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Software AG updates webMethods BPM suite Software AG plans to unveil details of Version 7.1 of the webMethods business process management suite on Wednesday, along with a new enterprise service bus (ESB) and a supply chain performance optimization tool. Pundits on parade: What’s next in tech You’ve heard of Christmas in July, that classic advertising gimmick designed to lure shoppers into stores despite the oppressive heat and humidity. We’ll, we’ve got New Year’s in August, which invites you to stay indoors and read “The next big things in IT” -- 15 predictions about the future of technology.  August 20, 3:00 a.m. PDT SAP describes road ahead for its PLM software Business applications vendor SAP on Wednesday laid out the future path for its product lifecycle management (PLM) software over the next three-plus years. August 8, 4:24 a.m. PDT Weird tech: Raw fish ID When James Allard lived in Japan as a student in the 1990s, he frequented kaiten sushi restaurants, which keep prices low by circulating dishes on a conveyor belt rather than making nigiri, sashimi, and sushi rolls to order. The problem he observed was that dishes stayed on the belt too long, losing freshness and becoming unappetizing. July 30, 3:00 a.m. PDT Oracle updates Demantra one year after purchase Oracle Corp. has released the first major new version of its demand management software a year after acquiring the technology through the purchase of Demantra. June 25, 9:54 a.m. PDT SAP still on track with A1S Executives of German business software maker SAP remain committed to a first-quarter 2008 launch of the company's hosted midmarket application despite acknowledging problems with product development. May 14, 8:57 a.m. PDT Recipe for disaster There have been so many food contamination episodes in the past several months -- tainted spinach at the supermarket, bad green onions at Taco Bell, salmonella in our beloved peanut butter, courtesy of Peter Pan -- that I decided to do a little digging and see whether technology can take a role in the prevention of future outbreaks. March 13, 3:00 a.m. PST Timely coverage Usually daylight-saving time is no big deal. We “spring ahead,” grumble briefly about an hour of lost sleep, and get on with life. This year could be different. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 advanced DST by three weeks, forcing IT managers into a feverish patch-fest, as they scramble to make sure their systems can handle the March 11 transition. March 12, 3:00 a.m. PST Tech 101 for startups “It’s not the old guard in manufacturing anymore. Now there is a new guard” that understands technology and can digest the information and knowledge that advanced business applications offer to young, growing companies. March 6, 3:00 a.m. PST More IT war stories Off the Record, the real-world slice of life that graces the last page of InfoWorld, is one of our most popular columns. I know this from reader surveys and from all the e-mail I receive about it. As reader Roland Sickenberger put it recently, “It’s my favorite part of the magazine, kind of like a ‘Dilbert come to life’ thing.” March 5, 3:00 a.m. PST Women in technology: A call to action A quick scan of almost any IT department -- from the trenches to the corner office -- confirms it: Women who embrace technology as a lifelong career remain a rare breed. To be sure, opportunity for women in technology has advanced in the past few decades, as have education initiatives aimed at leveling the playing field, but for every woman rising to prominence or embarking on a profession in IT, there seems to be another opting out of her career in technology. January 29, 3:03 a.m. PST Back to school: Getting girls into IT Despite the success of various education initiatives in the past several years, there’s little doubt that the shortage of women in technology begins on the playground. As such, many industry leaders and experts believe the long-term solution to the gender imbalance in IT lies in women technologists going back to school -- way back, to high schools and even elementary schools to mentor young girls, who too often give up on math and science at an early age. January 29, 3:02 a.m. PST Activism provides competitive advantage for IT Encountering another woman working in technology was a rare event for me when I started out in IT many years ago. In the years since, women have made significant strides, sometimes against great odds, proving their mettle as both tech execs and engineers. January 29, 3:01 a.m. PST Gender crisis in IT You don’t need a degree in statistics to recognize that IT is a men’s club. Just walk the floor of any tech conference or, in all likelihood, your own office — XY chromosomes everywhere you look. January 29, 3:00 a.m. PST Technology of the Gods January is named after Janus, the two-faced Roman deity of beginnings and endings, who reportedly was able to look both forward and back. So for our Jan. 1 issue, we pay homage to the mythological immortal with our seventh annual Technology of the Year Awards, an analysis of where IT has been and where it’s going in 2007. January 1, 3:00 a.m. PST Review of reviews It’s coming up on closing time for 2006. All around us, everyone is going into holiday mode. Not to be curmudgeonly contrarians, InfoWorld will be following suit, taking a one-week break before returning on Jan. 1 with our first print issue of the year. (It’s really only a semi-hiatus; InfoWorld.com will continue to perk over the holidays with a slightly reduced slate of stories.) December 18, 3:00 a.m. PST Mining profits upstream and down If you work in IT for a big oil company, you know that your company (and probably your IT shop) is divided into two parts: upstream and downstream. Upstream is exploration and production of the oil. Downstream is the distribution through retail channels (aka gas stations) to the consumer. December 8, 3:00 a.m. PST Good ideas take time Two years ago, I publicly floated the concept that IT should start thinking more like entrepreneurs. What a disaster! I was speaking at a meeting of CTOs, and I mentioned that I’d heard of a few IT departments that were focusing, at least in part, on creating saleable new products and services for their companies. I asked the group what they thought of the idea. December 4, 3:00 a.m. PST The carbon-adjusted supply chain At the Emerging Technologies Conference at MIT in September, Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos gave a keynote talk on the slew of new and innovative Web services his company has recently launched. His discussion of MTurk, S3, and EC2 held no surprises for me, or for readers of this column and of my blog. But one of the questions posed by an attendee, in the Q&A period following Bezos’ talk, was a stunner. November 22, 3:00 a.m. PST SAP, Microsoft plan more Duet features and new version Businesses interested in Duet, the software application jointly developed by Microsoft and SAP, can look forward to new features and a new version of the product over the next several months. November 15, 5:22 a.m. PST 2006 InfoWorld 100 Awards: Distribution/Supply Chain Avnet www.avnet.com Rebate Management System for SOA Environment Project Lead: Bill Chapman, CTO Project Description: Rebate Management System was conceived as a part of Avnet's enterprisewide SOA. The solution was developed using Fair Isaac's Blaze Advisor business rules management solution, with Avnet creating Java EJB services to attach it to Avnet's SOA. Avnet used Web services, Oracle Stored Procedures, and JMS messages to call the business rules engine and to process massive amounts of Oracle-based data. This provided the latest rebate information and real-time monitoring for customers against dynamic sales goals. Avnet created the rules framework with reusable components, establishing the scope of knowledge and logic foundation. It used WebMethodsand Informatica software as the middleware layers to integrate ARMS with more than 10 systems, including order management, invoicing, CRM, ERP, and HR. November 13, 3:00 a.m. PST Springhill Medical Center emerges from the paper age For software developers, a crucial metric of success is the ability of their organization’s employees to get solid results from the applications the developers build, a practice known in the industry as “eating one’s own dog food.” Mark Kilborn, a regional CIO of Eclipsys, has spent the past three years helping Springhill Medical Center in Mobile, Ala., in its effort to automate emergency department procedures. He got to witness the results of his team’s project when, in early October, his 14-year-old son broke his wrist playing football. November 13, 3:00 a.m. PST Redefining innovation Innovative ideas are a dime a dozen, according to Jim Andrew, senior partner at big-time consultancy BCG. In fact, at most companies, coming up with great concepts for a product, service, or process isn’t even an issue. But turning those ideas into money … ah, there’s the rub. October 30, 3:00 a.m. PST I2 sues SAP over patent infringement I2 Technologies accused SAP of patent infringement in a lawsuit filed Tuesday. September 6, 6:48 a.m. PDT Waging war on the bottom line Delivering IT capabilities is one thing. Justifying your expenditures is something else — particularly in the government sector. In the ongoing effort to modernize and consolidate U.S. Transportation Command’s IT infrastructure, demonstrating ROI is a