How is it for you?

Do you know, I am so weary of the Cr ...t Cr...h news and cliches that I am now weary of the people complaining of being weary of the same. Yet strangely, life goes on. Sure, if people are having second thoughts about buying that new house/car/huge TV, then there will be a few industries out there that are hurting. But industries that feed our basic needs, or have an economic cycle longer than their countries' economic cycle, are actually doing OK. Very OK, in some cases. We have been very busy with our customers in the food processing sector, and there is an interesting common thread. Those that are supplying the discounters (Aldi, Lidl, Netto) and the value end of the retail market (Asda, Morrisons), are doing very, very well. And I expect Defence contractors, aerospace manufacturers, major projects construction, oil exploration and similar will also be carrying on regardless. So I wonder when the BBC will have a news item featuring those successes?

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ERP in 2009

So far I have avoided any mention of Economic Downturn or that horrible cliche "Credit Crunch" because I can see no benefit in jumping on that particular marketing bandwagon. I'll leave that to the journalists who just want to sell newspapers. However, now that I have, I had better say why. I received AMR's weekly update email this morning and I was interested to read their comment on ERP sales in 2009. This is based on genuine research and I have known and trusted AMR's knowledge of the business IT community for many years. Their research shows that discretionary IT spend (i.e. "nice to have" rather than "essential") will be slow, but expensive global roll-outs of major ERP systems will actually ramp up to 2010. This is interesting because although these projects could have been an obvious cost-cutting target to a multi-national under pressure, they are clearly being regarded as an essential component of their drive for efficiency - something that will help the business thrive in tough times. This way of thinking is equally applicable to businesses without such a wide geographic spread - a highly efficient ERP system that is aligned to your way of working today is as essential as any other key aspect of your organisation.

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Is Anything New?

I had just finished reading "The Victorian Internet" by Tom Standage (thank you again Dr. James Bellini) which is a fascinating and very well written history of the telegraph system. You might think this is just a book for nerds and engineers but not so, it is a real insight into the social impact of a revolutionary new technology. There are so many parallels with our recent experiences with the Internet that you really wonder why we never made the connection before. Perhaps you did, I had to read the book first!

Apart from the stories of social networking, worries about privacy, dating, power-users and the rest, the most intriguing part came right at the end - exactly. Where will it end? The telegraph had two ends, firstly when the teleprinter made it possible for typists to use the network without the need for a telegraph office, and secondly the technical evolution of the telegraph network into a voice network with exchange hubs, replacing Morse code with telephones. So what will happen to our Internet? My personal view is that when we rid ourselves of the restriction of 40 foot mobile network masts and have 100% mobile coverage, we will see that evolution happen again - fixed networks and PCs will give way to fully mobile, personal devices and infinite connectivity.




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