-Contributed by Neha Bhatia
Technology advances, and with it, new terms build up. Grid computing has been shifted to “Cloud Computing”. As the name suggests the data is somewhere in the clouds simply because large groups of servers that often use low-cost consumer PC technology are networked together, with specialized connections to spread data-processing chores across them.
You don’t know where the server located is and where is the data amongst multiple servers but it is ensured that you have created repository of information which will stay lifelong irrespective of common problems of losing data- computer crashes; file lost or damaged.
All you need to implement cloud computing is: servers, nodes to connect to server, a controlling server to handle other servers, applications to be loaded on the cloud,
fast internet connections and an open source software required for binding the clusters and provide virtualization.
One of the best examples of implementing the Cloud is Google Apps, which not only implements so called virtualization by allowing companies to run multiple applications on a single server computer but also makes it as an open source by collaborating the data of multiple companies under a single unit. Software as a Service (SaaS, typically pronounced 'sass') is a model of software deployment where an application is hosted as a service provided to customers across the Internet. By eliminating the need to install and run the application on the customer's own computer, SaaS alleviates the customer's burden of software maintenance, ongoing operation, and support. Cloud computing easily manages Saas by reducing the overhead involved in buying the software simply by offering “on demand pricing”.
Since the simple storage service is provided by the vendor, there are lot of risks being involved in the technology
• What will happen to data in the case of a disaster of the server
• How will data be accessible when server is down
• What will happen to data if the company goes out of business; how data be returned
• Quality of Service when internet connections aren’t fast, reliable and available at all places at all the time
Even with the cons, this technology is getting adapted worldwide with Oracle introducing the cloud based versions of its database – Imagine unlimited database accessible to privileged user all the time with no hassles of online transfers! Amazon operates a booming cloud business by renting out storage space of 440000 developers, with more than 30,000 signing up each quarterly. Microsoft is coming up with Windows Azure an OS designed for allowing to run Web based applications.
While a low cost service like this always attracts SMEs because you get an unlimited IT infrastructure as a service. The cloud shrinks or expands depending upon your requirement, and you pay for what you use.
Another benefit of cloud computing for enterprises is faster time to market for their products and services. The traditional approach to launching a new product in the market is to procure the hardware and software, setup the OS and applications on it, and then start developing the application on it.
However my opinion after reading several blogs by SMEs themselves, I come up with this statistics: 47% of SMEs want to adopt cloud strategy however 12% out of them are still sceptical about the Internet connectivity issues and 9% - 13% consider that security issues for hosting the mission critical applications over the internet makes them doubtful to adopt the technology.
In the near future when this technology would advance as the most cost effective, secure with no issues of higher bandwidth, it would be “Information – Not into some device but into the service that exists in the sky”.
References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing
http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2008/10/14/232649/smbs-may-not-see-clouds-silver-lining.htm
http://pcquest.ciol.com/content/datacenter/2009/108123101.asp
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Frugal Marketing
-Contributed by Ankush Garg, Knowledge Guide
When recession hits hard, consultants are the first ones to be shown the door. The next are the marketing teams.
Organizations worldwide slash marketing budgets in difficult times. While some purists contend that recession is the best time to strengthen the brand and get a competitive edge, the question is how? The funds are scarce and they need to be channeled into the essentials of the business to keep it running.
While increase in the marketing budgets in difficult times may continue to be a distant dream for most marketers, the circumstances offer opportunity to become more effective. The adage necessity is the mother of all invention never works better that it does in current macro-economic environment.
So how can marketers become more effective and get more bang for the buck? The first step is to segment your customers by the product categories and allocate the marketing budgets to different segments depending upon its profitability. Then develop a marketing strategy for each segment depending upon the customer profile or its behavioral traits. Seek synergies by identifying segments with similar customer profile. Reduce corporate campaigns and launch product category focused marketing programs as it would help improve profitability and enable the company to endure difficult times.