key issue. August 28, 3:00 a.m. PDT Streamlining the ultimate supply chain U.S. Transportation Command, the division of the Department of Defense responsible for worldwide air, land, and sea transportation for the U.S. armed services, manages the mother of all supply chains. It distributes matériel to every corner of the defense enterprise — including durable goods, fuel and consumable supplies, hazardous materials, perishables, and even personnel. August 28, 3:00 a.m. PDT HP axes Global Operations in realignment Hewlett-Packard said Tuesday it will dissolve its Global Operations organization and delegate the group's activities to the company's three main business groups as part of an ongoing companywide restructuring. June 21, 4:46 a.m. PDT Oracle snaps up supply chain management vendor Oracle is to acquire yet another business applications vendor, this time scooping up supply chain management company Demantra for an undisclosed sum, Oracle announced Thursday. June 1, 3:57 a.m. PDT Microsoft to deliver CRM in China Microsoft is joining with channel partner CDC to deliver various applications in China using the software-as-a-service model, Microsoft announced Wednesday. May 24, 6:21 a.m. PDT SSA buy spawns new software giant Roll over, Oracle. Infor’s acquisition of SSA Global for $1.4 billion last week creates a new enterprise software giant that claims to be ready to do battle with the big players. May 22, 3:00 a.m. PDT SAP buys its way into on-demand SRM SAP AG is buying its way into providing on-demand supplier relationship management (SRM) software through the planned all-cash purchase of Frictionless Commerce Inc. announced Wednesday. May 17, 10:06 a.m. PDT TrueDemand keeps retailers from running out of stock For 30 years, retail supply chains -- manufacturers, warehouses, delivery systems, and retailers -- have struggled to eliminate running out of stock. Not only does it kill sales for a given item, but studies show it also causes some buyers to delay shopping altogether until the back-ordered item arrives. According to the Grocery Marketing Association, the out-of-stock percentage for all retailers hovers around 7 percent. May 15, 3:00 a.m. PDT Tech startups to watch Startups are back! or at least, startup fever is back. Scan the latest numbers from PricewaterhouseCoopers and you won’t find any hockey sticks -- the level of investment in enterprise-related technology startups has actually remained fairly flat, hovering between $1.5 and $2.3 billion per quarter from 2003 through 2005. May 15, 3:00 a.m. PDT Fine-tuning your supply chain The McKinsey Quarterly is out with an interesting look at the challenges of consolidating supply chain data -- and some advice for focusing IT resources to make sure you’re capturing the data that matters most. April 21, 3:00 a.m. PDT Next-gen RFID tools expand the market Despite the hype, the truth is that RFID deployments made little headway in 2005. New standards, prohibitive costs, and the lack of upper-level business context left most companies tuned out to this much-ballyhooed technology. April 13, 3:00 a.m. PDT Lawson's ERP upgrade adds SOA capabilities Lawson Software has announced a new version of its ERP applications that includes SOA (services-oriented architecture) capabilities delivered through a middleware partnership with IBM. March 16, 5:34 a.m. PST SAP extends virtualization to Microsoft platforms SAP announced a move to extend the adaptive computing capabilities of its NetWeaver integration platform to Microsoft environments, among other product enhancements, on the opening day of the Cebit trade show. March 9, 4:18 a.m. PST SAP staff go to court over workers' council Three union employees at SAP have turned to a German court to help win support for the establishment of a workers' council after a majority of employees voted against the idea at a meeting last week. March 6, 4:32 a.m. PST SAP employees in Germany vote against workers' council Employees at SAP's German headquarters voted late Thursday evening against establishing a workers' council. March 3, 4:18 a.m. PST SAP steps into the software-as-a-service arena It’s as momentous as when the Union Pacific met the Central Pacific and the final, golden, spike was driven at Promontory Summit, Utah, completing the transcontinental railroad -- not that in high tech anyone would notice an event as significant. I can’t even predict for you all the innovations that will be generated from the recent developments, but I will give you my thoughts. January 31, 3:00 a.m. PST SAP launches new premium support offer Business application vendor SAP is adding a new support service targeting customers who want more than the company's standard offering, but not its pricier high-end