2012 Apr 29

Is Apple After the Carriers?

I believe a number of elements are coming together to make it inevitable that Apple will go after the carriers, first with their own MVNO and then eventually with their own full-fledged carrier. I believe tight government regulation of the carriers is the one reason Apple will be hesitant. First, Apple is now an iPhone company. I love my iPad and my MacBook Air, but the bulk of Apple's revenues and profits now come from iPhones.

2012 Apr 26

Surviving an Acquisition

As a rule of thumb, it is known that acquirees are disposable. Essentially, if someone bought your firm, you are in a weaker position and are relatively disposable. There are exceptions to this rule, for example, if the company bought the firm specifically for its people, as is often the case in tech (Google and Cisco are both well-known for acquiring for the talent), or if it bought it for an ongoing project.

2012 Apr 6

Work-Life Balance in Tech? Sort of... Sheryl Sandberg Leads the Way

I have been involved in tech - either the tech industry (sell side) or IT (buy side) for pretty much my entire career. People in tech are, overall, smart, dedicated... and a little obsessive and focused. We work night and day, on crazy deadlines, whether you are developer or administrator, management or staff, marketing or R&D. Part of it is the mindset, and part of it is the expected culture.

2012 Mar 30

An Article This Old Engineer Would Love

I saw a great article today, an interview with Drop.io's founder Sam Lessin and NYTech Meetup's Nate Westheimer. The gist? Non-technical founders will always make "subpar products that fail slowly." The main thrust of the argument is that non-technical founders have vision, and in translating that vision to the implementors, well, something gets "lost in translation." I am an engineer at heart. I consult nowadays, most of the time on technology and business operations, oftentimes also on product strategy.

2012 Mar 15

Open Your Coat!

A colleague of mine recently sent me a great article on Forbes called, "Why Siri Needs an API." While it was an interesting article, it had one great line, which I loved. "During the last five years, APIs have begun to be recognized as one of a company's most enduring assets." API - Application Programming Interface - is the well-defined methods and interfaces that enable other developers and engineers, i.

2012 Mar 6

The 3Cs: Contraception, Catholics, and Coercion

A lot of ink has been spilled over the last several weeks over the pending health-care requirement that all employers cover contraception at no cost to their employees. I am not interested - as a professional, at any rate - in whether or not the mandate is, per se, good public policy; I am not interested in whether or not contraception is morally good or bad. I am interested in two key elements:

2012 Feb 19

Can Real Estate Really Have Long Term Value?

I read a very interesting - and contrarian - article in Reuters today. The article argues that it is possible - and given that those with a vested interest like Trulia and Bankrate hesitatingly agree, it is probably more likely than possible - that home ownership may be emotionally fulfilling, but it is a poor wealth creator, i.e. real estate is not a great investment. The article led to my thinking about all investments, and whether real estate, in this respect, is unique.

2012 Feb 14

Overflights and iPads - China is not as big as it thinks!

The trademark spat between Apple and Proview of China just got really interesting, and, ironically, reminded me of Air Canada. For those not following, Apple claims it bought the worldwide rights to the trademarked term "iPad" several years ago, but Proview claims it did not, at least in China. On that basis, Chinese officials have been seizing iPads from retail outlets in China. Further, as the above article states, Proview is now trying to get Chinese officials to block all exports of iPads.

2012 Feb 8

MBAs, Innovation and Disruption

I read a fascinating article in today's WSJ, available here, about how AOL was the first Facebook, that really understood the value of community. Unfortunately, as they became a public company, a "Taliban" of MBAs came in, focused on short term profit and their own reputations, and killed the real long term value of AOL. In many ways, I can appreciate his perspective. Many companies have been killed by naive MBAs who think the formulae and theories they learned in business school can "

2012 Feb 1

Does 3D Printing Exclude China?

In the last several years, the concept of 3D printing has shown significant promise and even actual execution. 3D printers have existed, at least according to Wikipedia, since the 1980s. However, the combination of reduced cost of printer, increased flexibility, and expanding number of materials which can be shaped using a 3D printer has brought 3D printing closer to the regular end-user. I do not know if 3D printing will ever be a desktop experience.