IBM announces their Federal Cloud offering just as GSA completes their migration away from Notes...
Category IBM/Lotus
Back on July 20th, Ed Brill announced that IBM was set to offer up a US Federal Cloud Collaboration offering consisting of FISMA-compliant data centers hosting Connections, Sametime, and Domino/iNotes. Against that backdrop, GSA made the news in the IT press this week by completing their migration away from on-premises Lotus Notes to Google Apps for Government. It apparently took Unisys six months to migrate 17000 employees over to the new platform. I don't know if they migrated mail or started fresh or what, but six months isn't too bad in either case. I know how slow huge organizations can be...
On one hand, I'm happy to see that IBM has finally addressed the market for government cloud computing. In one of the battles they lost for a government contract, the IBM spokesperson was quoted as saying that pursuing FISMA certification wasn't overly important to their plans. That told me that they were going to concede the government market for email, as moving government agencies to the cloud for email systems is a high priority now. Someone either wised up or the original IBM spokesperson "misspoke". Either way, it's nice to see that IBM now has the pieces in place to be allowed at the table.
On the other hand, are they considered a viable option?
In the various stories about the GSA migration, I've seen reference to 15 agencies who are currently moving to the cloud or who have made decisions to do so and picked vendors. The only names I've seen mentioned are Microsoft and Google as the winning vendors. Scattered around the online articles are links to stories that compare Google Apps with Office 365. You even have this line at the end of the GSA article:
Google and Microsoft are in a heated battle to win government cloud contracts for agencies that choose a public option.
The press either doesn't know IBM even has a cloud offering, or they don't think it's viable. Realistically, you mention cloud email to most people, and you'll hear either Microsoft or Google mentioned as the dominant offerings. If you're not already on Lotus Notes, you probably don't even know IBM *has* a cloud offering based on marketing and advertising, and it seems that far too many companies that *are* on Lotus Notes want to move to the cloud with one of those other two vendors for reasons that may or may not be accurate or valid. But that really doesn't matter, as their perception is their reality, and that's where the money ends up.
If people who aren't on Notes don't think of IBM for cloud email, and people who are on Notes are leaning to either Microsoft or Google, that doesn't bode well for market share unless you can raise your visibility significantly to businesses of all sizes... from government monoliths to the local medical clinic. Ed has mentioned that he knows this is an issue and needs to be addressed, but that seems to be at odds with overall IBM marketing wanting to talk about "solutions" and not necessarily products.
With each passing week, more decisions are made, and money gets spent for long-term commitments to new platforms. I hope the visibility issue gets addressed very soon...
Back on July 20th, Ed Brill announced that IBM was set to offer up a US Federal Cloud Collaboration offering consisting of FISMA-compliant data centers hosting Connections, Sametime, and Domino/iNotes. Against that backdrop, GSA made the news in the IT press this week by completing their migration away from on-premises Lotus Notes to Google Apps for Government. It apparently took Unisys six months to migrate 17000 employees over to the new platform. I don't know if they migrated mail or started fresh or what, but six months isn't too bad in either case. I know how slow huge organizations can be...
On one hand, I'm happy to see that IBM has finally addressed the market for government cloud computing. In one of the battles they lost for a government contract, the IBM spokesperson was quoted as saying that pursuing FISMA certification wasn't overly important to their plans. That told me that they were going to concede the government market for email, as moving government agencies to the cloud for email systems is a high priority now. Someone either wised up or the original IBM spokesperson "misspoke". Either way, it's nice to see that IBM now has the pieces in place to be allowed at the table.
On the other hand, are they considered a viable option?
In the various stories about the GSA migration, I've seen reference to 15 agencies who are currently moving to the cloud or who have made decisions to do so and picked vendors. The only names I've seen mentioned are Microsoft and Google as the winning vendors. Scattered around the online articles are links to stories that compare Google Apps with Office 365. You even have this line at the end of the GSA article:
Google and Microsoft are in a heated battle to win government cloud contracts for agencies that choose a public option.
The press either doesn't know IBM even has a cloud offering, or they don't think it's viable. Realistically, you mention cloud email to most people, and you'll hear either Microsoft or Google mentioned as the dominant offerings. If you're not already on Lotus Notes, you probably don't even know IBM *has* a cloud offering based on marketing and advertising, and it seems that far too many companies that *are* on Lotus Notes want to move to the cloud with one of those other two vendors for reasons that may or may not be accurate or valid. But that really doesn't matter, as their perception is their reality, and that's where the money ends up.
If people who aren't on Notes don't think of IBM for cloud email, and people who are on Notes are leaning to either Microsoft or Google, that doesn't bode well for market share unless you can raise your visibility significantly to businesses of all sizes... from government monoliths to the local medical clinic. Ed has mentioned that he knows this is an issue and needs to be addressed, but that seems to be at odds with overall IBM marketing wanting to talk about "solutions" and not necessarily products.
With each passing week, more decisions are made, and money gets spent for long-term commitments to new platforms. I hope the visibility issue gets addressed very soon...
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Comments
Thomas, you're dead on target about visibility to businesses of all sizes. Consider that 99.7% of all companies in the U.S. are small businesses. (check out more interesting facts at { Link } )
Innovation starts with small businesses (they produce 13 times more patents than big businesses) and they are the first to adopt new technologies. I have written and spoken on this topic often.
But hey, who are we to think we know more about marketing than IBM? How arrogant of us little people!
Posted by David (The Notes Guy in Seattle) At 23:33:52 On 28/07/2011 | - Website - |
Posted by Domino Admin At 11:05:36 On 21/10/2011 | - Website - |
Posted by Another Domino Admin At 12:37:25 On 11/11/2011 | - Website - |
Posted by Thomas Duff At 14:33:33 On 11/11/2011 | - Website - |