Yet another reason to move to Cloud... A study out this week has found that if companies adopt cloud computing, they can reduce the energy consumption of their IT and save money on energy bills. The report, created by research firm Verdantix and sponsored by AT&T, estimates that cloud computing could enable companies to save $12.3 billion off their energy bills.

Private cloud investment by Enterprise & Public Sector accelerating - will lead investment in Cloud over next 18 months

Not to restate the obvious but most enterprises and government entities are doing little or nothing with public cloud and heavily investing in private cloud initiatives. Two big reasons for this are that 1) IT organizations are able to more effectively articulate a quantifiable business case for deploying a private cloud based on a) increased agility, and b) increases in operational efficiency and staff productivity and 2) security concerns are still a major factor in curbing adoption of public cloud services and implementing hybrid cloud solutions that blend private and public cloud solutions.

A good article by Dave Gaeda provides more detail.

Cisco's Partner Summit in N'awlins!

Getting ready for another great Cisco Partner Summit next week. This year, it's all about the Cloud (isn't everything?) and how Partners can participate in the market transition to "IT as a Service" or "XaaS".

Here's a great "explainer" for those wanting to know more about how Cisco is enabling the benefits of cloud with our partner BMC Software.

Verizon and Cisco team up to bring 4G mobile collaboration to business

- posted from my iPhone

Taking Enterprise Mobility to the next level

http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2011/prod_010511b.html?CMP=AF17154&vs_f=News@Cisco:+Press+Releases+and+Features&vs_p=News@Cisco:+Press+Releases+and+Features&vs_k=1


- posted from my iPhone

Location:Las Vegas

Mobile Visual Collaboration for Business is Here! Cisco's New CIUS Tablet

Time to buckle your seatbelts everyone! The much anticipated mobile visual collaboration CIUS platform has arrived! The Market Transition to the Mobile Enterprise is shifting into overdrive with this new product that enables mobile HD Video Conferencing anywhere.

This announcement is significant in many respects. First, this platform allows companies to use this tablet for all communications (voice, video, email, IM, etc.); providing a bigger screen for visual collaboration and allowing workers to stay connected wherever they are. Businesses can start cutting back on investments in wireline phones as this is the only device you'll need! At the office, the device uses low cost, high bandwidth WiFi, while on the road, will use 3G or 4G connectivity.

Great addition to the many announcements we've heard this past month that are fueling the transition to a mobile workspace!

One step closer to Broadband Internet as a Public Utility

A federal court ruled that the FCC lacks the authority to require broadband providers to give equal treatment to all Internet traffic flowing over their networks.

While this is a blow to fans of Network Neutrality, and a short term win for the CableCos and Telcos providing broadband internet services, it's causing the government and FCC to rethink its strategy including acceleration of broadband as a regulated utility. With the belief that its every American Citizen's right to cost effective broadband internet, I believe we're only 5 short years away from "$75 for 100M broadband internet"; provided as a tariffed service with today's service providers reinventing themselves, creating new an innovative services riding on top of this infrastructure.

At the end of the day, this is very good news for business and consumers, its not such good news for service providers that don't "make the turn"; changing their service portfolios and revenue mix to favor value added services in lieu of commodity broadband internet network services.

...en route back from VoiceCon 2010

Coming back from a great VoieCon show. This is definitely the year of "Visual Collaboration" with new innovations coming from Cisco and many others.

Three breakthrough solution areas that are poised to be "game & fame" changers in 2010 are: 1) inter-company video conf & telepresence (in the office, for teleworkers, and on the road), 2) next gen Customer Collaboration centers - aka "contact centers" or "call centers", and 3) Enterprise Social Networking - think of Facebook + Web Conferencing + Team Workspaces.

Check out the VoiceCon site for the recap:
www.voicecon.com/Orlando

Location:Orlando, FL

Inter-Company Visual Collaboration: At the Tipping Point...

Finally! The market conditions have come together to rapidly accelerate broad adoption of inter-company visual collaboration! Everyone in our industry has discussed benefits of inter-company collaboration (unified communications <=> videophones <=> desktop video conferencing <=> web conferencing <=> Telepresence) but implementations have been limited to "early adopters" and "C-suites" of the Fortune 500.

Although announced in November 2009, Cisco made a splash yesterday as it re-announced its Intercompany Media Engine which gives people business-to-business communications capabilities over any IP network. It’s a new solution that enables boundary-less communications between organizations, including business partners, customers, and suppliers. The idea is to make communications between separate companies and organizations as effortless as it is within a single organization.

