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Symantec CEO Clears the Fog
Nov. 29, 2011—I had the pleasure of hosting Enrique Salem (CEO Symantec) today as part of our Britt Technology Impact Series. This year the series is focused on cloud and we have already had a fantastic line-up of speakers from infrastructure providers (Peter DeSantis of Amazon), service providers (Kent Parker of Ariba), the enterprise user side (CIOs...
Target Rocks Toys
Nov. 26, 2011—Five years ago Walmart owned the toy aisle, aggressively pricing toys as early as Oct 1 to drive store traffic. Often those prices seemed ridiculously low, even below cost. Holiday 2009 Walmart abruptly shifted the toy strategy, slashing toy shelf space by more than 50% and offering fewer deep toy discounts. Last year the aisle...
The BIG C = Cloud Computing
Nov. 15, 2011—I had the pleasure of discussing cloud communities with Kent Parker (COO of Ariba) during his recent visit to speak in my class. Ariba is a fascinating case study of a procurement firm that survived the B2B boom of the later 90s and subsequent melt down. Cloud is “back to the future” for Ariba. In...
Sapphire hums with Energy and Challenge
May. 18, 2011—During Bill McDermott’s visit in February, he invited us to see SAP in action. So his week John Torget and I trekked to Orlando with six Tuckies for the annual Sapphire conference. With more than 13,000 participants and legions more attending virtually, the event is one of the largest enterprise IT gatherings in the world....
Data-driven Cement
Apr. 21, 2011—When I think of cement, I don’t think about complex data analytics. This week at our Roundtable in Zurich, I realized how analytics have become part of every business. Our tour of Holcim’s cement facility became a vivid example for the Roundtable discussion. Cement production uses an extremely high-temperature (2000C) process to transform raw minerals...
New Shopping Experiences w/ Social Media & Augmented Reality
Apr. 7, 2011—We just finished a fascinating report that examines the impact of mobile apps on traditional shopping. Researchers Neil Davis T’11 and Kathryn Malinick T’11 document how social media and augmented reality can create exciting new shopping experiences. My biggest takeaways are: 1. Brick-and-mortar retailers should not neglect the potential of mobile technologies to drive foot...
Lunch with Mike LaJoie (CTO, Time Warner Cable)
Mar. 30, 2011—Today I hosted Mike LaJoie (CTO, Time Warner Cable) for one of our CDS Tech lunches. Mike showed off TWC’s cool new ipad app that lets cable users watch their favorite shows anywhere in their home. Released two weeks ago, the app has been a huge hit with over 300,000 downloads this month and has...
Virtualizing Fulfillment Operations – Physical Clouds allow Amazon to Scale
Mar. 2, 2011—Thanks to my friends at the POMS Supply Chain College, I visited Amazon’s Fulfillment Center (Fernley NV) this week. It is an amazing operation shipping 100,000 items on a routine day and over 400,000/day during peak holiday season. While not the most automated facility I have seen, the Fernley Center has embraced a level of...
Insight on technology and life from SAP Co-CEO Bill McDermott
Feb. 8, 2011—I had the great fortune to host Bill McDermott (SAP’s Co-CEO) during his visit to Tuck this week. As the largest enterprise software firm on the planet, SAP faces many challenges and opportunities. Bill tackled hard student questions head-on with a warm, authentic personality that captivated the Tuck community. Here are my three takeaways: As...
Technology and Quality at Steinway
Sep. 1, 2009—Preview Copy in PDF Format Professors: Preview Copies and Orders For almost two centuries, Steinway & Sons set the standard for excellence in piano manufacture. This case articulates the Steinway definition of quality, how they achieved that quality, and contrasts their quality with its mass produced competitors. More importantly, this case explores the role and...