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Business @ The Speed of Thought: Succeeding in Digital Economy (Paperback)
by Bill Gates
| Category:
Management, Technology, Innovation, Entrepreneurship |
| Market price: ¥ 178.00
MSL price:
¥ 168.00
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Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
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 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
World's top entrepreneur and executive's strategic business thinking from the technology perspective. |
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Author: Bill Gates
Publisher: Warner Books
Pub. in: May, 2000
ISBN: 0446675962
Pages: 470
Measurements: 8.8 x 5.6 x 1.2 inches
Origin of product: USA
Order code: BA00034
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- Awards & Credential -
The New York Times Bestseller and Wall Street Journal Bestseller. |
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- MSL Picks -
The digital nervous system is built using PC technologies, low cost software, and internet protocols. Specialized companies give choice in terms of chips, system software, business applications, networking, and service. COM/.Net Object technology allows the developer to use the component without having to know the inner workings, extends usefulness through reusability, and communicates across different networks as three tiered architecture. For example, Merrill Lynch presents fifty separate applications as one single interface on the desktop.
Middleware serves the purpose too make different applications and systems integrate together. Middleware has the potential to keep all data consistent between different systems. Leaps in PC performance have eliminated the need to deploy incompatible middleware applications. High end PC hardware is compatibility and the software is a 100 percent compatible. The homogeneous platform is the reason PCs are being accepted as servers. ERP companies are moving to PC technology realizing support for more internet user pools at lower costs. The internet protocol allows software running on PC servers to provide information analysis and business transactions.
Out of the box software provides easy to customize applications to meet business needs. Using a three tiered architecture combined with customized software makes customization more possible. Companies of all sizes have PC technology. Microsoft next generation of 64 bit operating system will give Microsoft a larger stake of Unix servers. Microsoft NT has already scaled by Unisys as a Mainframe power equivalent operating system. Microsoft and telecom technology will allow voice and data networks to pass information over fiber lines and be internet based.
Savings on infrastructure are significant. Listed companies realizing savings were: McDonalds - predicted savings of 18 percent, Dayton Hudson ($100 million and save at least that amount in operation savings), Lockheed and Martin Marietta (cut IT spending by $700 million over five years - realized in two years).
Horizontally integrated computer industry based on PC technology attracts more software development. Software developer builds software components reducing the cost of business and providing a rich layer of functionality. Windows standardize operating system insulates the developer from the variability of the hardware. Selecting PC technology safeguards your software investment and retains hardware preference.
In summary, cheap hard drives, massive amounts of memory, faster processors have reduced the cost of PC technology. Rich internet applications can be streamed to browser or client applications using internet protocols. More cities will invest in fiber optic infrastructure bring media, voice, and video to businesses and homes. Combining these two factors: cheap PC technology and standardize Internet Protocols will allow software developers to provide rich business functionality and result in "Free capitalism". We are just beginning to discover what the computer can do for us. There will be many more billionaires in the next generation. (From quoting D. Nishimoto, USA)
Target readers:
Executives, managers, entrepreneurs, government leaders, professionals, IT practitioners, and MBAs.
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Bill Gates is the chairman and chief executive officer at Microsoft Corporation. His vision and commitment regarding personal computing have been central to the success of Microsoft and in the advancement of software technology. He lives with his wife, Melinda, and daughter, Jennifer, in the Seattle area.
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From the Publisher:
"If the 1980s were about quality and the 1990s were about reengineering, then the 2000s will be about velocity. About how quickly the nature of business will change… The successful companies of the next decade will be the ones that use digital tools to reinvent the way they work."
Bill Gates' vision changed our world. But in this monumental work argues that the capabilities of computers, software, and networks are only beginning to be harnessed – that your company must start building a modern, digital nervous system now in order to compete quickly and intuitively in the new millennium.
In Business @ the Speed of Thought, Gates explains how to turn your hardware and software into a powerful, evolving networks of information. Look at the digital systems in place at Microsoft and other leading corporations, Gates shows how your company can:
- Convert every paper process to a digital process – and end information bottlenecks.
- Use networks to create fast-reacting virtual teams to work together among traditional departments.
- Decrease cycle time by using digital transactions with suppliers and partners to get products out before the competition.
- Know down the walls of your company and electronically build new business relationships and new markets.
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Real-time flow of sales information through its Web site and order processing system is important to Dell's competitive situation. Instead of having 80 days of inventory, as indirect sellers have (although indirect sellers are trying to reduce that number), Dell keeps only 8 days of inventory, and much of that is in parts such as chips and hard drives. Dell's manufacturing time is only 4 fours. Machines generally reach customers within 3-4 days of order.
Dell's business model is based on the evils of inventory. The more Dell can reduce its inventory, the more it freed up working capital to drive into other revenue-generating activities. Dell's reduced inventory translates to a savings of hundreds of millions of dollars in assets. At the same time, the requirement for greater customer service means that you never want to be out of stock, either. Only information technology can provide the means to balance these needs. "Physical assets used to be a defining advantage, " Michael (Dell) says. "Now they're a liability. The closer you get to the perfect information about demand, the closer you get to zero inventory. It's a simple formula. More inventory means you have less information, and more information means you have less inventory. We're trading physical assets for information."