It is always cheaper to retain existing customers that to procure new customers. Hence, a very strong customer relationship program is the need of the hour. It is important for marketers to integrate with the overall business and not operate in isolation. This will help them create new customer offers at low cost to the company. For example, if the company is carrying huge inventory for certain product categories, CRM program can create attractive offers for the existing customers using these product categories. This can help liquidate inventory without having to drop the prices in the market which can have deleterious consequences on the brand equity. The communication costs for CRM program should be closely monitored and reduced as far as possible. Email marketing, mobile marketing or social media networks (e.g. facebook) provide communication channels at no cost.
No sector or industry has been left unscathed by the recession. There are many businesses that are looking for avenues to utilize their existing capacity. Marketers should collaborate with them and offer them benefits that cost nothing. In return, they should get higher visibility for their brand. For example, retailers can distribute discount coupons at its billing counters for a famous restaurants or clubs in the city. In return, they can get high visibility through placement of tent cards at the tables of the restaurants or through setting up kiosks at the clubs.
The art of negotiation can always add the much needed strength to the marketers. Whether it is the airtime or column area in print media, there is tremendous room for cost reduction. One must not forget that marketing budgets are down and media companies are probably running helter-skelter to fill airtime or column space. And they would go lengths to retain you as a customer.
If airtime is extremely essential for your brand, an effective PR strategy can help gather lot of airtime literally free of cost. For example, a company in education business can voice its opinion on education policy of India or release papers on related subjects. This followed by effective networking with media personnel would lead to opportunities to participate in debates or forums where such issues are discussed.
With every problem comes an opportunity. It is clearly a very opportune time for the marketer’s to break the shells and think creative, and frugal. It is a different matter that this is not longer a choice, but the need of the hour.
When recession hits hard, consultants are the first ones to be shown the door. The next are the marketing teams.
Organizations worldwide slash marketing budgets in difficult times. While some purists contend that recession is the best time to strengthen the brand and get a competitive edge, the question is how? The funds are scarce and they need to be channeled into the essentials of the business to keep it running.
While increase in the marketing budgets in difficult times may continue to be a distant dream for most marketers, the circumstances offer opportunity to become more effective. The adage necessity is the mother of all invention never works better that it does in current macro-economic environment.
So how can marketers become more effective and get more bang for the buck? The first step is to segment your customers by the product categories and allocate the marketing budgets to different segments depending upon its profitability. Then develop a marketing strategy for each segment depending upon the customer profile or its behavioral traits. Seek synergies by identifying segments with similar customer profile. Reduce corporate campaigns and launch product category focused marketing programs as it would help improve profitability and enable the company to endure difficult times.
It is always cheaper to retain existing customers that to procure new customers. Hence, a very strong customer relationship program is the need of the hour. It is important for marketers to integrate with the overall business and not operate in isolation. This will help them create new customer offers at low cost to the company. For example, if the company is carrying huge inventory for certain product categories, CRM program can create attractive offers for the existing customers using these product categories. This can help liquidate inventory without having to drop the prices in the market which can have deleterious consequences on the brand equity. The communication costs for CRM program should be closely monitored and reduced as far as possible. Email marketing, mobile marketing or social media networks (e.g. facebook) provide communication channels at no cost.
No sector or industry has been left unscathed by the recession. There are many businesses that are looking for avenues to utilize their existing capacity. Marketers should collaborate with them and offer them benefits that cost nothing. In return, they should get higher visibility for their brand. For example, retailers can distribute discount coupons at its billing counters for a famous restaurants or clubs in the city. In return, they can get high visibility through placement of tent cards at the tables of the restaurants or through setting up kiosks at the clubs.
The art of negotiation can always add the much needed strength to the marketers. Whether it is the airtime or column area in print media, there is tremendous room for cost reduction. One must not forget that marketing budgets are down and media companies are probably running helter-skelter to fill airtime or column space. And they would go lengths to retain you as a customer.
If airtime is extremely essential for your brand, an effective PR strategy can help gather lot of airtime literally free of cost. For example, a company in education business can voice its opinion on education policy of India or release papers on related subjects. This followed by effective networking with media personnel would lead to opportunities to participate in debates or forums where such issues are discussed.
