Microsoft’s planned Parature acquisition will improve Dynamics CRM customer support app to compete more successfully with Salesforce.com and Oracle RightNow. 7 Mistakes Microsoft Made In 2013 (Click image for larger view and slideshow.) Microsoft announced Tuesday that it has reached an agreement to accumulate Parature, a cloud-based provider of purchaser-service capabilities if you want to complement Microsoft’s Dynamics CRM application. Parature is a 13-year-old company that delivers Web- and mobile-access knowledge-bases, live chat, survey and feedback systems, and social monitoring and response functionality. The Herndon, Va.-based firm has greater than 500 customers. Its 2012 revenue was $16.4 million, in keeping with Inc. magazine. The terms and timing of the deal weren’t disclosed, but one news outlet citing unnamed sources put the price of the transaction at $100 million. Microsoft executives said adding Parature will fill in gaps in Dynamics CRM, that is largely taken with case management and on serving because the container for all service interactions with customers. “With Parature, we’ll integrate multiple channels,... Read More »

In effort to trim $1.5 billion from IT, Navy proposes placing most non-classified data into commercial cloud offering. Internet Of items: 8 Cost-Cutting Ideas For Government (Click image for larger view and slideshow.) In its ongoing efforts to attenuate network and IT infrastructure costs, the U.S. Navy desires to move most of its non-classified, publically available data to a commercially provided cloud, cut the variety of Navy data centers from 150 to twenty-five, and eliminate redundant costs including duplicative software applications. The move reflects the Navy’s want to cut $1.3 billion from its IT budget, and cloud-based data storage is a price-effective option, Navy CIO Terry Halvorsen told executives at a central authority IT event in Washington D.C. on March 13. a considerable portion of those savings would come from consolidating the Navy’s data centers and adopting cloud computing and virtualization for many of the service’s non-classified data, Halvorsen said, adding that the Navy would continue to maintain mission-sensitive and demanding information in its classified... Read More »

Fidelity Investments works with ElectroRack, Delta Computer, and CPS to present an innovative new rack design to the Open Compute Project. 6 Ways SDN Shakes Up The Enterprise (Click image for larger view and slideshow.) As the Open Compute Summit ended last week, details emerged of the second one user-originated design of the Open Compute Project: a convertible datacenter rack designed by Fidelity Investments. Fidelity designed the rack to fulfill the desires of its telco providers within the carrier room, where facilities from different communications suppliers are brought together, while continuing its traditional datacenter operations. The telcos wanted a 23-inch design, but a lot of Fidelity’s datacenters require the EIA-standard 19-inch rack that’s utilized by most enterprises. These requirements fit with the Open Rack design initially submitted by Facebook. Its version, which serves as a building block of the company’s air-cooled datacenter complex in Prineville, Ore., is a 23-inch rack that permits for spread-out components on a motherboard. Fidelity’s convertible design incorporates dual-sided internal vertical... Read More »

CIOs can learn from Consumerization 2.0 issues akin to restless employees, shadow IT, and BYOD. According to Gartner, in 2012-2013, 64% of enterprises said mobility projects forged ahead without the total involvement of IT, with employees acquiring connected mobile devices, personal DropBox accounts, or even developing personal applications through Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure. “We do not need IT anymore” became the tagline for the consumerization of IT 1.0 movement during the last few years where employees moved to independence through programs like bring-your-own-device (BYOD). By the tip of 2013, even cautious companies in heavily regulated industries started to embrace this consumerization. Just 18 months ago, Wells Fargo stated that BYOD wasn’t within the cards, but today the bank is testing its use/rollout. There has been a time when CIOs thought that tablets had no need in a business environment. Now tablets are changing the manner employees communicate, especially those within the field. The CIO of Verizon Wireless indicated that its field technicians have reinvented... Read More »

Courting the socially connected should help make games more profitable. Web Turns 25: 10 Graphics To See (Click image for larger view and slideshow.) Casinos for years have pursued “whales,” gamblers who spend quite a lot of money, called “high rollers.” They are trying to entice them to go to with lavish perks, like free rooms and free airfare. With the increase of mobile devices, online social games, and the free-to-play business model, the pc gaming industry has joined the quest. It isn’t hard to work out why: 0.15% of players account for half the in-app purchase revenue in free-to-play games, in step with Swrve, an in-app marketing company. Winning the affinity of those few big spenders could make a tremendous difference in a game’s profitability. At the sport Developers Conference in San Francisco on Monday, Dmitri Williams, CEO of NinjaMetrics and associate professor at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication, made the case for going after another species of whale: the social whale. Williams argues that,... Read More »