(11-Jan-2012) At what cost do you value convenience? As the hype around Near Field Communications (NFC) or contactless payments intensifies one technology analyst wonders if we're inching toward a dangerous mobile security situation. Some...

The current triple crisis has put Japan under stresses far beyond what any planner had imagined. In doing so, it has provided an opportunity to see the real Japanese global economic model laid bare.

Let's look at the two major worlds of consumer commerce, and give a cold assessment of what we see, in terms of profits.

This week, after 15 years of being either one thing or another, Salon.com announced that it was up for sale. According to its SEC filing, the firm showed $1.4 million in revenues this year, up from $1 million a year ago. And its operating loss...

Premium Resource

Learn how your IT department compares to your peers in the Insurance Services sector by using Info-Tech's IT Budget & Staffing report. The attached PDF contains a consolidated report covering both Financial and Insurance services research.

Note

In order to obtain budgeting success, IT leaders must first calculate current costs, build accurate estimates, consider potential changes to expenses, project costs by line item, create a budget proposal, and successfully negotiate gaps imposed...

Video

Address your concerns about budget preparation by understanding what works and what doesn't.

There is an illusion afoot in the technology world that technology matters more than those who work with it; that the mousetrap is more important than those who create, market, and sell it. Those greybeards who have been around a while know the...

Publisher's Note: A couple of years ago, my Conference panels on the cloud began looking more deeply into Cloud construction, Cloud security, Cloud infrastructure discontinuities, and, in general, higher level Cloud questions. Mark Thiele was...

Apple and Google had interlocking boards, Adobe was Apple's lifelong development partner and ally, and even Intel had come back from the Dark Side of Wintel to make the chips used in Apple machines. What a happy family, all playing around the...

A few weeks ago, in the onslaught of morning emails, I found a press release that, at first, was almost unbelievable. It had come from Matthew's new company, and that story forms the basis of this week's Special Letter. If you want inspiration,...

(8-Mar-10) In today’s financial services industry, technology isn’t just an accessory; it’s a bare necessity. Technology is essential in gathering information and providing advice to your clients. And demonstrating a grasp of technology can...

(5-Mar-10) The popularity of netbooks helped computer makers shore up their sales through the recession, but analysts suggest the market is changing again and the booming sales of these super-portable computers will be short-lived. Netbooks...

I had the opportunity to make a new friend last week – someone who had, it turned out, recently attended my annual predictions talk in Bellingham. He had spent the last 20 years building two communications companies for a Japanese parent corp:...

Phillip Scanlan has moved forward into the position of Consulate General of Australia in New York. In that office, he hosted MP Chris Bowen for a discussion, before his non Australian friends, explaining the country's current status and some of...

A cash flow analysis is a crucial step in determining the financial position of the enterprise as well as that of prospective vendors and business partners. Learn to read a statement of cash flow to improve IT decision making and to better...

(9-Nov-09) The world is a different place than it was when Microsoft Corp. released Exchange 2007 software a few years ago – today, the economy is down and the demand for productivity is up as Exchange 2010 enters the market by the end of this...

6-Oct-09 Outsourcing, once thought of as the panacea for high IT overhead, has come under fire lately for several reasons. Hidden costs have come back to haunt penny pinching technology companies. Off shore vendors are supposed to save you...

Any enterprise can be adversely impacted by poor vendor performance - especially when it is a key vendor. These vendor problems can be especially traumatic for small enterprises with little or no recourse. As a result, IT managers should make it...

(6-Aug-09) Caught between pirates on one side and the open source movement on the other, Microsoft may have little choice but to lower its prices. That outcome would benefit the vast majority of personal and business users who aren't inclined to...

(31-Jul-09) - Many a cynic has quipped that despite early optimistic predictions of the paperless office, computers have become the most efficient paper generators since Gutenberg. Studies have found that companies routinely spend 2 to 3% of...

(30-Jul-09) Consumers have almost non-stop appetites for watching video on the Internet, a habit that bidders for financially troubled Nortel Networks will consider when they look at its technology for bandwidth hunger. A key unit of Nortel...

Knowledge of basic accounting can make a huge difference in measuring the costs and profitability of an IT department. Understand accounting basics in order to recognize how purchases influence IT.

IT departments must plan for enterprise-wide budget cutbacks to avoid being unable to meet service level expectations. Pre-empt spending cuts by rightsizing IT services.

According to early statistics in a new Info-Tech Research Group study, more than 80% of IT departments are taking action to cut and monitor spending. In light of these results, the research firm urges overly optimistic IT leaders who haven't...

The combination of low call center costs, a solid telecommunications infrastructure, and an educated workforce has made the Philippines an attractive option for North American companies struggling to reduce costs in a challenging economy, a new...

Despite heavy government intervention to allay further financial crises, many US and Canadian Information Technology leaders are anticipating budget impact from the downturn and should be preparing to manage with less, a recent poll by Info-Tech...

Tool

Though it will require some estimate of future benefit, attempt to quantify the ROI of training. As long as an estimate can be reasonably backed up by facts, you should get a rough idea of the expected benefit from training. This can help in...

Enterprises in the Financial Services sector are, in general, spending more on IT security and have a greater level of satisfaction with their budgets than do their peers in other industries. Nonetheless, IT leaders for these businesses...

Note

With all of the demands placed on today's IT departments, reducing the cost of the output fleet (printers, scanners, fax machines, copiers and multi-function peripherals (MFPs)) is not at the top of the list of priorities for most department...