With every problem comes an opportunity. It is clearly a very opportune time for the marketer’s to break the shells and think creative, and frugal. It is a different matter that this is not longer a choice, but the need of the hour.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Friday, October 3, 2008
Ten years of excellence!
-contributed by Ankit
Ten years ago, two young men called Larry and Sergey founded an organization called Google. Since then, Google has become an essential part of millions of people around the globe.
Here is a list of 15 milestones which changed the lives of millions of people forever.
· 15 September 1997: Google.com registered as a domain
After a long brainstorming session, Larry and Sergey decided to name their Search Engine as Google – a play on the word “googol,” a mathematical term for the number represented by the numeral 1 followed by 100 zeros. The use of the term reflected their mission to organize a seemingly infinite amount of information on the web.
· 23 October 2000: Launch of Google AdWords
Google AdWords was launched with 350 customers. The self-service ad program promised online activation with a credit card, keyword targeting and performance feedback.
· 28 July 2001: Launch of Google Image Search
Google Image Search was launched, offering access to 250 million images.
· 23 September 2002: Launch of Google News
Google News was launched with 4000 news sources.
· 17 February 2003: Acquisition of Blogger.com
Google acquired Pyra Labs, the creators of Blogger.
· 4 March 2003: Google AdSense Released
Google launched a content-targeted advertising service, enabling publishers to access Google’s vast network of advertisers.
· 22 January 2004: Orkut Released
Google launched Orkut to tap into the sphere of social networking.
· 1 April 2004: Gmail Launched
Google launched Gmail on April fool’s Day. Initially an invitation was needed to get an account.
· 28 June 2005: Google Earth
Google unveiled Google Earth: a satellite imagery-based mapping service combining 3D buildings and terrain with mapping capabilities and Google search
· 24 August 2005: Launch of Google Talk
Google Talk, an application that enables Gmail users to talk or IM with friends was launched.
· 9 October 2006: Acquisition of YouTube
Google announced the acquisition of YouTube, an online streaming video portal.
· 13 June 2006: Launch of Picasa Web Albums
Google unveiled Picasa Web Albums, allowing users to upload and maintain their photo albums online.
· 11 October 2006: Google Docs and Spreadsheets Released
Google released web-based applications for Docs & Spreadsheets.
· 5 November 2007: Announcement of Android mobile platform
Google announced Android, the first open platform for mobile devices, and a collaboration with other companies in the Open Handset Alliance.
· 1 September 2008: Google Chrome browser
Google finally released there long awaited web browser called Chrome.
With the kind of success which Google has achieved within the first ten years of its inception, it will be interesting to see what surprises it has in store for the internet community in the years to come.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Indians are 10th most intense internet searchers in Asia Pacific
An Indian netizen is hitting the search button on an average 51 times during a month, but this puts them only at the last position among the top 10 countries of Asia-Pacific in terms of intensity of online search.
According to the latest ranking of top internet search figures for Asia-Pacific released by internet traffic tracking firm comScore, Koreans have topped in terms of online search intensity with an average of 102.8 searches per searcher during the month of July.
“Searchers in Korea exhibited the heaviest search intensity with an average of 102.8 searches per searcher during the month, followed by Australia (102 searches per searcher) and Japan (100.8 searches per searcher),” comScore said.
India has ranked after Korea, Australia, Japan, Singapore (91.2), New Zealand (87.2), Hong Kong (81), China (76.6), Taiwan (74.8) and Malaysia (64.2) on search intensity ranking.
India’s score of 51 searches per searcher is even lower than the overall average of 80.7 for the Asia-Pacific region.
However, the figures might increase after taking into account traffic from the public computers. The comScore data has been compiled by taking into account all unique internet users aged 15 and above from their home and work computers and it excludes searches from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs.
However, India fares much better in terms of the number of people searching something on internet as well as in terms of the number of such searches.
