Avatar 3D and ERP - What is so Common?

Does the above combination sound strange?...

May be...

But, that is the coincidence that came to my mind when I read Why I hate 3-D and (You Should Too) by Roger Ebert in Newsweek. In this article, Roger says that he is not opposed to 3D as an option. But he opposes 3D as the future, a way of life for movies going forward.

I didn't watch Avatar 3D version. But, recently I watched DreamWorks 'How to Train Your Dragon' in 3D version. I should say that was one of the best entertaining movies that I had watched in recent times. I felt that the script of the movie was so interesting that I would have watched it, even if it didn't have 3D features. In fact, I would have loved to watch it in 2D version. The 3D version was distracting and it didn't add any enhance the movie watching experience in any way.

I am disappointed that next Dreamworks summer release Shrek 4 is also going to be released in 3D soon.

The 3D technology is hyped up so much that its already making inroads to Home entertainment. Samsung has introdcued 3D technology in LED TVs in India. And thats not all, there is a whole bunch of movies waiting to be released in 3D. Does it worth the hype?. I dont think so. I agree with all the reasons that Roger has mentioned in the Newsweek article.

Ok, So What?. How is it related to IT? or ERP?

Will come to that observation in few mins...

In the article, Roger concludes - Whenever Hollywood is threatened, it turns to Technology like sound, color, Dolby, DTS, and 3D. This is the observation that made me to think of the correlation to ERP...

Now..cut to ERP technology...

I recently upgraded my car stereo to Pioneer music system. And One of the reasons for doing that is to listen to Audio Books. The first Audio book that I rented was 'Beyond Goal' from Dr.Goldratt. I listened to this book couple of times, purely because there so many messages in that. I could write several other blog posts just on the thought-provoking speech by Dr. Goldratt.

If anyone has read Goal/or read Dr.Goldratt's articles, one could understand that Dr.Goldratt takes a hard stand on ERP. And He clearly outlines why it is so hard to derive benefits from ERP these days... Trust me, not just ERP, any significant IT investments that a company want to make, must listen to Dr.Goldratt to understand the process of yielding benefits from it.

And he goes on to say that, Whenever ERP fails to provide any new ROI/new benefits to the company, it simply turns to ....Technology...How true is that?

If you are watching the ERP industry, you dont need a evidence to prove this statement. We are only hearing about technology "innovations" namely SOA, BPM, Composite Apps, etc. We dont hear anything at all about Business Process Innovations/New Business Solutions. And Whenever the ERP vendors are cornered for innovations, we get the answer of new technology upgrades. And you know that, People just don't buy those!.

Now lets come back to 3D technology...

Isn't it a nice correlation to say that whenever we run out of ideas to provide real value to the end customers, we turn to technology based ideas?. And We use that as the reason to "charge the customers more" because the customers get a 'seemingly premium' experience. And if you look at it, that new technology opens up a whole new market around it. In case of 3D, its the glasses, TV, projectors, etc. In case of ERP new technology - new middlewares, new visual modeling tools, new monitoring tools, etc.

And thats one of the reasons that I am not intrigued to blog so much these days...all the time we hear about smartphones, social networking, graphics and games. I dont deny that they are true innovations. But, I dont accept that they are the way of life...We are told by the media to believe that thats the only innovation happening in the industry...

And, we as consumers, when we start to focus on real issues, we will also start to see real innovations...

Big Software Plans for Amazon Kindle?

In february 2009, I wrote about Amazon's kindle evolving into an application platform.

Looks like its becoming true. This Businessweek's article confirms my speculation.

Some of the possible directions that the article indicates:
- New applications that run on Amazon's kindle e-Book reader
- An Online App store like iPhone/BlackBerry application store
- Kindle evolving into a delivery channel for content. example - Blog Publishing
Amazon already provisions selected internet blogs thru the device
What else could be delivered to the device directly?
- Email applications/Web Browsing.

Once Amazon provisions an SDK for application development, I am sure there would be interesting possibilities!.

Digitize Your Wallet!

Citibank is introducing mobile based credit card payments in India. It is an integrated solution that Citibank is piloting along with other vendors such as Nokia (Handset provider), Vodafone (Telecom service provider), VivoTech (Technology provider) and Mastercard (Credit Card & Secure Payments Authority) and with selected merchants in the city.

Using this technology, the customers will be able to make contactless payments in the Point-of-Sale locations.

The customer downloads the credit card into the mobile application and protects the same with a password. When the customer makes a purchase in a retail store, he taps the mobile against a special reader device which performs the transaction. As I understand, a Java application installed on the mobile phone communicates with the card reader using Near-Field communications technology (elder brother of Bluetooth?) and communicates with the reader.

