Monthly Archives: February 2008

February 29, 2008 Posted in Efficiency, IT, SaaS, Strategy 5 Comments

Thoughts on Google Sites, IT department threat?

By Ben Kepes

Google released Sites today, a centralized repository for sharing information and collaborative workspaces. There’s been much commentary around the blogosphere on whether Sites is a threat to Microsoft’s SharePoint product, MiramarMike gives an excellent comparison over here. There’s been so much discussion post launch that I wasn’t going to comment.

February 29, 2008 Posted in Efficiency, Governance, IT, New business, SaaS, Strategy 1 Comment

On SaaS, security and perception…

By Ben Kepes

I wrote a day or two ago about the issues around security of SaaS products. I suggested a number of strategies that SaaS vendors could use to ensure that their product was sufficiently secure. Comments pointed out a duality of issues here. Kaila said; security is usually less about security

Tagged Xero |

February 28, 2008 Posted in Business and the Environment, Cleantech, New business, Strategy 2 Comments

Crowdsourcing cleantech…

By Ben Kepes

Yet another high-flying Silicon Valley entrepreneur is planning to capitalize on the growing popularity of “green” technology, and to do it, he’s tapping the wisdom of crowds as well as their cash. Steve Newcomb, a co-founder of search startup Powerset, is in the early stages of launching a venture-capital fund

February 28, 2008 Posted in Design, IT, SaaS, Strategy 1 Comment

Zoho introduces new features to writer…

By Ben Kepes

It’s a battle all right – Buzzword vs Zoho writer vs Google apps vs MS office. Zoho upped the ante today by introducing a host of new features; DocX Support – ho hum, whatever. No relevance to me but I guess it makes for ease of use for those working

February 28, 2008 Posted in Design, IT, New business, Strategy, Web x.0 Leave a comment

Why Etsy works (Platforms 101)

By Ben Kepes

In recent days much has been written about Etsy, the online community for craftspeople. I thought it opportune to give my perspective. People have already talked about mass customization and emergent business networks in relation to Etsy so I won’t go there. My perspective is somewhat simpler (and has less

February 27, 2008 Posted in Design, Efficiency, IT, SaaS, Web x.0 11 Comments

SMEs rate security a barrier to SaaS adoption…

By Ben Kepes

A new research paper from Fairfax Business Research has the following worrying statistics; 79% of respondents gave security concerns as one reason to not sign up for a SaaS product Almost 50% site concerns that data could be hacked or accessed in transmission 32% state the data is too important

February 27, 2008 Posted in Efficiency, IT, SaaS, Strategy Leave a comment

SaaS gives startups their own barrier to entry…

By Ben Kepes

An excellent comment over on Smoothspan regarding differentiating factors for SaaS vendors. Bob says; …SaaS is such a corrosively disruptive business model that the incumbents generally can’t adopt it when an upstart comes along. For all intents and purposes a SaaS and Perpetual License Vendor may as well be in

February 27, 2008 Posted in Business and the Environment, Cleantech 3 Comments

Here’s an investment bargain…

By Ben Kepes

Clean tech is the big thing of the future. It’s also (relatively) insulated from the sub prime woes as no matter the economy, Kyoto continues. Strange then that WindfarmsNZ share price has slumped so markedly of late. Especially so given the good performance just released. Windfarms is poised to leverage

February 27, 2008 Posted in IT, Strategy 2 Comments

Rod Drury and Eric Schmidt – soulmates?

By Ben Kepes

The Unreasonablemen draw an interesting parallel between our own Rod Drury and Google’s Eric Schmidt in this post. Quote of note from Schmidt; As more and more people conduct online searches and interact with applications like Gmail, Google Earth and YouTube, we’ve had to think outside the box to create

February 27, 2008 Posted in Economic Development, New Zealand, Strategy 4 Comments

Our trading partners lack faith in us too…

By Ben Kepes

News this morning that a NZTE survey of some of New Zealand’s main trading partners show that they consider us unsophisticated when it comes to business accumen.Interestingly enough Australia took a differing point of view but then again they generally do. Seems timely given the recent opening of the Labour

Ben Kepes is a technology evangelist, an investor, a commentator and a business adviser. Ben covers the convergence of technology, mobile, ubiquity and agility, all enabled by the Cloud. His areas of interest extend to enterprise software, software integration, financial/accounting software, platforms and infrastructure as well as articulating technology simply for everyday users.