service product. January 30, 4:23 a.m. PST SAP reports one of its best years ever SAP, the world's largest supplier of business application software, is letting the numbers speak for themselves: eight consecutive quarters of double-digit growth, record-breaking fourth quarter sales, higher profits, and more employees. The figures the company presented Wednesday at a news conference in Frankfurt are among the company's best ever. January 25, 7:38 a.m. PST SAP: 2006 software revenue to increase up to 17 percent Business applications vendor SAP expects its revenue from software to increase by between 15 percent and 17 percent this year, it announced Wednesday. January 25, 4:21 a.m. PST Software as a service: Pay as you build, but at what cost? See correction below January 24, 3:00 a.m. PST SAP merges North and South American sales Business application vendor SAP is merging its North American and Latin American business operations into one organization in a move aimed at increasing sales and market share. January 12, 7:39 a.m. PST A channel play for SaaS in 2006 Microsoft’s competitors are ridiculing what they claim is Redmond’s half-hearted entry into the world of SaaS (software as a service) with CRM 3.0. In numerous conversations I’ve been told, “It shouldn’t even be called SaaS. They’re not even hosting it. They are just reselling their solution to VARs.” January 3, 3:00 a.m. PST Top technologies of the year Welcome to our first issue of the year. For those of you who took a break, re-entry into the heady universe of work may be a bit discombobulating. Fortunately, last Saturday, the world’s ever-considerate timekeepers saw fit to give us an extra sliver of time -- a leap second-- to prep for the new year. And now, with the pop of the cork (or was that the buzz of a pager?), we’re ready to herald 2006, a potential banner year for the enterprise. January 2, 3:00 a.m. PST Microsoft launches upgrade of project-based software A new version of Microsoft's project-based business management software, called Dynamics SL 6.5, will be available Monday in the U.S. and Canada, the company said Thursday. December 16, 4:31 a.m. PST NATO upgrades and expands RFID network The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has awarded a contract to upgrade and support an RFID (radio frequency identification) network launched last year to track multinational defense consignments between Europe and Afghanistan. December 14, 4:29 a.m. PST Do-it-yourself software services? If you’re a regular reader of my column, you know that I’ve been looking closely at the pluses and minuses of the SaaS (software as a service) model recently. SaaS solutions let you easily deploy standard functionality across a wide spectrum of users cheaply, as opposed to best-of-breed, on-premises applications, which cost more but offer product and competitive differentiation. December 13, 3:00 a.m. PST Doctors turn to PDAs I don't usually watch ER-type TV shows, but I've lately been intrigued by the latest ABC hit, Grey's Anatomy. If you've seen it, then you know that the whole staff of Seattle Grace Hospital is young, has lots of sex, and hardly ever sleeps. But have you noticed that they don't spend much time at computers either? December 9, 3:00 a.m. PST SAP nears end of battle for SAP SI SAP hopes to end its long battle to acquire the remaining shares in SAP Systems Integration (SAP SI) that it doesn't already own. December 5, 4:29 a.m. PST Beating the competition If InfoWorld were seeking a mantra, we might just opt for “IT is the business,” a quote from Netflix’s Tom Dillon. Interviewed in this week’s cover story, “Why IT gives business a competitive edge”, the movie-rental company’s COO was asserting that IT should be integral to a business’s goals, not an afterthought or simply a support mechanism. The conclusion: When fully aligned -- even woven into -- core business strategy, IT can foster competitive advantage and drive market leadership. InfoWorld shares that belief deep in its bones. December 5, 3:00 a.m. PST Software as a service moves beyond the sales force There’s no denying that SaaS (software as a service) and Salesforce.com have together reshaped the CRM segment of enterprise software. I’ve written about the pluses and minuses of SaaS before. This time I thought I would look at some other software categories where SaaS will have a major impact, including PLM (product lifecycle management) and project/portfolio management. November 29, 3:00 a.m. PST Mitrix lands first customer for hosted SCM system A new entrant in the SCM (supply-chain management) software market, Mitrix Inc., signed up its first enterprise customer this week and released an update to its hosted application, SCM Live 3.1. November 