With the Intercompany Media Engine, communications travel over an IP network or the Internet, but you use the phones you are already using, the numbers you are already dialing, and the contact lists you have already entered. It doesn’t even matter whether you’re working within or outside of your company. The ease, efficiency, and overall experience of communicating with each other will be exactly the same.

One important benefit of the Intercompany Media Engine is reduced costs. Instead of using the PSTN, the communications path for business to business communications is going to be an IP network or the internet. Because you are using more efficient IP network connections, you can potentially reduce the number of PSTN connections you need.

The relevance of Intercompany Media Engine cannot be understated. IME is positioned to be a "Force Multiplier" in accelerating InterCompany Visual Collaboration which service providers are counting on to drive demand of QoS enabled premium IP network services.

Visual collaboration, after years of constant challenges, became a technology that businesses regarded as difficult and unlikely to be used on regular basis. However, a perfect storm of technological, economic, and environmental developments has brought visual collaboration to the forefront again. To capitalize on this prospect, vendors should be aware of their customers’ applications and requirements in order to develop products, which fulfill clients’ needs. They should also focus on leveraging relationships with strategic channel partners who are successful in providing visual collaboration equipment.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan, World Visual Collaboration Managed Services Markets, finds that the market earned revenues of $82.7 million in 2008 and estimates this to reach $938.3 million in 2015, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 162%.

“A driver that is most likely to contribute to the growth of the visual collaboration market is the reduction of travel required by a company,” notes Frost & Sullivan Research Analyst Iwona Petruczynik. “This can create significant cuts in business costs and help improve productivity levels; employees can conduct their businesses without the need to meet face-to-face with their clients or partners. New models offered by service providers that do not require up-front capital expenditure (CAPEX) by customers are also adding to the widespread adoption of visual collaboration services globally.”

In addition to Cisco, more storm clouds are on the horizon as Avaya, Skype, and others are rumored to be releasing similar solutions soon. The democratization of visual collaboration - I'm a very happy camper indeed! :)

Consumer Led Market Transitions: Innovations powering mobile and video

“5 Innovations, Implications, and Imperatives from the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show”

1)Skype ushers in Consumer Telepresence

Innovation: Simple and Free Consumer video conferencing

Implications: Conditions the “masses” with easy to use video conferencing from the couch,
The video collaboration market transition has just been accelerated

Imperatives : Accelerates the innovation mandate of both SPs and vendors that sell to them;
It also places a governor on SPs pricing HD video conferencing too high

Interesting: Skype debuted their service with the #2 player from Japan (Panasonic) and
#2 from Korea (LG)

Yikes! as a proof point of Skype mindshare, they called Cisco’s consumer TP a
“super-powered Skype”

2)Mobile Video Conferencing (demonstrated by Intel CEO in keynote)

Innovation: Mobile Video Conferencing

Implications: Increases adoption of video conferencing and expectations of VC service from SPs. Will drive demand for “pro-sumer” svc (integrated, “dual personality”; professional & consumer)

Imperatives: SPs must invest in the capabilities to deliver real time, “wired to wireless”, rich media services. Must develop “inter-cloud “ strategy that includes wireless, content, communities.

Interesting:The Dick Tracy impersonator had a watch that worked! …Valentines Day is coming up!

3)3D HD TVs with Broadband Internet

Innovation: 3D HD TVs with Broadband Internet; enabling Web Collaboration w/video over 50” HD TVs

Implications: With the ability to hold multi-point, HD video web collaboration meetings over the internet, from
your living room, SPs need to rethink their strategies for monetizing residential FTTH services.

Imperatives: SPs need to consider partnerships with web collaboration providers, bundling services,
and integrating social networking (e.g. via partnership with LinkedIn or Facebook)

●

4)Managed Desktop Services powered by LG’s Network Connect; 31 users, 1 PC!

Innovation: LG announces Network Computer; 1 PC supporting 31 users (with monitor and keyboard only)

Implications: Accelerates the adoption of managed desktop services. This platform mitigates many risks
that challenge managed desktop profitability. High relevance in customer care, education,
and government.

Imperatives : Service Providers need to evaluate how best to meet their customers demand for managed
desktop

5)Touch Screen HD TVs with Broadband Internet & embedded hard drive

Innovation: Sony (and others) introduces TouchScreen HDTV with Internet

Implications: Improves the economics of Digital Media Signage which will in turn accelerate market adoption.
The economics improve further when you add the fact that these TVs can also
enable Internet Video Conferencing… your on-demand shopping consultant coming soon!

Imperatives : Service Providers need to invest now in a full suite of InterCompany Video Collaboration services.

