So, look at my musings on the event here: (if the video doesn’t show up, check here)
No time to watch – here is the 1-2 slide condensation (if the slide doesn’t show up, check here):
Want to read on?
Here you go: Always tough to pick the takeaways – but here are my Top 3:
Watson or bust – Not only does Watson get its own event, it also is the first-time CEO Ginni Rometty makes it to a Las Vegas event (that I am attending, ok) and the marketing spend in show floor, sponsors signage etc. seems to eclipse all the many events that started with an “I” in Las Vegas. The show floor itself takes most of the large space up in the Mandalay Bay Convention Center, and that with minimal partner presence (Box, Cisco and 2 more I think). So, Watson for everything, of course IoT, of course industries, sports, The Weather Company, personal development etc. – every possible use case for AI was on the show floor.
Bye Bye SoftLayer (in marketing) – IBM shared that it is consolidating its cloud brands with SoftLayer getting de-emphasized in favor of BlueMix going forward. Of course, all SoftLayer capabilities will remain preserved and continued. No surprise, the acquirer brand wins usually, and simplification is always a good true north. The message for developers is certainly attractive and simple – as it is all BlueMix. For enterprises with a differentiated IaaS and PaaS strategy the branding can be confusing, as enterprises may want / need the one and not the other. But with all things marketing – you never know – so we will be watching, how well this works for IBM.
Watson for Video – In many ways video is the new medium, as people read less, listen more but want visual stimulation, need to stay on top of large amounts of video, and watching video / TV is becoming an interactive experience. IBM has acquired video assets (Ustream and Clearleap), as they are also key to drive load to cloud infrastructure, the newly labelled BlueMix infrastructure now. And video is an area where Watson can make a difference, as pattern, picture, face recognition is well understood and mastered in Watson. Finding pictures, scenes in video is very powerful, as the next deluge – after the digital picture one – is from video. And the approach can be productized relatively easily, with little customization required, so a good showcase and revenue opportunity for IBM.
On the concern side, IBM needs to make sure not lose the eye on ‘bread and butter’ business, e.g. buried in the announcements was a new, HTAP enabled version of DB2. That by itself would have carried a conference by itself not too many years ago. And pretty much all the solutions talk general capability with a grey line between Watson capabilities, product capabilities and what smart consultants are making possible. Prospects and customers want and need to know what are product vs. services capabilities, as the mix creates a very different value proposition. Hiding behind ‘it’s all about the solution’ won’t work for long, as tangible AI platform capabilities are key to evolve solutions that are powered by them.
Overall we see IBM going Big on Watson, and it’s always good when software vendor put the marketing behind promoting and evangelizing their product innovation, IBM has certainly done a major step in this regards with World of Watson, good to see the commitment, now it is important to see the adoption and dissect on the product vs. services demarcation line. We will be watching.
Want to learn more? Checkout the Storify collection below (if it doesn’t show up – check here).
More on IBM:
Find more coverage on the Constellation Research website here and checkout my magazine on Flipboard and my YouTube channel here.
Watson or bust – Not only does Watson get its own event, it also is the first-time CEO Ginni Rometty makes it to a Las Vegas event (that I am attending, ok) and the marketing spend in show floor, sponsors signage etc. seems to eclipse all the many events that started with an “I” in Las Vegas. The show floor itself takes most of the large space up in the Mandalay Bay Convention Center, and that with minimal partner presence (Box, Cisco and 2 more I think). So, Watson for everything, of course IoT, of course industries, sports, The Weather Company, personal development etc. – every possible use case for AI was on the show floor.
Bye Bye SoftLayer (in marketing) – IBM shared that it is consolidating its cloud brands with SoftLayer getting de-emphasized in favor of BlueMix going forward. Of course, all SoftLayer capabilities will remain preserved and continued. No surprise, the acquirer brand wins usually, and simplification is always a good true north. The message for developers is certainly attractive and simple – as it is all BlueMix. For enterprises with a differentiated IaaS and PaaS strategy the branding can be confusing, as enterprises may want / need the one and not the other. But with all things marketing – you never know – so we will be watching, how well this works for IBM.
Watson for Video – In many ways video is the new medium, as people read less, listen more but want visual stimulation, need to stay on top of large amounts of video, and watching video / TV is becoming an interactive experience. IBM has acquired video assets (Ustream and Clearleap), as they are also key to drive load to cloud infrastructure, the newly labelled BlueMix infrastructure now. And video is an area where Watson can make a difference, as pattern, picture, face recognition is well understood and mastered in Watson. Finding pictures, scenes in video is very powerful, as the next deluge – after the digital picture one – is from video. And the approach can be productized relatively easily, with little customization required, so a good showcase and revenue opportunity for IBM.
Analyst Tidbits:
- The Assistants are coming – It’s good to see IBM providing more packaged offerings, always tricky in the AI area, but good to see progress being made with a series of Watson powered “Virtual Assistants”, the most notable for customer service. It was good to see frameworks for creating bot / chat applications. Check out my colleague Alan Lepofsky's coverage on this soon here.