23, 3:34 p.m. PST Span-Alaska freezes out legacy supply-chain system Imagine hundreds of 18-wheelers rolling into Span-Alaska's warehouse every week, each carrying as much as 28 tons of cargo from hundreds of different shippers. Each trailer must be off-loaded, and every manifest must be sent to the back office, where it is logged in and rated before goods are reloaded onto containers. And the job doesn't end there. November 14, 3:00 a.m. PST SAP updates software for small businesses SAP Monday released a new version of its Business One suite that features changes driven by feedback from its small-business customers. October 24, 6:57 a.m. PDT Update: SAP raises full-year forecast on strong Q3 sales Strong third-quarter license revenue has prompted SAP AG to raise its full-year forecast, as the German business application vendor continued to grow its market share in the U.S. October 20, 4:26 a.m. PDT IBM expands midmarket software line IBM has added to its Express line of software for midsized businesses with 22 new products in areas including security, supply chain management and backup and recovery, the company announced Monday. October 10, 6:31 a.m. PDT Microsoft issues service pack for Navision 4.0 Microsoft announced Monday the release of Service Pack 1 for its Navision 4.0 software, adding a Web-based portal for employees that allows them to handle company information on a secure intranet. October 10, 6:22 a.m. PDT The end of 'one throat to choke'? OK, first let's dispel two myths foisted on us by big-name software industry personalities. September 20, 4:00 a.m. PDT Dirty words, take II My column "IT's Seven Dirty Words" -- a subjective list of terms that shouldn't be repeated in polite IT company -- generated piles of e-mail from readers who were quick to add a few choice words of their own. In the interest of sharing, let me reproduce a few of their suggestions. September 5, 4:00 a.m. PDT The real returns of RFID Despite the hype associated with RFID, when you hear success stories from a very large organization, you have to believe there really is something there. August 9, 5:00 a.m. PDT Farewell, CTO Connection If you haven’t checked out this week’s columns yet, let me be the one to break the bad news: Chad Dickerson is hanging up his InfoWorld CTO spurs and heading off to Yahoo, where he’ll be toiling away in the brave new world of search. August 8, 5:00 a.m. PDT A buyer's guide to open source Build or buy? It's a question that vexes every enterprise IT manager. On the one hand, developing applications from scratch can be a difficult endeavor, one fraught with the possibility of failure. On the other hand, high price tags and the aggravation of installation, maintenance, and support contracts can make purchasing a commercial package equally painful. August 8, 5:00 a.m. PDT Open source CRM The open source community can't provide a drop-in replacement for expensive, high-end CRM applications from the likes of Salesforce.com or Siebel just yet. Still, you might be surprised at the level of sophistication some of the available projects already offer, particularly for midsize organizations. August 8, 5:00 a.m. PDT Open source RFID If there's one area of the IT industry that's gotten as much buzz as open source itself during the past year, it's RFID. So far, however, it's been a big-ticket item, with its strongest backing coming from megaretailers such as Wal-Mart. Companies have had to rely on expensive commercial packages to get the ball rolling in their own businesses, but that could be set to change. Founded by two Canadian entrepreneurs, the RadioActive Foundation aims to develop a suite of open source RFID applications that support EPC (Electronic Product Code) and other standards from the EPCGlobal Network. August 8, 5:00 a.m. PDT Midmarket CRM vendors release bumper crop of updates As vendors jockey for position in the crowded midmarket enterprise applications field, their customers reap the benefits in rapid product enhancements. A half-dozen ERP (enterprise resource planning) and CRM (customer relationship management) software makers are in the midst of major software releases right now, bringing deeper integration options and added customization features to their applications. August 5, 4:28 p.m. PDT Update: SAP revenue and income rise on software sales SAP reported a rise in net income and revenue for the second quarter, driven by increased sales of its ERP (enterprise resource planning) software in the Americas and Asia. July 21, 6:05 a.m. PDT SAP offers Safe Passage program to midsize firms In a move to attract a larger number of customers from rival Oracle, business application software vendor SAP is extending its Safe Passage program to include small and