Articles by Jeffrey M. Kaplan

There is no question that one of the hottest topics in the tech industry is the rapidly evolving world of the Internet of Things. The seemingly infinite variety of use cases for capturing data from a widening array of connected devices and objects is inspiring the imaginations of corporate decision makers and fueling a new wave of innovation among established and emerging players...

A rising tide of interest has sparked a series of competitive moves among the widening array of software and technology providers vying for a share of the rapidly expanding IoT market As with previous major IT industry trends, the enormous promise has driven a growing number of large and small players to rebrand and reposition their product and ser...

Everyone's well aware that the explosive growth of data is one of the biggest challenges facing organizations of all sizes across nearly every industry. A growing number of cloud service providers (CSPs) are recognizing that they can provide more than just simple storage and economical compute power to their customers who are buried in data. They also can help them manage their Big Data processing needs on an ongoing basis...

One of the sure signs of a maturing company, or even an entire industry, is the ability to offer free services to nonprofit organizations in order to demonstrate benevolence. However, such charitable acts aren't just about being altruistic. As a growing number of cloud providers are discovering, there are plenty of new revenue and profit opportunities in the nonprofit sector...

One of the geographic regions asserting itself as an epicenter of technology innovation focused on the rapidly evolving Internet of Things is the Boston area. To bring greater attention to the widening array of area companies pursuing new business opportunities in the IoT market, the region recently hosted a series of IoT events, anchored by Axeda's annual Connexion conference...

I've been suggesting for a number of years that a new wave of opportunities is emerging to create industry-specific Software as a Service and cloud computing vertical market solutions. A number of new examples of this phenomenon have crossed my radar over the past few weeks which clearly illustrate the long tail effect of the cloud. The most promi...

Although I've been a proponent of the business benefits of migrating to the "cloud" since before the term was popularized by today's market leaders, I have to admit that the cloud industry is doing a great job of making it increasingly difficult for CIOs and other corporate decision makers to feel confident about making the move The success of the ...

Computer and software companies have been battling for the hearts and minds of students for decades, and now school administrators are becoming the target of smart Software as a Service and cloud computing service providers. The most notorious examples of using classroom marketing tactics to gain a long-term strategic advantage are Apple and Googl...

The Internet of Thingsis a key driver of accelerated growth of cloud-based alternatives to traditional on-premises systems and software, and as the new year begins to unfold, it is gaining momentum The idea of the IoT evolved from the more narrowly focused concept of machine-to-machine communications, which has been floating around for a while and ...

Despite recent revelations regarding the NSA's extensive surveillance of email messages, Internet traffic and mobile communications, no one expects people or businesses to discard these essential habits and tools. In fact, I believe cloud-based alternatives to traditional, on-premise software and systems will continue to expand in 2014, as providers offer more deployment choices...

Although the cloud marketplace is growing rapidly, the current rate of growth will continue only if a broader set of strong channel companies emerge to extend the reach of today's cloud leaders into new industries and geographies I've been suggesting for years that building more channels to market for cloud vendors is essential to the growth of the...

I'm not a religious guy, but I've been preaching about the virtues of moving to the cloud for a long time. Well before the idea became popular, I saw the potential cost savings offered by the cloud, as well as the opportunities to leverage it to generate new innovations. Now, nearly every industry is recognizing these potential benefits, including church pastors and other religious leaders...

A persistent myth in the tech world is that major enterprises in highly regulated industries are risk-averse and reluctant to adopt new technology innovations. In the case of the financial services sector, this has not been the case for years, and it is being disproved again as a growing number of financial institutions aggressively pursue a widening array of cloud computing alternatives...

With nearly every market forecast and growing anecdotal evidence pointing to escalating demand for cloud-based alternatives to traditional on-premises systems and software, the challenges of integrating the new on-demand solutions with existing applications and data sources are becoming even more critical. Data integration continues to be a pivota...

Organizations of all sizes across an assortment of industries are using a growing set of cloud analytics solutions to address their Big Data, business intelligence (BI) and data integration challenges, as I heard first-hand at the recent THINKstrategies' second annual Cloud Analytics Summit, which I had the privilege of hosting Escalating competiti...

Strategic Big Data and Actionable Analytics are two of the Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2013, according to Gartner. Yet only 12 percent have a big data strategy that governs their daily operations, a recent survey of 339 data management professionals by SAS and SourceMedia found.

A growing number of established and emerging software and technology vendors areseeking to take advantage of the convergence of Big Data and the cloud. None has madea bigger bet than IBM Since 2005, IBM has spent more than US$16 billion on 35 acquisitions to boostits analytics capabilities. The company is hoping that this investment will generateap...

One of the age-old challenges that has plagued the software industry, like many others,is how vendors can reach small- and mid-sized businesses with their software products Although today's Software as a Service model eliminates many of the distributionchallenges of the past, it hasn't overcome the obstacles associated with selling cloud-based appl...

All the hype about Big Data over the past year has succeeded in educating executives in organizations of all sizes across nearly every industry about the unprecedented potential to use analytics to improve operations, sales effectiveness and customer support. However, the hype has also too often made the path to success appear overly complicated a...

Software as a Service has become an accepted alternative to traditional on-premises enterprise applications, and a broader set of cloud services is becoming a viable option for businesses seeking more flexible and economical computing capabilities Despite occasional service disruptions, the adoption of these services is acceleratingrapidly, because...