The Stack Fallacy | BY ANSHU SHARMA

Jeff Nolan just announced on his blog Venture Chronicles that he has resigned from SAP and will be doing something new- which makes me curious. I learned a few things about the art of blogging while working for a large enterprise sofware company from simply following his blog. I also learned a lot more about […] 

I was listening to someone on NPR forecasting a distant future where we would no longer age due to advances in genetics and disease would be mostly stamped out. It led me to ask the question what would that do to the airline industry? Yes, the airline industry. My logic goes as follows. We make […] 

Marc Fleury has written a very interesting post on the future of Red Hat, Linux from Oracle and game theory. He makes the point that a new player has little to gain by entering the Linux market, a self-serving but well thought out argument. He also refers to Red Hat becoming a target of PeopleSoft/Siebel […] 

Yes, I am saying Google is a dinosaur when it comes to Office 2.0 applications. Zoho Sheet is better than Google Spreadsheet as I wrote in a previous entry. And now Zoho is launching Zoho Projects- a complete project management app for the 2.0 fanatics. Some features I like:– Integration with Calendar– Easy to add […] 

I wanted to welcome my new readers. Please do participate by leaving a comment below. Here is the list of my top 5 articles- Let’s play games! Open source generates lots of value but little revenue India at a threshold- a first hand account TiE Event: The great Virsa story for Enterprise Software Disruptive Innovation, […] 

I recently wrote an article for the Line56 magazine, and it is now published on their site at Line 56 site. Here is the introduction: When CIOs leave their homes this summer for a vacation, they will not just lock the front door but will attempt to secure every door and window. Unfortunately, the same […] 

If you are an enterprise software entrepreneur, the Virsa story will definitely warm your heart. In addition, if you believe humility, hardwork and intelligence should pay off you would have enjoyed today’s presentation. The husband-wife team of Jasbir Gill and Kaval Kaur created and led the startup from start to acquisition by SAP. Virsa: The […] 

SAP has been beating the drumbeat of organic growth as opposed to Oracle’s acquisition strategy. It is immaterial that SAP did make an unsuccessful bid for Retek and has acquired a few small companies. Bottomline is that SAP failed to deliver the revenue growth, growing a small 8%. I am waiting to see how SAP […] 

Yes, it may sound counter-intuitive but many technologies over the last 100 years have successfully added a lot of value without being a profitable business. Airlines add a lot of value to both individuals and businesses allowing us to meet people, establish relationships, ship goods and deliver services. However, since flying is a highly competitive […] 

When you think of EMC buying RSA Security it may seem like a strategic fit for a storage company to provide security especially with Network Applicances (NetApp) having aggressively positioned itself in security around data encryption. But it is the math that is most at play here- just as with most small enterprise software companies […] 

Google is launching an authentication (Auth) service that will allow third-party applications to better integrate with Google services. Nathan Torkington of O’Reilly reported this in their blog. So now you can allow a third-party application to access Google services on your behalf. Current limitations include having to manage separate tokens for each Google service. Google […] 

Google created a lot of buzz around its Web2.0 Spreadsheet anouncement a few weeks ago. Many other players including Zoho had launched similar or even superior functionality before Google did. So now Zoho is launching ZohoShow to provide Powerpoint-like functionality on the web. I test drove the ZohoShow and it appeared to be a good […] 

Oracle Q4 reported higher than expected earnings. (See Oracle Profit Jumps to $1.3B byAP) So how does a business like Oracle have a high cash-flow and very high margin business? What are the key metrics to look at? Is Database still a growth business? What is the role of SOA and other key technology trends? […] 

Google Spreadsheet lacks many common features available in Microsoft Excel. There are plenty of reviews on Google Spreadsheet comparing its features with Microsoft Excel. See Rod Boothby’s ‘Spreadsheet wars!…’ , Computer World’s ‘Google Spreadsheets is more powerful than you think’, Zoli’s comparison of Google Spreadsheet and Zoho, Vinny Carpenter’s ‘Google hits a home run with […] 

These are age old words of wisdom in the Silicon Valley but some people still do not get it. I have encountered a lot of budding entrepreneurs that see venture-capitalists and angel investors as no more than a source of capital. They forget that one of the key reasons you want to ask other people […] 

I was in India for a 20-day family vacation and found an India that continues to amaze, dazzle and disappoint simultaneously. The real-estate market is booming, stocks are growing faster than in any other world economy (except Russia) and people are excited about the future. And it is the last aspect that holds out the […] 

I started reading the latest book by Clayton M. Christensen- Seeing What’s Next. He is also the author of Innovator’s Dilemma and Innovator’s Solution. An interesting case study to apply his book’s theories is JBoss. JBoss was clearly a disruptive innovator that targeted low-end customers with a good enough product at a lower cost of […] 

My first response was of initial excitement. And then 30 seconds later… a big yawn. The Application Server market is mature and growing slowly (if at all). The big players like IBM and BEA have cornered the enterprise customers that are willing to pay for the software and support. For Red Hat this clearly makes […] 

I attended a TiE (The Indus Entrepreneur) event tonight. There were 3 speakers- Dan Avida, General Partner, Opus Capital (ex-CEO Decru) Joshua Pickus, Senior Vice President & GM, Computer Associates (ex-CEO Niku) Tom Berquist, CFO, Ingres Corporation (previously Securities Analyst at Citigroup) Dan Avida sold Decru to Network Appliance for $272.5M; Josh Pickus sold Niku […]