mid-size enterprises (SMEs) worldwide. June 29, 7:35 a.m. PDT SAP to buy Lighthammer to improve manufacturing apps Business application vendor SAP has reached an agreement to acquire Lighthammer Software Development in a move to help boost the German software company's expertise in manufacturing applications. June 22, 9:35 a.m. PDT In search of the perfect price point A year ago I rarely heard the term price optimization. Now on any given day my inbox has two or three e-mails announcing software with that capability. In addition, during the last year and a half the big four consulting firms have all added pricing optimization practices to their portfolios. June 14, 5:00 a.m. PDT Siebel approves dividend to appease shareholders Siebel Systems said Wednesday it will begin paying quarterly dividends, a move made to appease shareholders growing restless about Siebel's large stash of unspent cash. June 8, 9:27 a.m. PDT Putting a stop to counterfeit products Although a bottle of bogus Viagra might prove to be a big disappointment, a counterfeit bottle of a heart medication such as Lipitor could be deadly. On the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy’s list of drugs most susceptible to adulteration and/or counterfeiting, Viagra is No. 23 and Lipitor is No. 10. In 2003 more than 200,000 bottles of phony Lipitor were found on the shelves of major drugstore chains. June 7, 5:00 a.m. PDT Lawson acquires enterprise-software vendor Intentia June 2, 7:54 a.m. PDT SAP arrives at Home Depot Bob DeRodes, executive vice president and chief information officer of The Home Depot, admits that the home improvement company, North America's second largest retailer and a Fortune 13 company, hasn't been on the cutting edge of information technology. June 1, 8:30 a.m. PDT Sapphire show addresses SMBs BOSTON - In a move to broaden its customer base, SAP AG has launched a new channel partner program aimed at small and medium-size businesses (SMBs). The program was unveiled at the company's Sapphire user event in Boston, which ends Thursday. May 19, 3:22 p.m. PDT SAP wins Home Depot, JPMorgan BOSTON -- German business applications vendor SAP, which is battling rival Oracle for customers in the important U.S. market, announced two new contracts at its Sapphire user event in Boston on Wednesday. May 18, 8:43 a.m. PDT SAP targets SMBs with new channel program BOSTON -- With an eye to biting out a bigger chunk of the small and mid-size business (SMB) market for business application software, SAP AG has launched a new tiered channel partner program that offers a wide range of incentives to drive sales. May 18, 7:49 a.m. PDT Lawson Software buys into IBM's SOA vision Lawson Software will work with IBM to develop new service oriented architecture (SOA) interfaces to its line of business application software, the two companies announced Wednesday. May 12, 4:28 a.m. PDT The great business process handoff During the past 15 years, standards such as Java, Windows, and TCP/IP have made it much easier to outsource various aspects of IT, spawning a huge IT outsourcing industry. But that trend may pale in comparison to the next outsourcing wave: BPO (business-process outsourcing). May 9, 5:00 a.m. PDT SAP's business with SMBs grows steadily COPENHAGEN, DENMARK -- SAP's sales to small and medium-size business (SMBs) are growing steadily and could grow even faster with the launch of a new channel program planned in the third quarter, according to Donna Troy, senior vice president of global small and medium business. April 28, 5:45 a.m. PDT SAP expands in the public sector, unveils wares German business software vendor SAP opened its Sapphire European user conference in sunny Copenhagen with a flurry of announcements, highlighting some of the company's new partnerships and product enhancements. April 26, 6:17 a.m. PDT Update: SAP increases Q1 profit on strong U.S. sales German business software vendor SAP reported Thursday an 11 percent increase in first-quarter net income on strong sales, particularly in the U.S. April 21, 8:34 a.m. PDT An irresistible supply-chain story Want to hear what could be one of the best supply-chain success stories ever? Take the $4 billion commercial and consumer equipment division of a $20 billion company, reduce inventory by $500 million, and as sales grow, keep inventory constant -- thus avoiding an additional $500 million in inventory. This is what John Deere did starting in 2002, with the help of supply-chain optimization software vendor SmartOps. April 19, 5:00 a.m. PDT Supply on demand See correction below April 18, 5:00 a.m. PDT Ahead of the supply-chain curve Demand-driven supply chains are more common in some industries than in others. The electronics, automotive, pharmaceutical, and