A recent commentary calls the Microsoft Surface tablet a “misunderstood jewel.” Its value, the argument goes, lies not in being a major market competitor to the iPad, but in its potential as a powerhouse machine for enterprise use. As it seems clear it won’t really be giving Apple a run for its money anytime soon, focusing the Surface’s marketing and application in the enterprise sphere might be the best thing Microsoft can do right now, positioning its greatest strengths alongside one of its flagship devices. And the company should do so especially if it wants to see the Surface stick somewhere.
What major trends are changing the nature of the enterprise environment?
This question is constantly floated among technologists and industry experts, always looking ahead to what the workplace will look like in the next year, five years, and so on. Ars Technica recently made its definitive list, including:
- Moving mobile beyond the poor PC substitute
- The transformation of the “app”
- The social enterprise
- The IT department as integrator
We recently discussed the changing role of IT on the blog, and the other points listed are hot topics that come up often in tech industry speculation. The merits and reasoning behind each are sound.
Which do you think will have the biggest impact on the enterprise?
Predicting the future is hard, especially when you have an installed base to consider. But it’s not hard to identify the economic, technological, and cultural forces that are converging right now to shape the future of enterprise IT in the short term. We’re not entering a “post-PC” era in IT—we’re entering an era where the device we use to access applications and information is almost irrelevant. Nearly everything we do as employees or customers will be instrumented, analyzed, and aggregated.
A recent article purports that “With Nokia, Microsoft has no more excuses.” It has all the pieces it needs now to succeed or to fail. We found this assessment quite compelling. Microsoft is not going to become a “Devices and Services” company overnight. It takes a long time for a ship the size of Microsoft (and even bigger with Nokia now in tow) to correct course once the rudder is moved. Between the company’s massive “One Microsoft” reorganization, the eventually “retirement” of CEO Steve Ballmer, the integration of Nokia and the naming of a new CEO, Microsoft is going to be in a state of flux for the foreseeable future.
There are some things Microsoft is doing very right.
Since the news on August 23 that Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer will be stepping down within the next year, there’s been a maelstrom of responses across the tech world. We’ve contributed our share, too. In fact, something our CEO Sanjay Bhatia said on Stuart Varney & Co. struck a chord with me, and I heard a similar sentiment in a blog posted this week on the Official Microsoft Blog by VP of Communications Frank Shaw.
While making reference to Charles Dickens and Rashomon, he responded to all the critics and pundits evaluating all of the Rights and Wrongs in Microsoft’s last decade and a half: we’ve all got our own biases and perspectives, and each person will see Microsoft’s lifetime differently. If you’re focusing on all the bad, or calling the company “unfocused,” that’s what you want to see. He is free to see the exact opposite.
Cloud Computing: A Thing of the Past?
Yes, in ten years, we will hardly ever mention “the Cloud” and all related buzzwords surrounding cloud computing.
Notice what I am not saying: that cloud computing will go away.
Cloud computing will simply have been ingrained in the technology we use, and will cease to become a meaningful term for technologists. We’ll all be cloud computing pros, in enterprise and consumer fields alike. Says a recent article:
“Cloud computing in ten years will have gone off in various directions, all systemic to how we handle enterprise computing in the future.”
