Top Stories:
- Herd of chickens?
- Leaving it to Larry
- Herd of chickens?
Who can blame farmers for not falling at Telecom’s feet as it tries to convince them that it has all the answers for their broadband needs? Isn’t this the same company that bleated endlessly about how it has to bear the onerous burden of providing voice services to the rural sector?
And yet out trots rural solutions manager Seagar Mason to tell Fieldays visitors that “The e-farming engine is revving, it’s time to put New Zealand in gear and move ahead, at high speed”. Telecom has signed a $1 million sponsorship deal with the National Fieldays Society to create an online showcase for agricultural developments and online market places. What’s the point if people can’t access them? And who has been working to provide the access to date? It’s been left to others such as Auckland-based Rural Networks, and Walker Wireless.
As Federated Farmers boss Tony St Clair asked, how is Telecom going to get broadband to 80% of rural homes in one year when much of the copper wire in rural areas is wearing out?
Farmers wary of Telecom’s broadband advances – NZ Herald
- Leave it to Larry
Having failed to shake the yachting world, with just a few words Larry Ellison has riveted the attention of thousands of IT employees, customers and shareholders worldwide.
Last week, consolidation of the enterprise software industry continued apace (following on from Microsoft’s purchases of Navision and Great Plains) with PeopleSoft and JD Edwards announcing a $US1.7 billion share swap and merger. Four days later Ellison blew everyone out of the water by saying he wanted to buy PeopleSoft for $US5.1 billion.
PeopleSoft head Craig Conway described the hostile bid as “atrociously bad behaviour”. Presumably he was also miffed on a personal level to have his thunder stolen in such an atrociously bad way. Ellison said the two companies had only been in merger talks a year ago, and what was the problem? He further riled everyone by saying if Oracle buys PeopleSoft it might not buy JD Edwards.
Computerworld, the only IT newspaper that bothers to talk to users, discovered an uneasy reaction from Oracle users. You’d think the PeopleSoft customers would have more to worry about but Oracle user group president Michelle Teirney was looking at the big picture when she said rapid reduction in the number of ERP vendors isn’t in the best interest of any end-users. PeopleSoft customers must be quaking because Larry says they’d eventually be made to switch to Oracle products, albeit for free. These products are notoriously hard to put in so moving between them is likely to be a nightmare. The fact that the migration would be free still doesn’t cover all the time spent on such projects, which equates to money anyway.
JD Edwards boss Bob Dutkowsky is probably chanting “anti-competitive” like it’s a mantra, as therein lies his greatest hope that it won’t go ahead.
All the analysts are saying it will never happen but then a lot of people said the same about HP and Compaq.
Oracle NZ group uneasy about PeopleSoft bid - Computerworld
Beware Oracle’s free offer JD Edwards tells customers - NZ Herald
Ellison urges people to give him a fair hearing – Computerworld Australia
Oracle’s PeopleSoft bid could mean trouble for users - Computerworld