The reader & the application are from the technology company Vivotech. From technology perspective, Vivotech empowers the Bank to provision the credit card information securely to the mobile phone over the network provided by the Telecom Vendor. Vivotech also empowers the merchants with contactless readers.

It looks more convinient than pure-play mobile payments, where the mobile application sends an SMS or instructions to the bank directly to make payments. Here the idea looks more of digitizing your wallet and carrying it along the way. And there are no additional costs involved in data services consumption for payments as there is no need to send an SMS or connect to Internet.

The interesting perspective is that Citibank believes that it is not just a technology trial. But, a business model trail. Just imagine, if the mobile application can accept information from the card reader device at the merchant location - the possiblities are many - individualized discounts, gift vouchers/coupons download, personalized marketing. And all of these will result in additional revenue to the companies!.

We will have to wait and see how the technology picks momentum in Bangalore!.

I would be willing to sign-up but the catch is that I need to have a specific NFC-enabled Nokia handset.

Technology in Bathing Soap?

This post is on a lighter note, but definitely has a technology perspective and caught my attention recently.

Hindustan Unilever, a reputed FMCG company recently conducted a market research in a village in India. The intent was to collect the usage patterns of their famous product - Lifebuoy - a bathing soap. As part of the study, a small microchip was planted inside the soap and they were distributed to selective set of participants who signed-up for the research. From technical perspective, the microchip was based on motion-sensor that captures the data when the soap essentially 'moves' when used by the customers. After the study, the chip would be shared with the company to assess the customer usage patterns. It was a brilliant idea!. This idea reminds me lots of interesting opportunities/ideas in Enterprise IT space. (for example - potential in remote infrastructure management?)

Now there ends the tech story. What would happen if the same soap falls into the hands of customers who are totally unaware of the presence of the chip and then they eventually find out the same?. - Panic :-). Yes, thatz what happened. When few customers found the presence of the chip, they mistook it for a hidden camera and that led to confusion. Later the company had to step in to clarify the actual situation. Innovation boomerangs! :-)

Mining Hidden Gems!

Have you ever heard of a non-human receiving a patent?. By Non-human, I mean a robot kind of application. Yes, thats true. HP's auto-innovation achieved the same. HP calls it as 'Genetic-Programming'. The idea is an application could analyze the 'genes' of earlier inventions and point to evolutionary advances. Thats interesting!.

In any organization, there are plenty of creative ideas, suggestions, initiatives always flow thru. only few of them sustain, rest of everything gets abandoned or goes unnoticed. If the organization does not have a formal way of capturing those ideas/suggestions, then there are chances that people are re-inventing the wheel again for persistent problems. The question is, Can the past knowledge help in determing or predicting the future?. Can a software application help mining those ideas and recommend suitable directions?. And HP claims to have an answer.

Am sure there are chances of looking at false positives!. But the brighter side is that it would help analyzing the existing data for useful patterns, relationships and understanding its impact in the future. For me, it looks to me its an application of Predictive analytics in the Innovation space. HP claims that it uses the concept to streamline their supply chain and come out with new ways of predicting future sales.

I believe the concept/idea is applicable across variety of domains within the enterprise, especially in the area of Idea/Innovation Management.

Innovation from Coca-Cola!

This is outstanding!.

When I first time read this newsbit, I was thinking it sounded like a 'Telematics' solution.
The idea is simple. Coke is introducing a 'freestyle' wending machine this summer. Using this machine, the customer will be able to pick and choose the flavor/colories/water of his choice and make a beverage using a touch screen interface.

Ok, so, what is so Techie about it?. Here comes, the vending machine transmits the customer choices using a verizon uplink to Coke's data center and updates the choice information in SAP and Business Warehouse. The vast amount of choice information getting uploaded to the warehouse can give unique insights into Coke's next product of choice. That's innovation!.

The presss release says Coke has been designing this machine for the last four years. And some of the technology used are RFID (for flavor dispensors), Microsoft Windows, and SAP BW with Verizon Data services.

This is an excellent case of work where the company tries to co-create its future product by working along with its own customers, not in isolation. Apart from giving insights to future product design, the data can also lead to other obvious benefits such as stock replenishment, regional preferences. It can also potentially make healthy recommendations and customized offers.

Phone Banking in 150 languages!