aerospace industries are furthest ahead, because they either have short product lifecycles or rely on just-in-time manufacturing to keep down overhead costs. Some update their demand plans hourly, forcing them to share more information across the supply chain to ensure optimum levels of production and delivery. April 18, 5:00 a.m. PDT A field guide to software as a service Everywhere you turn, another company pops up offering SaaS (software as a service). Inspired by the success of Salesforce.com, SaaS vendors are hoping customers large and small will get the message: Browser-based, pay-as-you-go applications mean fewer servers for your IT department to maintain and less capital to shake loose from the CFO for software licenses and hardware. April 18, 5:00 a.m. PDT NEC and Sun extend systems integration partnership NEC and Sun Microsystems will work more closely together in the areas of systems integration, network technologies, and middleware, the companies said Tuesday. April 5, 4:37 a.m. PDT Quest pays CA $16 million to settle lawsuit Quest Software has agreed to pay $16 million plus additional royalties to Computer Associates International to settle a lawsuit CA filed in 2002 accusing Quest of illegally using CA source code, the companies said Thursday. The deal also resolves Quest counterclaims challenging the validity of some CA copyrights. March 24, 6:58 a.m. PST RFID for asset tracking Earlier this month, I went to Palo Alto, Calif., to meet with scientists Cyril Brignone, Craig Sayers, and Salil Pradhan. They demonstrated for me a practical IT asset-tracking solution for datacenters, designed around RFID technology and software visualization. March 22, 6:00 a.m. PST Update: Oracle overcomes SAP to acquire Retek Oracle has won its bidding war against German software rival SAP to acquire retail management software developer Retek, Oracle said on Tuesday. March 22, 4:46 a.m. PST The marriage of manufacturing and retail As this week's issue went to press, Oracle and SAP were still battling to acquire retail management software vendor Retek. The real story, though, isn’t about who wins the prize but what’s inside the box. March 18, 3:00 p.m. PST Demand-driven manufacturing: Burn those spreadsheets The Aberdeen Group says that 92 percent of all manufacturers use spreadsheets for production planning and scheduling. I spoke with See’s Candy, a chocolate manufacturer with about 200 wholly-owned retail outlets, mostly on the West Coast, and Wise Foods, the East Coast’s premier potato chip manufacturer, which has more than 400 potato chip SKUs. Both companies recently gave up their spreadsheets and transitioned to a single platform for production planning, packaging, and inventory management. March 11, 3:00 p.m. PST Amazon cooking up search, Web products in India BANGALORE, INDIA -- Amazon.com has pulled back the curtain on its new development center in Bangalore, India to reveal it is focused on developing technologies in the area of search and Web services, according to an executive of the company. March 9, 4:51 a.m. PST SAP acquires U.S. retail software specialist In a vertical move to broaden its offerings for customers in the retail sector, German business software vendor SAP has agreed to acquire Retek, a developer of retail management software. February 28, 6:56 a.m. PST Seven strategies for highly effective buyers When Oracle released version 6 of its database, Jay Hemmady, then CIO of an information services provider in the trucking sector, decided it was time to take a calculated risk. Knowing Oracle was in a tough financial position, "we took the opportunity to negotiate incredible pricing," Hemmady says. But Hemmady and his team didn't stop there. They locked in provisions for future licensing as well. "Even five years after signing up with them, our licensing and support costs were unbelievably low," he adds. February 18, 3:00 p.m. PST New Navision head eyes expansion Microsoft this week has appointed Mogens Elsberg as the new head of its Navision enterprise applications business, in charge of leading product strategy and managing partner relationships. January 18, 8:17 a.m. PST Modernizing product development The past few years have seen companies doing everything they can to reduce costs. From outsourcing and offshoring to RIFs (reductions in force), the byword has been, “Cut expenses.” But if most of the economists are right, 2005 will be a much better year, and companies will go back to concentrating on increasing revenue. January 14, 3:00 p.m. PST Mary Kay rejuvenates its supply chain Talk about an extreme makeover. November 12, 3:00 p.m. PST > Applications > Business > Data management |
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