Paul Shread

Big Data is all the rage in corporate IT departments these days, but building IT systems with the ability and flexibility to make the most of your data is easier said than done. Scale-out NAS (network-attached storage) is one option that enterprises have turned to for easier data management. A good SONAS system can provide […]

New research from QuinStreet Enterprise reveals some surprising winners in the market for next-generation data center technologies. Consider IT vendors, for example. Amazon, IBM and Dell top the list of vendors being evaluated by enterprises for next-generation data center solutions, with about one in five respondents looking at them in early stage evaluation (see graphic […]

Every few months, a few of us give a presentation to the sales folks here on what’s hot in IT and where it might be headed. It’s a useful exercise for me because it forces me to step back from the daily news grind to see the bigger picture: what’s hot, where we need to […]

By one estimate, only about 5% of Fortune 500 companies are moving toward virtualizing their entire data centers, which makes MicroStrategy’s nearly two-year head start all the more remarkable. The enterprise software company has been building out its software-defined data center since November 2011, and the result has been some remarkable efficiencies gleaned from running […]

The idea of virtual data centers, where the vast infrastructure of storage, servers and networks can be managed as one, has been around since IBM accomplished essentially the same thing on the mainframe nearly 50 years ago. It’s taken decades to achieve, but a few companies today may be close to matching IBM’s feat from […]

Brand awareness counts for only so much when it comes to cloud computing. That was one of the conclusions of a new survey of enterprise IT buyers from Palmer Research and QuinStreet Enterprise. The survey examined the purchases and planned purchases of 341 qualified IT buyers, and found that private cloud deployments in enterprises are […]

Enterprises generate a flood of data, yet effectively analyzing that data tends to be a daunting challenges. SAP offers two additional solutions. At SAP TechEd 2011 in Las Vegas, SAP (NYSE: SAP) unveiled two new solutions built on its HANA in-memory analytics platform. The new solutions — Smart Meter Analytics software and COPA Accelerator software […]

Having made a strategic decision to focus heavily on business analytics, IBM invested still more in its BI portfolio this week with two acquisitions. IBM (NYSE: IBM) made a pair of acquisitions this week aimed at bolstering its fast-growing business analytics practice. The company added to its $14 billion in analytics acquisitions with Algorithmics and […]

At the big Dreamforce confab, Salesforce’s new products and features reflected emerging trends in tech. At its Dreamforce conference in San Francisco, Salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM) unveiled a number new products and features, including HTML5-based mobile apps, the new Data.com social customer contact service, and a number of new Chatter features. Salesforce’s new HTML5 mobile service, […]

With the merger of these two companies, the ERP market suddenly looks quite a bit different. Paul Shread reports. Infor and Lawson Software (NASDAQ: LWSN)officially announced their intention to merge today. The deal will create a new titan in the ERP marketplace. The combined Infor and Lawson Software business will be the third largest ERP […]