Cloud Wars Live with Bob Evans

The Big Themes:

• We launched the Cloud Database Report in February: Sign up now via the Cloud Wars website.
• Moving data to the cloud is more complicated than it seems: Will your next database migration project take one year, or one click? 
• Snowball, Snowcone, Snowmobile: Snowmobile is an 18-wheeler. It’s a tractor trailer that they back up to your data container and upload a hundred petabytes at a time.
• InterSystems has been around for 40 years: They have deep expertise and proven technologies, and they’re expanding into new spaces.

The Big Quote:

“I think of Snowflake as the Robinhood of databases.”

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The Big Themes:

• Roaring 20’s redux: Fed Chair Jerome Powell said that the economy was at an inflection point: 6%-7% or more growth, and unemployment 4%-5%.
• Two books on strategy: “Post Corona: From Crisis to Opportunity,” by Scott Galloway. And “Strategy Beyond the Hockey Stick” (McKinsey).
• Technical debt can sink you: But a due diligence approach can save you. The Forbes article by Noah Barsky offers great insights—as do Wayne’s comments.
• Board governance of technology: A certified board of directors spends 5% on cybersecurity – and hardly a word on other technology risks or opportunities. The road to perdition!

The Big Quotes:

“How intense is the war for talent? My number one trend over the last 30, 45 days is this: recruiters—the people doing recruiting every day for search firms or manufacturers or high-tech firms—are being recruited themselves to help find great new talent.”

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The Big Themes:

• $5 billion building and rewriting modern cloud apps: In the last few years we’ve really had all the ingredients, the products, the market, the technology – and so we’ve pushed it hard.
• We’re private and extraordinarily well-funded: That’s actually given us an advantage on that front. We are truly thinking in decades.
• Last mile functionality, last mile content: The solutions have to be architected in a way to address an adjacent set of industries.
• One throat to choke: We’ll have our services teams to partner with Deloitte or Accenture, or a typical SI. We’re clearly a part of this and are answerable to any issues.

The Big Quote:

“It does feel like companies want a return on their investment a lot more quickly because they're facing much more material business issues and disruption.”

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The Big Themes:

• Pet peeves: Not every manager is a leader. When you need a leader but hire a manager, you quickly realize that you’ve either hired the wrong person, or the wrong team—and it’s usually the wrong person.
• A culture of fear: What kind of culture do you have? How are you leading and how do you assess whether you’re courageous or not. You have to embrace the notion that everybody in your organization is a leader.
• We teach the Marine Corps how to be a leader: In bootcamp, I remember standing at attention in a chow line about half a mile long reading the Marine Corps book on leadership. So leadership can definitely be learned.
• Jack Welch is a classic example of someone who led with intent: You do not have to agree with the intent. That's not the point of this, but he said we would be number one or number two in every single market or segment we participated in.

The Big Quotes:

“It's not a 60-minute meeting for crying out loud. We have enough of those in our days, right?”

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The Big Themes:

• We’re getting back to normal – which is awesome: But the markets are crazy and the blank check companies – or SPAC as they’re often called – are red hot.
• Private schools are expensive: Do you want to get that Gulfstream or not?
• These magical moments: A lot of these companies want to delight their customers. They absolutely do make these companies more efficient.
• There’s a bigger mountain over there: We’re looking over there and saying it’s a ton of fun right now.

The Big Quotes:

“I think they will both be fabulously successful – great companies that are here to stay.”

This episode is brought to you by BMC Software.

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The Big Themes:

• Manufacturing is hot again: In this country there’s a Renaissance, I love it because I joined Thomas four years ago with the idea it is going to get white hot again.
• The millennial generation: Young people in particular are starting to imagine what their future might look like, and what manufacturing provides for them that other technology doesn’t.
• The Dollar Shave Club: The technology enabled the ability to create a subscription business out of razors into a retail outlet of my brand of razor.
• If you're a horizontal player: At some point you’ve got to understand that your entry into a marketplace needs to be vertical.

The Big Quotes:

“So the idea that a computer company could be a car company and a car company could be a computer company is not a reach today. It's a reality.”

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The Big Themes:

• The appetite for industry solutions is expanding in a very big way: Speaking the language of our customers is key.
• AI becomes much richer: The key element is how do you imagine the whole thing using AI – including industry-specific data models, processes, and analytics.
• Industry-specific offerings: Partners and customers building on top of not only our 360 platform but also industry-specific clouds.

The Big Quotes:

“We have seen an immense need from our customers and we have responded in kind by building and acquiring these companies, which are based on top of our plan.”

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The Big Themes:

• Results based upon ~400 vetted project reviews: Completed by customers involved with the implementation of SAP, Oracle, and Workday within the past 24 months.
• On-budget delivery scores: As a rule of thumb, customers should figure on 1.5x the proposed amount for implementation.
• The team stayed the same – no changes: If you are like the majority of customers, your team is likely to change during the course of the project.
• Highest satisfaction for partner and project: SAP
• Highest satisfaction for software: Workday
• Most responsive during implementation: Oracle

The Big Quotes:

“All three vendors here are fairly neck and neck in terms of change orders.”

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The Big Themes:

• The business case for becoming a category creator in 2021: The “be different” category designers captured 51% of the revenue growth, and 80% of the market capitalization growth.
• Net worth of a typical White family is $171,000: Ten times greater than that of a Black family ($17,150). (Brookings)
• 10-second video clip just sold for $6.6M in “Non-Fungible Tokens” (NFTs): This selling of a piece of digital art has changed the future. A new category design could have profound implications.
• Netflix moves 2% of its cash to Black-owned banks. Twitter, Costco, others join in; Netflix moves $100M. Where do you bank?

The Big Quotes:

“They're trying to move the world from one way to another way. They take big risks in doing it. They have to have a point of view.”

This episode is brought to you by BMC Software.

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The Big Themes:

• The economy is opening up: Are you ready? Businesses are developing new ways to delight customers and the federal government is about pump more capital into the market.
• Invest in capabilities to win: Cloud, ERP/CRM, collaboration tools, networks (5G/Starlink/SD-WAN), and teleoperations (AR/robotics/low-latency networks).
• How do you budget for IT? Old: Centralized as a fixed number percentage of sales. New: Business-unit led with tech purchases seen as *business investments* rather than “IT spending.”
• The ability to move faster is a hallmark of true digital transformation: It’s far more important that CEO/CFO/BoD unshackles the IT investment process than investing in any specific thing.

The Big Quotes:

“So the worst outcome is we’ve got a tiger by the tail and they're multiple tigers running off in multiple directions.”

This episode is brought to you by BMC Software.

Visit Cloud Wars for more.