Suite vs Best of Breed – Let the Battle Begin (Yet Again)
A month or so ago I sat in a room with a small group of bloggers discussing the enterprise software space with NetSuite CEO Zach Nelson and one sentence he said stuck in my mind: The same was is playing out in this space all over again. And just like last time, the suite’s will [...]
The Skinny on Google's New SMB Application Marketplace
Last week I speculated to some impending announcements from Google about application stores specifically tailored to the small and medium business market. Well, readers didn’t have to wait long, Google has just launched what is essentially an SMB application marketplace – A place where (they hope) customers will discover, purchase and deploy integrated third party [...]
Implementing Enterpise 2.0 at Vistaprint Part Three: Operational Impact
This is part three in a series of four posts on how Vistaprint has been implementing Enterprise 2.0 at their organization. Today we continue the discussion with more information on change management followed by a focus on the ideation work. There were two key organizational changes that happened as a result of their E2.0 implementation [...]
Google, Intuit and App Stores – Tying it Together for the 96%-ers
As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m on the advisory board for Glue conference in Denver in May. I’m also moderating one or two sessions. One session in particular has me really excited. My background is small business – as readers will know, I own and run a handful of small businesses in varied industries and so [...]
The Entrepreneur Thesis
I was going to save this post for a while but the Patzer Problem meme has forced my hand. I have a philosophy. A thesis. I call it the entrepreneur thesis. I’m not talk about the age old debate amongst investors whether you back entrepreneurs, markets or products (or as people like to hedge – [...]
Company.com – It’s All About Community
I’m an advocate for small and medium businesses (SMBs) – coming from a SMB background I’m all to aware of the difficulties that those at the bottom of the foodchain experience. I’ve long been involved in business advisory roles and was part of a team that set up a SMB online community a couple of [...]
Online Finance – Rigid Segmentation Doesn’t Work
Recently ReadWriteWeb started a series taking a very high level look at online finance. One of the posts discussed the evolving online finance ecosystem. In the post, RWW editor Richard MacManus interviewed CEO of Xero (see disclosure), Rod Drury and repeated Drury’s assertion that online finance can be separated into four distinct types of markets: [...]
Intuit and Microsoft Sign Deal to Serve SMBs
Huge breaking news this morning is that Microsoft and Intuit (see disclosure here) have agreed to work together on the Intuit Partner Platform to bring a host of products and services to a greatly expanded customer base. This really is massive news for anyone involved in small or medium business – be it as a [...]
SaaS, Accounting, Microsoft Money and Hyperbole.
Over on Accounting Web, a right royal stoush was started when Aqilla’s Hugh Scantlebury wrote an op ed piece opining what the withdrawal of Microsoft’s Office Accounting product means and, more importantly, what is behind the move. For those who need the history, Microsoft discontinued its Office Accounting product line, having determined that; existing free [...]
Software+Services…. Intuit Bets that Desktop Software Ain’t Dead Yet
Considering CloudAve’s core thesis is the move to cloud computing, and given this authors penchant for cloud applications, one would have thought any development in the desktop software space would be dismissed. The truth is somewhat different however. I’m a major user of web apps but I’ve also got installed software on my machines – [...]
21 Million Reasons For Mint To Sell
When I heard about Mint’s sale to Intuit for $170 million, I never imagined that it would be controversial. I posted my congratulations to the friends who made money in the deal, and moved on. It’s been a busy week, and I haven’t been keeping up with Twitter and RSS, so imagine my surprise to [...]
What’s Wrong with Flipping a Startup for $170M?
Nothing, IMHO. But there’s a new debate on whether the Mint / Intuit deal was a good deal, or selling short-sightedly. I’m with Eric @CloudAve and Sarah @ TechCrunch in their call to “move past this incrementalism and start thinking big” – they just use Mint as a trigger to a good thought process. But [...]
MinTuit: a Second Look. (You Will Be Assimilated).
TechCrunch50 could not have asked for a better start: they get to announce that personal finance startup Mint winner of the $50K grand prize @ TC50 two years ago just got acquired for $170M. Great exit for a startup – not so sure about concerned users. But the big question today is why it made [...]
IntuMint – What an Intuit Owned Mint Could Mean
Image via CrunchBase Wow… exciting. Eagle eyed CloudAve stalwart Krishnan posted about the reported purchase of Mint.com by Intuit (disclosure – the Intuit Partner Platform is a consulting client but I had absolutely no previous knowledge of this deal nor any insight into Intuit’s plans). Many of us in the SaaS and personal/business finance software [...]
Breaking News: Intuit To Acquire Mint
Techcrunch is reporting that Intuit (Previous Cloud Ave coverage of Intuit can be found here, here, here and here), the company that offers financial and accounting SaaS solutions to Small Businesses, is acquiring the personal finance service Mint (Previous Cloud Ave coverage of Mint can be found here and here) for $170 Million. Launched in [...]
