Eric Lundquist

A downturn in tech spending? An upturn in tech inventories? Whats going on here? A wave of earnings warnings from major enterprise software providers such as PeopleSoft and Veritas; analyst downgrades in the semiconductor stocks, including Merrill Lynchs lowered Opinion of mighty Intel; and cash-rich Microsoft talking about cutting $1 billion in spending have all […]

More than a year ago, on June 24, 2003, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates sent to subscribers an e-mail technology update titled “Toward a Spam-Free Future.” Just a few weeks ago, on June 28, another e-mail update was distributed, titled “Preserving and Enhancing the Benefits of E-mail—A Progress Report.” The messages I […]

Big projects—remember those? There were the big ERP projects. The big sales force automation projects. The big content management projects. Many of those projects died an expensive death or were put off due to an unpredictable economy. Now, after years of dormancy, the big projects are returning to life. During the dormant period, many small […]

What are the current rules of the enterprise technology game? While calling the business of technology a game might seem to be treating it too lightly, any activity where there are winners and losers is a game on some level. And unless you know the rules, you cant play. Here is the current set of […]

You could call a recent journey of mine a tale of three cities—or a tale of three companies that once produced their revenues by selling hardware but are now focusing on selling software that configures, measures and allocates hardware resources. Such a model is a big change for the three companies—EMC, American Power Conversion and […]

Microsoft and SAP? Now theres a merger that might look good on paper but would be exceptionally difficult to accomplish. The proof that a combination of the companies was more than mere speculation was made public shortly before the start of the courtroom bid by the Department of Justice to block Oracles attempted takeover of […]

Should we really care about all the features that will be included in Microsofts “Longhorn” operating system when it arrives in 2006 or 2007? A little. How about the legal wrangles surrounding the birth and purchasing of the Linux operating system? A little, if you can stay awake during the quarrels. How about the idea […]

Gasoline prices are going way up. Inflation is slowly picking up. The cost of a barrel of oil is setting records. These external events will have an effect on your companys technology spending, but it is difficult to figure out what that effect will be. Should you dust off plans to increase the number of […]

There are no absolutes in security.” True-enough advice from Darwin John, a strategic adviser for Blackwell Consulting Services and previously CIO at the FBI. Recently, John spoke at a Security Summit hosted by eWEEK and addressed an expectation in upper corporate suites that security solutions can be treated as an absolute. For the technology managers […]

While you can argue over whether F. Scott Fitzgerald was correct when he wrote, “There are no second acts in American lives,” there are certainly second, third and fourth acts in the lives of technology products. A few cases in point: Stratus Technologies, in Maynard, Mass., has been around since 1980. Along the way, the […]

As it happened, I was in Round Rock, Texas, last week on the day Dell celebrated its 20th anniversary. While the company went for a subdued cake-and-conversation event rather than, say, a Tyco-style event with its infamous ice sculpture of Michelangelos “David” pouring (ahem) Stolichnaya vodka into crystal glasses, Dells birthday marked a milestone other […]

There seemed to be some symbolic harmony in that I—one of the 100 worst golfers in the world—was going to play in a media-day event last week at one of the countrys 100 best courses. Alas, it was not meant to be, as a steady rainfall kept me and the other media types off the […]