SAP Pushes Business-in-the-moment Strategy
At the Sapphire Now 2011 conference today, SAP attempted to outline a four-year plan through which it hopes to transform the way business is conducted by combining inexpensive in-memory analytics applications that will be accessible from almost any mobile computing device connected to multiple cloud computing services.
Multinationals show growing interest in cloud computing, survey reveals
Multinational corporations have significantly increased their take-up of cloud services over the past year, research by analyst firm Ovum reveals.
Some 45% of multinationals are using cloud for at least some elements of their IT services, up from 24% in 2010, according to a survey of 110 multinationals.
Two-thirds of businesses using cloud computing are seeing the benefit
Two-thirds of businesses in the Asia-Pacific region, including New Zealand and Australia, which have adopted cloud computing, say they are already reaping the benefits of the system.
A survey by AMD found that 67 per cent of companies which use systems including on demand cloud computing solutions have seen business value already, and more than half (54 per cent) believe they have seen greater efficiency since adopting the cloud.
Finance and accounting were the most commonly used applications, the survey found.
A guide to ensuring your security in the cloud
Everyone’s talking about cloud computing these days. However, there is a significant security risk that increases with the explosion of cloud computing adoption and could easily burst the bubble of the hype – leaving businesses and their suppliers without the silver lining they expected.
Cloud computing, SaaS, PaaS, IaaS … just choose your terminology, the one thing they have in common is they make applications or infrastructure available on an as-needed basis.
Why DoD Wants Cloud Computing
Over the past couple of weeks, I have been engaged in a series of discussions that have really highlighted to me the critical issue around why our defense and intelligence agencies are moving so quickly to adopt cloud computing. While the easy answer focuses on cost savings and higher efficiency, the most important explanation is grounded squarely in our need to exploit information faster than our adversaries. Please let me explain.
Information is often the decisive discriminator in modern conflict. Studies of recent mission failures highlighted this fact finding that many of these failures were caused by:
Validating your contact data may help to improve customer service
Businesses around New Zealand are reeling from the news that at least 60 per cent of consumers have had poor experiences in dealing with companies in recent years, with many considering businesses to be nothing more than a necessary evil.
The news has sparked many companies into worrying about how to improve their customer service so they are on the right side of this statistic, NZ Herald reported.
Dick Brunton, the co-founder of market research company Colmar Brunton, told the news provider that customer service should come from the heart.
Watching Social Networks for Clues about Promotions
Before people began making their lives public on social networks, retailers had to figure out their likes more indirectly. Companies like Oracle and Siebel provided huge database programs that analyzed individual sales and consumer demographics in search of patterns that might lead to more sales—say, by targeting groups of customers who might be likely to respond to special offers. But the retailers couldn’t directly observe the connections between individual consumers, or watch them chat online with each other about products.
Bring on the Hybrids: CIOs Make Staffing Shifts
Like writers at most technology trade publications, I and my colleagues here at IT Business Edge tend to focus on in-demand technical skills when we write about IT careers. While the right kinds of technical skills can certainly land folks a job (mobile development, anyone?), employers are increasingly looking for a somewhat fuzzier blend of IT and business skills.
SuiteWorld 2011: Manufacturers explain benefits of cloud applications
Manufacturers are using NetSuite’s on-demand enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems to cut IT costs and grow business. Jenny Williams reports.
During this week’s NetSuite SuiteWorld 2011 conference, several companies explained why they switched to NetSuite from Salesforce.com and Microsoft Dynamics.
Good data quality could help you keep customers
s a survey shows that consumers in New Zealand are not afraid to take their service elsewhere if they have a bad customer experience, businesses should be thinking of ways to improve their service.
The iStart Customer Experience Survey showed that 80 per cent of people would withdraw loyalty from a company following a bad experience, and three-quarters of customers would tell at least one friend about their bad experience.