Can you believe it!. Its yet another innovation by Royal Bank of Canada. In order to respect the diversity in Canada and to assit and attract new immigrant customers in Canada, RBC has recently rolled-out a customer service help line that works 24/7 and assits clients in more than 150 languages. I love Toronto!. I had been to the city twice and worked with major banks in the city. I can understand and appreciate how valuable the service would be!. The RBC bank has roped-in 2600 interpreters for this service.
More than this, I found another idea interesting...where in the Bank's website, the new immigrants can locate a RBC branch where their preferred language is spoken by more than three people. Guess what, its a Google Maps mashup!. If an immigrant is going to stay in canada for few months, I am sure this service would be invaluable. Apart from this, the website also provides various such as locating a house where a preferred cultural composition is high (sounds like BI heatmaps to me! :-))
Now, thats what I call Business Innovation that is truly sensitive to the local context!.
On a side note, RBC is also working on a Pilot with Visa to launch Contactless payments in Mobile devices. Just swipe your phone with the cash register at the merchant store and payment is done. Absolutely no contacts and no bills either!.

New way of Banking @ ATM

Bank of America has recently rolled-out an enhanced ATM facility where customers can deposit cash and get immediate credit on their account for the same-day deposits. The ATM also includes a fake currency detector that can immediately alert about fake notes in the deposited cash.
For cheques, the ATM gives out a receipt that contains the 'scanned image' of the cheque that was deposited. On seeing the cheque image in the ATM transaction slip, the customers will be immediately assured of the deposited cheque and the exact amount. There is no need for math and fill-up deposit slips as the ATM automatically adds-up if there are multiple cheques.
Some of the benefits that are quoted:
- Paperless transaction in the deposits
- Improved Customer Experience
- Real-time security
Its interesting to see the way technology & innovation touching consumers' lives. :-).
Slowly, but steadily, innovation is making inroads into the enterprise. Looking forward to the tipping point!

Technology Adoption

I attended a breakfast meeting organized by IASA bangalore chapter with Accenture Chief Technology Architect.

First I should appreciate the IASA team for organizing such events for the Architects community in India.

The key Take Away from the meeting is that - There are plenty of innovations happening in the industry. All we need to do, as System Integrators, is pushing for Adoption. Adoption is the key and the need for the hour for the businesses. I couldn't agree more to this.

The thoughts that triggered to me on this statement

- How can an Architect play the role of a 'Change Agent' in evangelizing the adoption?
- What are the key challenges that are being faced by the businesses in going for adoption?

The result and the single answer is 'Have Enterprise Architecture Govern your enterprise IT'.

Hyperactive Market

I was talking to my brother-in-law who is running his own business for the past 20 years or so..

Got an interesting insight while talking to him...Those days, the focus of the business was on reducing the operational expenses, reducing the profit margin and focusing on Customer delight. But, these days, the focus is more on operational expenses (expenses like marketing, branding, expensive showrooms) and increased sales. In olden days, businessmen were not really thinking about increased sales and growth year-on-year. But, its apparant that, these days, any business has to be a growth business, for it to survive. Do you read the lines from the book 'Goal' here?

And there is a mad rush from every business house to achieve that double-digit growth year after year...

My question is, if every business grows "big" enough, where will the space for small and medium enterprises to sustain?. Are we doing justice to nurture a business ecosystem, where all players have a fair chance to play the game?. Or are we restricting the market open enough only for big players?.

The outcome will be increased costs, less number of choices. There has to be some way... I dont know the perfect solution.

But, the optimal solution for big as well as small players would be 'Innovation'. For big players to grow on certain targets year after year, and for small players to survive on their key strengths, its required to 'innovate' and 'innovate niche' that other players would find difficult to replicate.

I think we will reach a point where it would be 'Innovate or Die'.

In summary, Business is getting tough but interesting...

Best is Yet to Happen

I think the world is hungry for innovation...

Recent Forrester report claims that the next evolution of IT services would be in Business Innovation. And there is lot of hype around innovation all over the market...There is a talk about open innovation model, innovation networks..Using Technology to Transform business innovatively, etc..

Whether the traditional IT services companies of India are positioned to be a Business Innovation partner or not...is a different story. I will blog about it later..

But, the need of the hour is not business innovation. But IT innovation. Yes...Many may deny that...But that is the need of the hour.

Rising package costs, slow penetration of SaaS, unavailability of competent vendors to the range of IBMs and SAPs, Need for Software Consulting/Services costs...The complexity around large system integration technologies and available options are still extremely prevalant. The magic pill for solving the traditional IT pains using Technology has not been discovered. Please note..the Outsourcing/Offshoring route is only a pain reliever. But, the permanant relief can only happen if the inherent technology that is outsourced to a vendor becomes less complex. The more the complexity decreases, the less the cost can be...

Till date, there are no viable innovations on that front..

So, the World is  pampering all incremental innovations like iPod, iPhone, SaaS, etc..

The best is yet to happen...And as the saying goes..."Innovation happens elsewhere"..