Telecom Italia: Profile of Innovating and Leading in Managed Services

Successfully navigating through the economic downturn requires the right strategies, the right investments, and the right partnerships. During a recent visit to Cisco’s San Jose Executive Briefing Center, Telecom Italia‘s senior leadership team shares how they are using this downturn to introduce new managed services and new business models to better serve the Small and Medium business segment and win market share.

Key to Telecom Italia’s success is their partnership with Cisco. Over the past several years, Cisco has helped Telecom Italia design and implement their “Impresa Semplice” managed service portfolio that provides SMBs with services including: managed LAN, managed VPN, managed firewall, and managed unified communications. In this video, Telecom Italia shares their perspective on the market, key success factors, and the power of partnerships to accelerate innovation.

http://bit.ly/5dDDI8

Howcast Video Bar

More how to videos and guides at Howcast.com

How-to Videos from Howcast.com

More how to videos and guides at Howcast.com

A bigger sail for partners to navigate the "Perfect Storm"

Cisco has added to its "Navigate to Accelerate" partner enablement arsenal with a series of announcements this week in Boston; less than an hour's drive from Gloucester, MA (where the Andrea Gail and Billy Tyne's ill-fated crew departed for the final time in 1991, inspiring 2007's "Perfect Storm").

The "Perfect Storm" for managed services adoption is well underway (fueled by technology enabling "clouds", the worst economy in 25 years keeping business "underwater", and many providers trying to offer their customers a "lifeboat" with new service pricing models). At the eye of this storm is Data Center Virtualization and the business benefits it will bring (efficiency, scaling, reliability, and new service time to market).

Among the announcements Cisco has made this week are new channel programs to expand its expanding data center partner channel:

Key Take-aways:

* To motivate channel partners to invest in building a unified data center practice, Cisco has expanded its existing Value Incentive Program (VIP) offering for all of Cisco's data center technologies, including unified computing, storage networking, and WAN optimization, as well as for its existing offering for data center switching. VIP is Cisco's flagship profitability program that rewards partners for investing in architecture practices around collaboration, data center virtualization and borderless networks.
* Cisco also announced the new Data Center Channel Solutions Program, designed to help enable and accelerate the sale of tested, validated reference IT solution designs that incorporate products from industry-leading data center vendors, including EMC, Microsoft, NetApp, Red Hat, and VMware.
* Cisco today announced it is opening the Unified Computing opportunity to a broader range of its channel partner community. Cisco is announcing an Authorized Partner Program (APP) to support the new Unified Computing C-Series Rack-Mount Servers. All Cisco DCNI Specialized Partners will be able to sell the new rack-mount servers after completing online training and exam from Cisco.
* The Cisco Advanced Data Center Network Infrastructure Specialization (DCNI) is the fastest-ramping specialization in Cisco's history. Despite the economic downturn, partners have rapidly invested in the specialization since its launch a year ago because of its strategic significance to their business.

More good things to come...

Prepare for the upturn, focus on Talent Development

With the latest Federal employment report just in, The U.S. is inching it's way toward 9% unemployment and 6 million jobs lost since November 2007. And while Fed Chairman Bernanke says that we should see improvement in the economy by the end of this year, he also said that job losses will continue. Estimates have the U.S. inching past 10% unemployment by the end of 2009.

Business is down, but most business leaders plan to lead a recovery that is powered by improved employee productivity coming from increased use of technology, collaboration solutions, training, and talent management tools. I've spoken with several business leaders who are expecting revenues in calendar 2009 to be flat to modestly higher than 2008; this after they've laid off 6-10% of their workforce. This mandate for increased employee productivity has proved to be a boon for solutions vendors selling web conferencing & collaboration solutions, teleworking solutions, and training & talent management solutions.

As we all know, in a recession, people managers are tested. Employees are disillusioned, demotivated, and scared. One strategy to ensuring your employees stay engaged and committed, is to invest in your people and their professional development. So, how do you do this in a tough economy with increasingly slim budgets?

You buy training and talent management solutions "on-demand" from companies such as Taleo, SuccessFactors, or Cisco/WebEx.

Some good perspectives on Taleo's blogsite

CIO Top of Mind: 1) Virtualization, 2) Collaboration, 3) How am I going to get #1 and #2 done?

According to a recent study by Network Instruments, three quarters of companies will have invested in virtualization and unified communications by the end of the year, despite the worst economic downturn since World War II. The biggest drivers behind this projection are the perceived cost savings and quick return on investments.

