On Robustness And Resiliency – Part 1
When you talk about cloud computing with the enterprises and tell them how cloud requires a different approach to designing applications, I get the biggest pushback from them. Since most of the large enterprises are used to the idea that expensive and powerful hardware that seldom fails is the only way to build robustness into [...]
Microsoft’s Cloud OS Play–A Logical Converged Cloud Offering
A week or two ago, Microsoft made a slew of announcements all aimed at creating a consistent story around hybrid cloud services. It’s a compelling product launch, and one which, frankly, takes Microsoft which was only a year or two ago one of the key whipping boys for the cloud cognoscenti, to a place of [...]
Tier 1 VC is Great. But More Money May Be Even Better.
One thing you hear a lot is how great it is to get a Quality VC into your company. Take Quality Money, at a lower price, they say, over Crummier Money at a higher price. Certainly, there’s a lot of truth in this. The last thing you want is an investor that isn’t up for [...]
PaaS and Mobile Enterprise – Real Conversations with Customers
One of the benefits of working on cutting edge technology like PaaS is that I get to have conversations with enterprise customers about the transformations that PaaS will bring. Increasingly, I’m seeing lots of interest in the intersection of PaaS and mobile enterprise (yeah, it’s not just an attempt by me to put together two buzzwords!). [...]
How To Know You’ve Hit First Traction In SaaS. The Moment When You’ve Got A Real Company.
There’s a common meme in Venture Capital that traction is tough to quantify, but you know it when you see it. Well, let’s take a stab at it anyway. Quantifying it. Because I don’t think Initial Traction is at all nebulous in SaaS — and I think it occurs earlier than many think. Here’s a [...]
On the Ethic of Delivery – Required Watching
Over the past few years I’ve been a kind of informal adviser to the Defrag event. The role is less than onerous, Eric Norlin totally understands what his participants (and at defrag, attendees really are participants and not simply an audience) most want to see. Defrag has always been a
SAP and SuccessFactors – Four Key topics I Want to Hear About at HR2013
The 10th Annual SAP HR2013 Conference will be in Las Vegas from February 26 to March 1 and it is regularly considered the premierevent for SAP HCM Professionals, consultants and customers. There are more than 110 in-depth educational sessions, ask the expert workshops, customer workshops, networking events and live demos by SAP and SuccessFactors. I will be attending [...]
The Multi-Screen Employee Experience
Multi-screen experiences are crucial but they aren’t just for the consumer that has his tablet open while watching TV. The multi-screen experience is just as important for employees within organizations and is a necessity for the future of work. Let’s take at a realistic scenario: Tina wakes up in the morning to check her email on [...]
New Meme: Business Users Are The IT
For the past two years, I have been advocating PaaS as the future of cloud services and how developers are the face of the IT in the PaaS era. I have long argued that as PaaS takes over the IT infrastructure in the organizations, we will see a shift in who holds the key to [...]
SaaStr on TechCrunch! The M&A “Nibble” And What To Do When You Get One
Hopefully, you saw us last weekend on TechCrunch. We’re trying to do our small part and hopefully save you a few headaches and mistakes as you scale your SaaS start-up from $0 to Initial Traction to $10m in ARR, $20m in ARR, and beyond. We’re glad — on a good day — to get as [...]
A Conversation on Cloud Computing, PaaS, Distributed Systems & Marketing Message Cleanups…
This video is a discussion between Ben Kepes @benkepes, Clive Boulton @ic, Rakesh Malhotra @rakeshm and Sam Johnston @samj. We tackle recent cloud computing trends, PaaS, distributed systems and cleaning up messaging around the mess marketing has made of “cloud”. Cloud Computing, PaaS, Distributed Systems and Cleaning the Marketing Mess from Adron Hall on Vimeo. [...]
A Post Startup Execs Should Forward to Your Spouse or Partner. 12 Tips for Making it Work
I recently wrote a post about how to manage relationships when you’re at a startup or are busy executive. It was based on an excellent book I had just read by Brad Feld & Amy Batchelor (his wife). I had images in my brain of all of the stresses I had placed on my wife [...]
Enterprise Connect and Innovation Showcase
Coming up is the Enterprise Connect Conference (March)- unquestionably the biggest UC event of the year. The conference, used to go by the name VoiceCon, takes place every Spring at the Gaylord Palms Hotel in Orlando. The conference is put on by TechWeb, the same masters of conversation behind NoJitter.com. I typically don’t leave the hotel [...]
Kim Dot Com’s new Mega site has XSS Security Holes
Any new site, not just Mega is going to have security holes, and reports have surfaced in Twitter, Reddit, and over on ZDNet that Mega has a couple of persistent XSS security holes that are going to make users days a little bit harder. Beyond the crypto issues that you can read on ZDNet, persistent [...]
SAP Business Suite on HANA, Because Big Data is a Stupid Term
I spent a lot of time last year talking with vendors about big data and it’s ramifications for both the tech industry and the economy at large. Often these conversations centered around one or another vendor’s use of the big data term as the buzzword de jour, regardless of whether anything they do even vaguely [...]
