A trip to the Mecca of Technology

I was recently invited to the annual sales kickoff of our GIVP winner Embarcadero in San Francisco and Silicon Valley.  I saw this. Truly awesome, I think the quote was "catch him whilst he's around".

Embarcadero won the 2011 GIVP award for Appwave .  Appwave is an incredibly innovative offering for a business application store which is very much of the moment.  Tapping into the whole consumerist ion of IT, mobility and socialisation themes this is very much something that is going to happen for businesses it's just a question of how and when.

Old ones are the best ones

Switching tack slightly, one of amazing insights I took from the event was that with their Rad xe2 Studio product they are generating over 50% year on year growth.  That is unprecedented in the software world when I tell you that the original source code is over 17 years old.  If any knows of products that have had similar experiences and metrics both inside and outside the technology world I would love to hear from you.

Lastly one of big learnings of the event was about something called FireMonkey. I'm getting a little off my technology comfort zone but an innovative complier that enables you to use the same source code for windows and IOs. Two for the price of one. Not bad, in this austere times. That is something well worth checking out.

Business App Stores - the way forward

Consumerisation of IT is impacting our business and that of our clients. It feels like a seismic shift. Initiatives like 100% mobility and BYOT – Bring Your Own Technology change the way we experience technology. The development of Enterprise Application Stores (EAS) is a new challenge. Business’s move to providing their software applications in a way that is similar to the iPhone App store or Google’s Android market.

Can that help to drive productivity?

I recently was involved in a roundtable discussion with our GIVP winner Embarcadero and Ovum . Enterprise app store are vital in moving organisations to a self service model that reduces complexity. It also helps to avoid delays in getting applications to end users.

Listen to this podcast in your own time but here is what we explored during the discussion. Enterprise app stores are quickly creating productivity and speed-to-value benefits for PC users and IT departments alike.

The debate kicked the tyres on steps businesses can take to build and develop their own enterprise app stores for mainstream use as well as examining what rapid and easy access to self-service apps on PCs and notebook computers through such app stores is doing for businesses.

Mobile devices like smartphones and tablets are very popular and have energised users on one hand. On the other hand, it’s caused IT and business leaders to scramble to adjust to new models of applications delivery.

21 century at home, 1995 at work?

App stores for me are part of the equation going forward. Why? The answers they can bring in ease of use and cost savings are high. Getting there tackles our mismatch between what people experience with their smart technology at home and what they find at work. To quote a good friend: “people come to work in the 21st century when they start work the majority step back to 1995.” Is this you and how long can you go on living in another century?