Susan Campbell of TMCNet summarizes saying: While this news is positive for this industry, the study also determined that some companies are not adequately prepared. In fact, 75 percent of the organizations that are rushing to roll out new network technologies do not have the tools and visibility necessary to monitor and troubleshoot performance problems.

This comprehensive study included nearly 450 CIOs, network engineers and IT managers throughout the world. It also explored the economy’s impact on virtualization and unified communications in addition to primary challenges in managing these technologies.

Key findings from the study highlight that more than half of all applications will run on virtual machines by 2011; companies deploying video conferencing solutions will double by 2010; 65 percent of network teams have not experienced layoffs and do not expect to in the near future; more than half of the surveyed companies lacked the appropriate tools or visibility into virtual environments; 80 percent struggle with identifying the problem source as their primary troubleshooting challenge; and 45 percent view virtualization as the greatest emerging monitoring challenge.

"While organizations have the right idea investing in technologies that reduce corporate expenses and improve productivity, they're failing to invest in appropriate monitoring tools," said Charles Thompson, product manager of Network Instruments, in a Monday statement. "This will actually create larger problems that can halt business processes and cause network teams to waste countless hours troubleshooting."

This is where partnering with a trusted managed service provider comes in. To get the job done, companies both large and small are turning to managed service providers to purchase: unified communications and collaboration "as a service" as well as virtualized infrastructure (virtual data center, virtual private clouds, storage as a service, compute as a service). I had an opportunity to participate on a webcast with the Kirk Laughlin of Information Week "Catching the Managed Collaboration Services Wave" where we discuss the business drivers fueling adoption of managed and hosted collaboration services. We also discuss how Cisco is uniquely enabling its managed service providers to "envision, build, market, and sell" managed services. To find a global list of the industry's leading "Cisco Powered" managed service providers, see the Cisco Powered Search tool: www.cisco.com/go/cpn. View the webcast and let me know your thoughts.

With regard to virtualization, as 75 percent of organizations have virtual network environments, the majority are running less than 25 percent of applications on virtual machines. This is expected to rapidly increase over the next two years. Yet as the majority of companies still cite monitoring in such an environment as a critical challenge, vendors will need to address this challenge and turn it into a market opportunity.

The study also found that the majority of companies will implement some form of unified communications within the next 12 months. More than half will have deployed video conferencing and unified messaging by 2010.

The Managed Collaboration and Virtualization Gold Rush is on!

Collaboration - empowering the new "Unified Workplace"

Today's business climate is being shaped by a number of forces that are driving an increasing need for all of us to "collaborate across distances"; collaboration that harnesses the power of technology to bring people together in high quality virtual environments to speed decision making innovation, and provide better customer serivce.

From financial issues to societal, business needs to do more with less. Business needs to achieve more with less resources; to have more customer interaction, more partner interaction, and keep employees connected while on the road. The "net is that we must use technology more effectively to increase collaboration between employees, partners, and customers. We must use technology to scale scarce resources, to expand globally, and to gain the most benefit from our human resources. The challenge for most businesses is how to harness the power of technology to increase collaboration when most IT departments are challenged to keep up with increasing demands.

In response to this challenge, many IT leaders are turning to managed collaboration service providers to help them get the job done. Cisco has invested in a a program named the "Cisco Powered Program" to help business decision makers easily find the industry's leading managed service providers. Verizon was just awarded TMC's Unified Communications and Collaboration service of the year; I encourage all to take a look at their service offerings to explore how they can take your business forward.

Facebook: enabling a "collaboration bridge" between our personal & work lives

As the saying goes, "if you want to predict the future of business IT and Communications, look at the younger workforce to steer your thinking in the right direction". Indeed, the "Millenial" generation has shepherded in new social networking technologies that are changing how business gets done.

When Zuckerman founded Facebook from his dorm room at Harvard, he was thinking of a safe and scalable way to bring communities of friends and like minded people together, to share likes, dislikes, and provide an unobtrusive way to share and learn more about one another (by viewing photos, personal information, comments and updates).

I don't think that Zuckerman was thinking about fundamentaly changing the way that global corporations would collaborate with each other, share ideas, innovate together, and stay conneected to virtual teams. With the "Millenial" generation streaming into the workforce over the past 5 years, they've brought new perspectives and culture with them; a culture of openness and transparancy, a willingness to collaborate to solve problems as a team ("crowdsourcing"), and a comfort level with being connected 24x7 and accessible, virtually, whenever and wherever you are.