- Big partnerships – As usual IBM attracts partnerships with large corporation around its technology, of course here Watson. A partnership with GM brings Watson into OnStar for cross-selling, presence etc. A partnership with Pearson brings Watson into education. A partnership with Slack will bring Watson to IT professional with Assistants and open the popular chat platform for Watson and developers.
- Watson Data Plaform and Watson Machine Learning – Two examples of how IBM uses Watson to enhance existing products (Data Platform) and create new product offerings (Machine Learning). Both are important for IBM's success in the new ML / AI future that is coming soon. Check out my colleague Doug Henschen coverage on this coming soon here.
- Watson for iOS Apps – No surprise Watson also plays to augment (and likely differentiate) the applications IBM has built and is building with / for Apple on the iOS platform.
- Watson for Professions – In almost a persona driven design approach, IBM wants to bring Watson capabilities to professionals in marketing, commerce, supply chain and HR. Certainly a good way to tailor AI capabilities and make the attractive to professionals.
MyPOV
It’s always good to see vendors ‘boldly go’ and IBM is certainly betting its future on Watson. We have written and talked about the immense potential of Watson not only for IBM and its customers, but the overall market and business in general. IBM has done probably the best job in the industry at applying Watson and related abilities to any possible use case that is there for AI technology. Bringing it all together at an event like World of Watson is an important step, and it is good to see that IBM is doing all it can to propagate technology and use cases.On the concern side, IBM needs to make sure not lose the eye on ‘bread and butter’ business, e.g. buried in the announcements was a new, HTAP enabled version of DB2. That by itself would have carried a conference by itself not too many years ago. And pretty much all the solutions talk general capability with a grey line between Watson capabilities, product capabilities and what smart consultants are making possible. Prospects and customers want and need to know what are product vs. services capabilities, as the mix creates a very different value proposition. Hiding behind ‘it’s all about the solution’ won’t work for long, as tangible AI platform capabilities are key to evolve solutions that are powered by them.
Overall we see IBM going Big on Watson, and it’s always good when software vendor put the marketing behind promoting and evangelizing their product innovation, IBM has certainly done a major step in this regards with World of Watson, good to see the commitment, now it is important to see the adoption and dissect on the product vs. services demarcation line. We will be watching.
Want to learn more? Checkout the Storify collection below (if it doesn’t show up – check here).
More on IBM:
- Progress Report - IBM Alliances Insights - Deep Plans, now it is execution time - read here - read here
- News Analysis - Workday, IBM Form Strategic Partnership on the IBM Cloud - The IaaS vendor race for SaaS load is on - read here
- News Analysis - IBM Boosts Support to OpenStack's RefStack... first serious attempt to make OpenStack interoperability real - read here
- Event Report - IBM Interconnect - IBM innovates and partners into the hybrid cloud era - read here
- News Analysis - IBM and VMware announce partnership to accelerate enterprise hybrid cloud adoption >> Looking promising - read here
- Event Preview - IBM Interconnect 2016 - read here
- Site Visit - IBM Design Studio Austin - read here
- MarketMoves - IBM strikes 3x in Fall - Cleversafe, The Weather Company and Gravitant - read here
- News Analysis - IBM launches Industry's First Consulting Practice Dedicated to Cognitive Business - a good move it's early times - read more
- News Analysis - IBM plans to acquire Cleversafe to propel Object Storage into the Hybrid Cloud >> a good move. Read here
Market Move - IBM acquires StrongLoop - nodejs comes to BlueMix - read here - News Analysis - IBM and ARM Collaborate to Accelerate Delivery of Internet of Things - The IBM NextGenApps Stack emerges - read here
- Progress Report - IBM Cloud makes good progress - but needs to attract more load - read here
- Market Move - IBM gets into private cloud (services) with Blue Box acqusition - read here
- Event Report - IBM InterConnect - IBM makes bets for the hybrid cloud - read here
- First Take - IBM InterConnect Day #1 Keynote - BlueMix, SoftLayer and Watson - read here
- News Analysis - IBM had a very good year in the cloud - 2015 will be key - read here
- Event Report - IBM Insight 2014 - Is it all coming together for IBM in 2015? Or not?
- First Take - Top 3 Takeaways from IBM Insight Day 1 Keynote - read here
- IBM and SAP partner for cloud - good move - read here
- Event Report - IBM Enterprise - A lot of value for existing customers, but can IBM attract net new customers? Read here
- Progress Report - The Mainframe is alive and kicking - but there is more in IBM STG - read here
- News Analysis - IBM and Intel partner to make the cloud more secure - read here
- Progress Report - IBM BigData an Analytics have a lot of potential - time to show it - read here
- Event Report - What a difference a year makes - and off to a good start - read here
- First Take - 3 Key Takeaways from IBM's Impact Conference - Day 1 Keynote - read here
- Another week and another Billion - this week it's a BlueMix Paas - read here
- First take - IBM makes Connection - introduces the TalentSuite at IBM Connect - read here
- IBM kicks of cloud data center race in 2014 - read here
- First Take - IBM Software Group's Analyst Insights - read here
- Are we witnessing one of the largest cloud moves - so far? Read here
- Why IBM acquired Softlayer - read here
Find more coverage on the Constellation Research website here and checkout my magazine on Flipboard and my YouTube channel here.
