Owner: mobidelphia URL:www.mobidelphia.com Join Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 12:32:49 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: musings on technology Site statistics:Click here
Launched: minglebox 2008-04-28 00:18:56 Last year, an ex-colleague of mine from i2, Sushma launched a social networking service in India called minglebox, India's answer to facebook and orkut. While orkut continues to enjoy a loyal following in India, its limitations to work consistently across browser platforms are well known. Again, who knows what Google's roadmap is for orkut?
Note: Today, the India market constitutes over 16% of Read more:Launched
New 3G Blackberry launch delayed? 2008-04-28 00:17:56 Fortune magazine reports that the new 3G Blackberry might be delayed
.
Rumors are rife that product quality issues are contributing to delays.
Well, activity is abuzz in the mobile communication world: Google is expected to bring out its Android phone using its new Android Open Source OS and Platform for Mobile Technology. No, there's no G-Phone, as this official Google video explains:
Types of Teams: Self-Managing Teams 2008-04-28 00:16:16 Note: This was part of my research on Organizational Development as part of my masters coursework in 2006.
The original socio-technical action research projects often led to new work process arrangements that included self-managing teams. Now managers seem to leap, at the outset, to the conclusion that teams are the solution in most work operations improvement projects. Here, I discuss basic
Managing Workplace Conflict: Everything Happens in Public? (or The Blind Men and the Elephant) 2008-04-28 00:13:33 Conflict: Wikipedia definition
Classic Organizational Behavior suggests tackling conflict in one of the following ways:
Avoidance: ‘hiding our head in the sand’, hoping the conflict will go away.
Collaboration: working together to find a mutually beneficial solution.
Compromise: finding the middle ground whereby a ‘little is given and little is gotten’.
Competing: ‘may the best person win’. Read more:Workplace
, Conflict
, Everything
, Public
, Blind
iPhone Launch 2008-04-27 23:42:38 What makes this man tick??
Slick presentation, well choregraphed and synchronized
Edit: Update from April 23, 2008: Well, I was about right. Some one's writing a book now on Steve Jobs: Check out this article on BusinessWeek - "Inside Steve's Brain" Read more:iPhone
, Launch
BusinessWeek: The World's 50 Most Innovative Companies 2008-04-27 19:56:57 Read all about it here (Interactive chart on the BusinessWeek
website). I'm surprised to see India's TATA group at #5, after Microsoft. How did that happen!? Nokia, the 2007 top 25 Supply Chain leader is at the 10th spot..and whatever's been happening to 3M?? Sadly, Motorola's not on the list at all.
Glad to see GE at #4. Like I've said in an earlier post, their new mobile ECG product is simply Read more:World
, Innovative
, Companies
2007 Top Supply Chain Ratings 2008-04-27 16:23:05 Where's Dell in AMR's Top 25 SupplyChain
Ranking?
Here's a link to the latest SCM Rating on AMR Research's website.
IndustryWeek cites that Dell's financial troubles made them ineligible for consideration by AMR Research.
Who would have thunk Nokia would have risen to the top of the list so quickly? The Ippo-based Finnish maker has clearly focused on quality and on its core product offering Read more:Ratings
SaaS: Commoditization of Business Software 2008-04-27 16:07:14 Google has partnered with Salesforce.com (on demand CRM & business apps) to compete with SAP and Oracle. SAP's equivalent offering is Business
By Design. The other emerging players are NetSuite and SugarCRM
With a shift from physical boxed software to SaaS gaining steam, it remains to be seen how global markets will react and adapt to subscription based, hosted business software! Read more:Software
Dreamliner- The much awaited American launch 2008-04-27 15:39:57 The success of the Dreamliner is crucial for America to maintain her competitive edge. With supply chain and sourcing delays of over six months, I hope there are no additional roadblocks to the much awaited launch (before technological obselence catches on) Read more:American
Failed Launches of Consumer Packaged Goods (India) 2008-04-27 13:54:15 Lets look at some launches in the consumer goods industry that did not do so well in India
around the same time (early '90s)
Check this article out here about Great Shakes, a soy-based drink introduced by Godrej in India. rediff.com,(link) I respectfully disagree with the author that Great Shakes failed because of its taste. Great Shakes, with a smoothie-like flavor, and my favorite those days. Read more:Consumer
Timing a product launch 2008-04-27 13:54:15 Early Adopters:
My thoughts go back to the mid-90's, a time before the SaaS and SOA concept became popular. My first job was with a startup called Project Planning Services(PPSL).