The popularity of Facebook has exploded in popularity as the place to connect with friends. As the pressures of a fast paced society have integrated our personal and business lives, so Facebook has followed suit; adding new business features (e.g. Facebook Connect) that allow facebook users to make facebook their "one stop shop" for personal and business.

In their 2007 book, Junco and Mastrodicasa expanded on the work of Howe and Strauss to include research-based information about the personality profiles of Millennials, especially as it relates to higher education. They conducted a large-sample (7,705) research study of college students. They found that Net.Generation college students were frequently in touch with their parents and they used technology at higher rates than people from other generations. In their survey, they found that 97% of students owned a computer, 94% owned a cell phone, and 56% owned an MP3 player (iPod, Zune, Sansa, etc.). They also found that students spoke with their parents an average of 1.5 times a day about a wide range of topics.[10] Other findings in the Junco and Mastrodicasa survey included that 76% of students used Instant messaging, and 92% of those reported multitasking while IMing, and 40% of students used television to get most of their news and 34% the Internet.

According to a study by Junco and Mastrodicasa, 69% of "Millenials" reported having a Facebook account, typically logging in twice a day. Since this time traffic has grown from approx 7M account holders to 100M.

Facebook's original rapid growth was in the U.S. but has expanded globally at a much faster clip. Facebook is wielding incredible bargaining power with advertisers having over 100M subscribers to date.

The end game? I'm guessing that we have a good chance that Facebook will replace Google and the "search engine paradigm" as the internet users "watering hole". The new "waterhole" being online communities of interest.

Collaborating from a Distance: The Business Value of Teleworking

When gas prices surged to $5 last summer, something happened. Managers everywhere began embracing teleworking to help alleviate some of the pain inflicted at the pump. Often talked about, few managers openly promoted teleworking as an option. Now, deep into a recession, managers have come to realize that for your more senior talent, teleworking not only raises productivity, but also raises morale.

Much earlier in my career, I had a manager say that he wanted to see everyone in the office to make sure he understood what everyone was doing. He said that his style was to "manage by walking around". During a quarterly meeting, we had one of our senior leaders fly in for this meeting. Somebody asked him if he was supportive of teleworking and hiring talent that was not based on the same city as our office. His response was very clear - "If you want to rise in the company, you need to learn how to work from a distance and manage from a distance. The higher up you go, the more your direct reports will live in other cities."

Increasingly, companies are empowering their employees to telework. Enabled with Instant Messaging & "Presence" which allows you to see the availability of your employees at any time, managers feel more comfortable "letting go". What we've come to see over the past few years is that doing so, pays off in spades. Productivity increases of 10-20% are the norm with the added benefit of higher employee morale and loyalty. In a challenging economy when you can't afford to give raises and promotions, allowing people to telework 1-2 days a week, gives them more autonomy in how and when they get the job done. Having the ability to go for a run at lunch, wash your clothes in the middle of the day, or pick your child up from school at 3pm is a real benefit to your most prized assets - your people.

This week's "Trendwatcher" (Institute for Corporate Productivity), sites some great statistics supporting teleworking including research from the non-profit, Telework Coalition, that has found sizable productivity rises within the U.S. and abroad. Two of the findings are:

* Productivity increased 31% among the 9,000 telecommuters employed by British Telecom.
* At JD Edwards, telecommuters are 20% to 25% more productive than office workers (All, 2008).

Some experts say that telecommuting, especially in customer service jobs, will likely broaden and expand in the future. This growth is fueled by solutions such as Cisco's Unified Contact Center, which allows companies to deploy a "virtual contact center" and take customer calls, emails, or chat sessions from home. Not only does it give companies the ability to offer flexible work arrangements for their employees it also allows them to tap talent wherever they are in the world.

Nancy Gofus of Verizon offers some compelling reasons for adopting a teleworking program including: raising employee productivity, savings real estate costs, and going "green". Listen to her podcast.

Collaboration - Goes Mobile!

Well, what we've all been waiting for has arrived. The ability to leave a Web Conferencing session at your desk, transfer it to your mobile phone and continue the session while on the move. When you consider that 35% of mobile calls are made in transit, having the ability to take full featured web conferencing sessions (with voice and slides) has tremendous value in keeping employees productive while on the move.

At last week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Cisco-WebEx announced the ability to support mobile collaboration on the iPhone, RIM/Blackberry, and Nokia N60. Functionality includes the ability to transfer sessions in progress from your desk computer to your mobile and vice-versa. To increase the safety of users taking a web conference call from the road, Cisco has added a new "one click to join" feature. Several minutes before a scheduled call, WebEx will trigger the "one click" feature allowing the user to press one button and be connected to his full feature web-conference.