Website Conversion Blog
IBM seems to have forgotten all about the web. In their announcement of its new 4,000-strong Business Analytics and Optimization Services, there are lots of exciting descriptions of making decisions faster to optimize processes, which on the face of it will do everything from making coffee to curing world hunger. At SeeWhy we were instrumental in defining this market back in 2006 when I published a book on the subject. More than 20,000 copies later, I’m flattered that IBM has decided to validate our vision.
In this announcement, IBM is combining resources from a series of diverse acquisitions: Taking the old PriceWaterhouse data warehouse practice and combining it with the services teams from Cognos and ILOG makes a lot of sense in trying to create force and mass in one of the few markets forecast to grow in these recessionary times. But shock and awe it’s not: I couldn’t help but be a bit disappointed by the announcement. It’s all so obvious, and frankly a bit ‘emperors new clothes.’ Packaged well, and fully buzzword compliant.
But missing from all the excitement is the internet. The web is the world’s single largest source of real time data and where all the action is today in optimizing decisions in real time. This is where the real heavy lifting in data terms needs to take place.
This is the new frontier in real time decision making, and it’s completely absent from IBM’s vision. But then, you don’t go to a big giant like IBM for innovation; no, therein lies safety, security and the ability to execute on a global scale.
Nobody ever got fired for hiring IBM. But they probably didn’t get promoted either!