This was when the internet was still at a premium, and there was only one email account on one sought-after computer. Emails were in ASCII format, Hotmail wasn't yet as popular or accessible to the massess.
PPSL was Read more:Timing
Designing for Maintainability 2008-04-27 13:53:02 Continuing my thoughts on designing for the lifecycle, proponents of Systems Engineering often suggest that design for maintainability consider several of the following attributes:
1. Select standardized components/materials: This will minimize the number and variety of components, thereby reducing the spare/repair part requirements, thus making the system more maintainable. It also helps if the Read more:Designing
Successful Hi-Tech Product Launches (Cont'd) 2008-04-27 13:52:28 Dubai-based Insyst Business Solutions, a company I used to work for in the late 90s, introduced a scaled-down version of its client/server Orion ERP solution around the time. Called Merlin, it came straight out of the box and catered to SMEs in EMEA. The market was ripe with no need for hardselling a web-based application as the internet was anyway scarcely accessible in those days in the Middle
Launch Architects? Launch Architecture? 2008-04-27 13:51:55 The other day, while browsing at the airport, I chanced upon this rich trove of articles on the website of this company called Optimized Launch
. It looks like they're making a serious effort to develop a Body of Knowledge around the entire launch process from concept through RTM.
Specifically,this link introduces the concept of launch architecture.
What I liked most was that the article states Read more:Architects
, Architecture
Predictive Management 2008-04-27 13:51:43 This stub here talks about a predictive management approach.
Many managers believe that their job is to resolve problems that arise. While that is true, it is only the lesser part of the job. More importantly, a manager’s job is to prevent problems. This is the difference between reactive management, which solves problems as they occur, and predictive management, which tries to prevent many Read more:Management
, Predictive
Amazon Kindle Launch 2008-04-27 13:50:38 I'll wait for a more pleasant looking version to be released. Why not take cues from Apple and design a easier, aesthetic interface? It kinda looks plain. Reminds me of the spoof iPhone Steve Jobs intros during the iPhone launch. Read more:Launch
, Amazon
Interesting Product Launch Blogs 2008-04-27 13:49:26 The other day, I chanced upon these interesting articles by the launchclinic website on product launches
I also found one other on typepad as well. This blog quotes the following as the secrets behind Toyota's success at launching quality products:
* Structure and organization
* Development process
* Extended enterprise
* Institutional learning
* People development
* Culture Read more:Launch
, Blogs
ITIL Framework and how its implemented by Software Vendors 2008-04-16 17:35:18 Three ITIL framework adaptations come to mind:
- SAP Solution Manager and Services to Run, Perform, Scale and Sustain (Safeguarding)
- Microsoft Operations Framework
- HP OpenView
What are your thoughts on how ITIL guidelines can help make you a better organization? Read more:Software
, implemented
, Vendors
SAP recognition 2008-04-29 12:23:24 Tony Tortorice, CIO of LA Unified School District, the 2nd largest school district in the US had this to say on linkedin.com. Obviously, this reflects the hard work of all the various team members that were involved. Especially, PK, VT, VS and NO in that order (Names abbreviated for privacy reasons)
“Naren led a team of SAP experts who advised the Los Angeles Unified School
District (SAP's
Managing Customer Expectations in Professional Services 2008-04-29 10:53:41 An article I read sometime back (available from Emerald Insight or Ingenta Connect) describes an empirical approach for managing customer expectations to achieve long-term quality and customer satisfaction in professional services. Professional services are somewhat different from other types of services, and often so are customer expectations. The article describes three types of expectations Read more:Customer
, Services
How can one measure Innovation? 2008-04-28 18:23:02 How does one measure innovation?
Check out the freakonomics blog on NY Times, and see what Seth Godin, Xerox, Carnegie Mellon Professors have to say about measuring innovation.
Sadly, there's no mention of 3M.
Update: Also see this interview with Jeff Bezos of Amazon talking about innovation on BusinessWeek Read more:Innovation
Snippet on Schedule Slippages in Professional Services Delivery 2008-04-29 22:56:55 This is part of my review of the book "Project Management As If People Mattered" by Robert J Graham: Note that this review was originally written in 2006, but I wanted to share relevant parts with my readers Schedule
slippages: When there are slippages in schedule, the Project Manager might try to find a reason for slippages. Day-to-day slippage is harder to observe, harder to prevent, harder to Read more:Snippet
, Services
, Delivery
Recommend Site To A Friend