Source: livemint.com
Source: livemint.com
Saturday, September 20, 2008
US meltdown may affect 3G bid
The meltdown of Wall Streets blue-blooded banks and the growing fear that the contagion will spread to some European banks could directly impact India's upcoming 3G spectrum auctions by keeping away global bidders.
The absence of global players is expected to seriously restrict the value of the bids placed for 3G spectrum, which jeopardises the government's Rs 40,000 crore revenue target from this spectrum sale.
Typically, it is large global banks like Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch that are intimately involved in supporting the financial bids of both existing operators and new entrants.
They also have a strategic role in the M&As that follow such bids. With the weakening of the financial sector and a general nervousness around money supply, it is highly likely that even if global telcos do participate, the bidding will be far more conservative than it would have been under normal circumstances.
"The financial meltdown is at its peak. India's 3G auctions could not have come at a worse time. The weakness in financial markets is bound to impact bidders confidence," a leading global banker told TOI.
Apart from the fundamental weakness in financial markets, these international banks have very close relationships with global telecom service providers where long term debt, bridge loans and IPO's are concerned. With the collapse of these banks, many global telcos have started tightening their belt and frozen future investments, M&A's and even hiring.
"The entire sentiment is negative. Don't expect global telecom service providers to swim against the tide and put out massive bids in a market like India which is already littered with regulatory uncertainties," says a global telecom operator whose company has been in the Indian market for investments for nearly two years.
The weakness of foreign banks and global financial sector is also expected to move the Indian banking sector to a more conservative approach for funding debt which will be critical to the post-bidding rollout scenario.
"Overall, the sentiment of telecom investments during and post the 3G bidding will be intimately linked to the scale of the unfolding financial crisis," says a telecom analyst.
Telecom minister, A Raja's 3G guidelines, announced on August 1, 2008 proved to be a dampener for global telcos who said they would not participate on account of discriminatory financial entry barriers among other issues.
This forced the DoT to revise the spectrum guidelines for both 3G and Broadband Wireless Access spectrum. Companies are currently studying the full impact of such revisions. It seems that the crisis faced by the global banking sector is definitely an unwelcome move that will adversely impact India's exchequer revenues.
Source: Indiatimes Infotech
The absence of global players is expected to seriously restrict the value of the bids placed for 3G spectrum, which jeopardises the government's Rs 40,000 crore revenue target from this spectrum sale.
Typically, it is large global banks like Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch that are intimately involved in supporting the financial bids of both existing operators and new entrants.
They also have a strategic role in the M&As that follow such bids. With the weakening of the financial sector and a general nervousness around money supply, it is highly likely that even if global telcos do participate, the bidding will be far more conservative than it would have been under normal circumstances.
"The financial meltdown is at its peak. India's 3G auctions could not have come at a worse time. The weakness in financial markets is bound to impact bidders confidence," a leading global banker told TOI.
Apart from the fundamental weakness in financial markets, these international banks have very close relationships with global telecom service providers where long term debt, bridge loans and IPO's are concerned. With the collapse of these banks, many global telcos have started tightening their belt and frozen future investments, M&A's and even hiring.
"The entire sentiment is negative. Don't expect global telecom service providers to swim against the tide and put out massive bids in a market like India which is already littered with regulatory uncertainties," says a global telecom operator whose company has been in the Indian market for investments for nearly two years.
The weakness of foreign banks and global financial sector is also expected to move the Indian banking sector to a more conservative approach for funding debt which will be critical to the post-bidding rollout scenario.
"Overall, the sentiment of telecom investments during and post the 3G bidding will be intimately linked to the scale of the unfolding financial crisis," says a telecom analyst.
Telecom minister, A Raja's 3G guidelines, announced on August 1, 2008 proved to be a dampener for global telcos who said they would not participate on account of discriminatory financial entry barriers among other issues.
This forced the DoT to revise the spectrum guidelines for both 3G and Broadband Wireless Access spectrum. Companies are currently studying the full impact of such revisions. It seems that the crisis faced by the global banking sector is definitely an unwelcome move that will adversely impact India's exchequer revenues.
Source: Indiatimes Infotech
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Google Strikes Again !
