Episode 45 | Infrastructure, Software, Applications

The Big Themes:

• CIO "Lego blocks": CIOs in tech are looking for vendors to provide the "building blocks" that are necessary to develop applications. When CIOs approach the board, they are not looking to describe servers and storage, but rather, systems, or applications.
• Vendors compete on the strength of their products: Wayne praises Oracle for competing with the strength of its product(s). The company is not looking to lock customers in. He says that, as a customer, it makes him feel like [Oracle] has less to hide.
• Choices are evolving for customers: Customers are now faced with selecting a cloud provider whose cloud philosophy resonates with the type of work they are trying to do. Wayne and Bob explore various cloud vendors and their differentiated offerings.

The Big Quote: "We're willing to pay for differentiated vertical software that solves our problem quicker. Companies don't mind making an investment in a quality product. What we've had to do up to now, as I say, "buy the Lego blocks and assemble our own solution." There are people who think that's great. I don't think manufacturing companies, supply chain companies, retail companies, hospitals should be in the software business. I think they should be in the business that's on the nameplate on the door. And so as a CIO, I'm encouraging vendors to give me more solutions that I can configure rather than customize, and that either fit together with other products in their app store or their infrastructure space, their partner space, or they just work out of the box from the vendor. Because then I do less integration and more solution. And that's what I think I want to do as a 21st-century CIO."

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