People may argue whether Derek Jeter is a better shortstop than Jose Reyes, but they most likely won’t debate the success of big-data or the cloud.

Throw in social networking, and you have a trifecta of today’s powerhouse technologies. You may not have thought, however, about how fantasy sports bring these three tech trends together — and the business implications of this growing phenomenon.

Click here to read THINKstrategies’ views in Jeff Kaplan’s latest blogpost on Internet Evolution.

All the hype about Big Data over the past year has succeeded in educating executives in organizations of all sizes across nearly every industry about the unprecedented potential to use analytics to improve operations, sales effectiveness and customer support. However, the hype has also too often made the path to success appear overly complicated and needlessly costly when a combination of new cloud innovations and higher end-user skills could provide a more economical remedy.

Click here to read THNKstrategies’ perspective in Jeff Kaplan’s latest contributed column on E-Commerce Times.

THINKstrategies, the Cloud Computing Showplace and Rising Tide Media have received a tremendous response to our 2013 Cloud Analytics and Cloud Channel Summit conference plans on May 2 and November 4, respectively. In order to respond to the speaking requests for these upcoming events in an orderly fashion, we have established an online speaker proposal process.

Please go to the following links to submit your speaking proposals for each of the Cloud Innovators Summits:

Cloud Analytics Summit
Cloud Channel Summit

We will consider each proposal on a first come, first serve basis.

Summit sponsors and those companies which propose customers as potential speakers will be given preferential treatment in the selection process. We are also looking for speaking proposals focused on key business issues rather than specific technical topics.

We will consider each proposal on a first come, first serve basis.

Contact me if you have questions regarding the speaking opportunities or have technical problems submitting your … Read More »

If 2012 was the year to shine a bright light on the ‘Big Data’ challenge, 2013 is the year you’ll be able to set your employees and executives free to do something about it. THINKstrategies believes a growing number of corporate end-users and executives have been unintentionally training to capitalize on today’s Big Data opportunity while prepping their fantasy sports teams and playing with their latest ‘cloud’ apps on their mobile devices. Those same employees can even be counted on to help identify the most effective analytic tools.

My first guest commentary published in the Wall Street Journal’s CIO Journal examines the business implications of these social trends and technological innovations. Click here to read my perspective.

Contact me if you’d like to discuss how these trends and developments impact your Cloud strategies and solutions. And, join us at the second annual Cloud Analytics Summit on Thursday, May 2 … Read More »

THINKstrategies and the Cloud Computing Showplace, in conjunction with Rising Tide Media, are pleased to announce the dates and locations for the 2013 Cloud Innovators Summit executive forums which will focus on the unique business opportunities created by today’s rapidly evolving Cloud Computing services and solutions aimed at capitalizing on the unprecedented BIg Data, Business Intelligence (BI), Data Integration and Channel Partnership opportunities in the Cloud.

Cloud Analytics Summit

We are very excited to be hosting the second annual Cloud Analytics Summit peer-to-peer networking event on Thursday, May 2, 2013, at the beautiful Apella meeting center in NYC.

After bringing together over 150 executives from the leading Cloud-based BI and data integration providers, along with CIOs from innovative companies like Facebook and Splunk at our first Cloud Analytics Summit, we believe the time is right to relocate our event to world’s commercial center where financial services, media companies and others are aggressively pursuing Cloud … Read More »

If 2012 was a breakthrough year for many organizations to take the plunge and join the “Cloud Rush” by adopting a wide array of SaaS, PaaS and IaaS alternatives, then 2013 will be the year they learn how to make good use of these powerful new resources without harming their businesses in the process.

Click here to read my first guest commentary of the new year on the Sandhill.com blog which discusses the operational challenges facing organizations who are relying more heavily on Cloud services.

If you’ve been holding back about moving to the ‘Cloud’, it is time to get onboard the Cloud Computing express. Not only has every major research firm published market forecasts indicating that Cloud services are growing exponentially, but we see multiplying customer success stories that clearly illustrate the immediate and measurable business benefits of moving to the Cloud. Click here the read about some of THINKstrategies’ simple rules in Datamation you should follow to help you move ahead in the coming year and successfully leverage today’s rapidly evolving Cloud alternatives.

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) has become an accepted alternative to traditional on-premises enterprise applications, and a broader set of Cloud services is becoming a viable option for businesses seeking more flexible and economical computing capabilities.

Despite occasional service disruptions, the adoption of Cloud services is accelerating rapidly because they are delivering tangible and measurable business benefits that clearly demonstrate their value.

It is a no-brainer to predict that the Cloud movement will continue to grow exponentially in the coming years. So, my predictions for 2013 focus on how the Cloud marketplace will be reshaped as it matures, and the gating factors that will impact its evolution.  Click here to read my predictions in E-Commerce Times.

The new IT department is evolving into a business unit that is measured by its enablement of key technologies to achieve improved business results and agility, including increased employee revenue contribution through higher productivity and a better return-on-investment (ROI).

Successful migration to the Cloud is dependent on high performing and redundant networks that can support increasingly robust and responsive applications and other computing resources on-demand from any global location, at any time.

The Cloud is breeding a new generation of innovation that is more reliably connecting and optimizing the performance of enterprise wide-area networks (WANs).

THINKstrategies has published a new Strategic Thinking profile that examines how Cloud-based application and network performance solutions from Aryaka remove the barriers to Cloud adoption, and provide IT business units with end-to-end visibility and control of network and application performance. Aryaka’s innovative Cloud-based services deliver application and network … Read More »

As the software and technology industry shifts from a product-centric to a services-driven go-to-market strategy to respond to a growing demand for Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and Cloud Computing alternatives, more and more independent software vendors (ISVs) and technology companies are attempting to realign their business processes to support a subscription-based revenue model.

Although there are a myriad of players providing billing solutions aimed at supporting SaaS, Cloud and other subscription services, none pulls together all of the elements that are essential to gaining an end-to-end view of the entire revenue recognition lifecycle. Implementing a revenue lifecycle management solution can help organizations capture critical information so they can more effectively launch and monetize new services that respond to changing market demands.

THINKstrategies latest Strategic Thinking profile examines how Revstream Cloud is addressing these challenges, processing over $25 billion in revenues annually for companies like … Read More »