-contributed by Ankit
Google is best known for two reasons. Firstly because they have an uncanny ability to come up with totally new and innovative products such as Google Earth which none of its competitors would have even contemplated about.
Secondly because they are motivated enough to come up with much more efficient replacements of existing successful products and solutions of their competitors. Before the Google Search Engine became the world's most popularly used search engine, MSN and Yahoo were the leading players. Due to much improved search algorithms and faster search results, Google left them way behind. Google captures more than 65% of the search engine market whereas Yahoo has a market share of 20% and Microsoft has a meagre 7%.
Chrome, the latest offering from the R&D labs of Google is a web browser giving direct competition to Microsoft's Internet Explorer and the very successful Mozilla Firefox. Currently Internet Explorer is used by 70 % of the Internet users and Mozilla has a market share of 20%. Mozilla has been growing at a steady rate in last few years, mainly at the cost of Microsoft IE. The major reason for the huge market share of Microsoft Internet Explorer is the fact that it comes bundled with the Microsoft Windows. Google clearly saw an opportunity here as there would be millions of people who would easily change over to another browser, provided it is easily available. Google on the day of launch of Chrome, displayed the download link on the main page of Google search, giving it a huge publicity infront of millions of Google users.
Using Chrome is a refreshing experience purely because of a new look and feel which it provides. Performance wise too, it is doing pretty well. It works much faster than the IE and Firefox and takes lesser memory compared to them. Chrome seems to work fine with over 25 tabs open too. The homepage with thumbnail images of frequently visited sites makes your work faster and the history search is as efficient and comprehensive as the Google search itself.
Its not possible that there will only be the positive side of the Chrome. There have been a few of instances in last 2-3 days when I had to "kill" a webpage because it wasn't responding, but the good thing is that, a crash in one tab does not crash the whole browser.
Google Chrome will definitely eat up a huge chunk of Microsoft IE users in near future. With Google going aggressive with Android, the mobile phone OS, the launch of Google OS for computers seems to be pretty close. And that definitely would be some competition for Microsoft!!
Google is best known for two reasons. Firstly because they have an uncanny ability to come up with totally new and innovative products such as Google Earth which none of its competitors would have even contemplated about.
Secondly because they are motivated enough to come up with much more efficient replacements of existing successful products and solutions of their competitors. Before the Google Search Engine became the world's most popularly used search engine, MSN and Yahoo were the leading players. Due to much improved search algorithms and faster search results, Google left them way behind. Google captures more than 65% of the search engine market whereas Yahoo has a market share of 20% and Microsoft has a meagre 7%.
Chrome, the latest offering from the R&D labs of Google is a web browser giving direct competition to Microsoft's Internet Explorer and the very successful Mozilla Firefox. Currently Internet Explorer is used by 70 % of the Internet users and Mozilla has a market share of 20%. Mozilla has been growing at a steady rate in last few years, mainly at the cost of Microsoft IE. The major reason for the huge market share of Microsoft Internet Explorer is the fact that it comes bundled with the Microsoft Windows. Google clearly saw an opportunity here as there would be millions of people who would easily change over to another browser, provided it is easily available. Google on the day of launch of Chrome, displayed the download link on the main page of Google search, giving it a huge publicity infront of millions of Google users.
Using Chrome is a refreshing experience purely because of a new look and feel which it provides. Performance wise too, it is doing pretty well. It works much faster than the IE and Firefox and takes lesser memory compared to them. Chrome seems to work fine with over 25 tabs open too. The homepage with thumbnail images of frequently visited sites makes your work faster and the history search is as efficient and comprehensive as the Google search itself.
Its not possible that there will only be the positive side of the Chrome. There have been a few of instances in last 2-3 days when I had to "kill" a webpage because it wasn't responding, but the good thing is that, a crash in one tab does not crash the whole browser.
Google Chrome will definitely eat up a huge chunk of Microsoft IE users in near future. With Google going aggressive with Android, the mobile phone OS, the launch of Google OS for computers seems to be pretty close. And that definitely would be some competition for Microsoft!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
