revenue of $3 billion to $3.05 billion, a sum that would be up 12 percent to 14 percent from 2007.

More reading:

• SeekingAlpha Intuit earnings transcript.
• Intuit takes QuickBooks Enterprise to Linux.
• QuickBooks Enterprise: The forgotten mid-market ERP player.

August 23rd, 2007

Facebook wants to match ads to your digital DNA

Posted by Dan Farber @ 6:52 am

Categories: Facebook, Social networking

Tags: Facebook, Advertisement, DNA, Dan Farber

From the what did you expect department, the Wall Street Journal reports on Facebook developing a targeted ad system, similar to what Google, Yahoo and Microsoft are doing to generate higher pricing and tens of billions in revenue.

The new service would let advertisers visit a Web site to choose a much wider array of characteristics for the users who should see their ads — based not only on age, gender and location, but also on details such as favorite activities and preferred music, people familiar with the matter say. Facebook would use its technology to point the ads to the selected groups of people without exposing their personal information to the advertisers.

These ads would show up differently than the banner ads and boxed flyers that appear on the borders of Facebook pages, say people familiar with the plan. Instead, they would be interspersed with items on the “news feed,” which is a running list of short updates on the activities of a user’s Facebook friends. In addition, the ads would show up on Facebook pages that feature services provided by other companies, one person says.

Facebook has enormous amounts of data about individuals, a kind of digital DNA, as well the social graph, to create profiles that advertisers could bid on in an automated system. The information gathered by Facebook is much richer than what Google and others can gather through search. If you thought that Facebook was unwise to sell out to Yahoo or another company for a few billion, think again.

I’m not sure I want Facebook deeply mining my data and providing it anonymized and clustered to advertisers, or super-targeted, contextual ads embedded in my Facebook news feed. I would expect Facebook to be flexible and offer users and opt-out alternative, perhaps a proxy revenue-per-person-per-year fee to avoid getting inundated with “targeted” ads or “recommendations,” similar to how Amazon personalizes its service for users but with data from a person’s social graph.

August 23rd, 2007

News to know: Insecure security; Windows Live suite; AMD exit

Posted by Larry Dignan @ 2:17 am

Categories: General, News to know

Tags: Security, Google Inc., Microsoft Windows Live, Microsoft Windows, Sales, Advanced Micro Devices Inc., Larry Dignan

Notable headlines:

David Morgenstern: The real question about Mac security. Ryan Naraine: Trend Micro, Zone Labs, ClamAV join list of insecure security products. Richard Stiennon : Not Constantinople. Again!

Mary Jo Foley: Bill Gates seeks patent for ad-rebate program. Windows Live suite debuts … on cell phones.

AMD’s sales chief to leave company
Dan Farber: AMD marketing and sales chief Henri Richard departs.

Jason O’Grady: AT&T simplifies printed iPhone statements. iWork review.

David Berlind: Inside one PC buyer’s mind (aka: A message for Michael Dell, Microsoft and other PC makers).

George Ou: The high definition format wars heat up. Ars Technica: Reasons financial and technical lurk behind Paramount’s HD DVD coup.

Google Earth gazes into deep space. Garett Rogers: Google turns Google Earth into a telescope.
Russell Shaw: As Google Sky debuts, I discover “Google Universe” is taken. Good Morning Silicon Valley: And wait til we launch the Street View rovers. Techmeme. Gallery (right).

Reuters: Intuit names new CEO, reports quarterly loss.

Russell Shaw: Avaya, Cisco, Nortel tech chiefs on enterprise IP telephony apps in the oven. New call center solution unveiled for Skype.

Dennis Howlett: Simplifying the enterprise: the next big thing.

Google’s Mayer talks iPhone, Facebook

Techmeme: The YouTube ad saga.

Dana Blankenhorn: Yahoo buys while Google and open source build. Contradictory trends abound in hospital messaging.

Freakonomics: The Last Word (for Now) on Our RSS Feed: An Excruciatingly Long and Boring Post That Will Please Exactly No One.

Heather Clancy Collins: Sun’s bid to save the planet (or at least make data centers more efficient).

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes: Dell’s problems isn’t down to paint, it’s communication. Larry Dignan: Dell: Fancy laptop colors are harder than they look.

Michael Krigsman: Stop enterprise software hype: send me your stories.

Denise Howell: Changing the way we find, reference, and talk about the law.

Joe McKendrick: SOA folks, call the BI department ASAP.

Matthew Miller: Mail for Exchange adds Tasks synchronization, but still no subfolders.

TheStreet.com: JDSU Profit Rises.

CIO Sessions: John Payne, San Francisco International Airport.

Reuters: Google CEO says mobile auction bid still probable.

Roland Piquepaille: Evanescent lasers to speed up data transmission.

IDC: Chip sales to show middling growth in 2007.

Photos (right): Tech reconnects Peru earthquake victims.

Enterasys aims to secure enterprise VoIP.

Poll: Facebook banned by half of employers

Survey finds increasing uncertainty over offshoring

SharePoint brought in to rescue Aboriginal language