Going forward, Dell is taking the next steps in Web site development: customizing more services on its Premier pages and making the entire ordering process for major customers totally paperless. Even with the ability of customers to order online, much of the approval process within a customer's organization has still been paper based. Dell will give companies an order application that integrates Dell's ordering database with the customer's purchasing system. Flexible reporting tools will give customers the ability to query Dell's information systems and generate their own status reports.
Dell is already offering Internet transaction capability in 36 countries and 18 languages. The company plans to continue its Internet services internationally so customers have a consistent Dell Internet experience everywhere.
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Marriott has found, as others have found, that the more interactive a site is, the more business activity it gets from its visitors. A dynamic Website creates more bookings and new business. Marriott plans to enrich its Web site and personalize it even further by adding a "customer profile" feature. Say I want a relaxing weekend within a reasonable drive of Seattle. I'll be able to enter the names of two or three Marriott properties else where that I really liked. Marriott will give me recommendations for similar hotels or resorts close to Seattle. The Web site might then let me read the comments from other guests who have stayed at one or more of those places.
"We've gone from monologue to dialogue in our Website – from talking at our customers to talking with them, " Mike Pusateri says. "Now we need to move from dialogue to forum. Building profiles of our customers will not only allow us to serve them better, providing suggestions for things and places we know they like, but it will allow us to put Marriott customers in touch with each other. It's sort of like a news group within your Web site, but the software is doing all the work for us."
Marriott believes that its value-added approach will differentiate it from other chains. The hotel is not interested in creating an "Internet flea market" where customers scrounge for lowest price. Marriot is not always the cheapest option. The company would rather follow the Nordstrom model and give customers a lot of nonprice criteria to shop by, intensifying its customer's loyalty with these programs.
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USA Today (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-26 00:00>
A road map for managers… effectively walks the reader through the business and life improvements the wired worlds presents… Plenty of specific tips and advice. |
Christian Science Monitor (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-26 00:00>
For business people, companies, or even individuals who want practical advice from an industry leader about how they might move forward in a changing environment, Gates’s latest effort is well worth reading. |
Fortune (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-26 00:00>
A textbook for business decision-makers who are interested in using information technology. |
Siddahanti (MSL quote), India
<2006-12-26 00:00>
Bill Gates, the whiz kid, IT Czar, has come out with a thought provoking, very educative, and very informative book that can easily be understood easily by everyone. Few chapters are bit technical, but one can make broad sense out of these chapters too. Reading the book has been a profound and very satisfying and rich experience for me.
Gates advocates complete digitalization of all aspects of life, and expounds a theory of Digital Nervous System, which envisages paperless offices, on-line, real-time transactions in a totally networked environment in a web based work style.
Gates talks about web-lifestyle, knowledge management, empowerment down to the last person in line, pooling and sharing of information on line which then becomes the bank of knowledge for everyone to access. He gives numerous examples of the applied digitalization in various Corporations, Government organizations, Schools & Educational institutions, US Armed forces etc. that have reaped enormous benefits of the same.
The entire concept, as well as the benefits thereof have been explained in detail, which make excellent sense and are very convincing. I got great insights into the scope and extent of improvements that the networked environment and total computerization can bring about, especially in a country like India where there is so much to be done! We haven't even started yet. I am happy that, irrespective of the current downtrend, my kids, who are into computers, will never be unemployed!
Master salesman that Bill Gates is, he doesn't let any opportunity go by without extolling the virtues of Microsoft and it's various products, makes a sales pitch here too, and subtly hints that ultimately the entire world should operate on a Windows platform.
All this is fine, but I have a few scary scenarios, which frighten me, every time I read a book like this:
1. Given the fact that hackers are penetrating most secured sites and databases, Banks are being defrauded, passwords and PIN codes are stolen, dangerous viruses are around which manage to jump all high security firewalls.... there is an unknown, invisible enemy lurking around out there somewhere, in such a situations, how can we surrender all our data, info, knowledge, records and secrets to a digital warehouse which doesn't have any physical protections, locks or impenetrable barriers of security and safety?
2. A virus, malfunction, or any such thing can wipe out the entire record....how and wherefrom do we retrieve and recreate the record? And at what cost?
3. The cookies, embedded software, firmware, middleware, or even parts of hardware can make any PC, any Server accessible to any one person, agency or an institution like Intel, MS, or CIA, and they will have the power to intrude and disable or self destruct your machine...then what? One electronic signal can bring an entire country , any selected institution like a Bank to a grinding halt...then what? Maybe I have read too many conspiracy theories of Ludlum, but then the possibilities exist!
4. A strong electromagnetic wave, radiation, grid failure etc, can cause a total, breakdown...there is no parallel system to keep things going, the old working style in the name of "legacy" has long back been disbanded, then what? We see this chaotic scenario for IA ticketing every time the Indian Airlines system crashes.
5. Any other software problem like the Y2k Bug, can once again create a havoc… then what?
6. Complete digitalization and digital nervous system on a national scale, obviously will need a battery of experts and dedicated specialist who alone can keep the thing going… If they go on strike? We have seen Air traffic controllers, Doctors, Postal workers, Teachers, Petrol Bunks, and Chemists going on strike and holding the society to ransom, but can we afford the digital experts bringing the complete country to a dead halt?
In an organization where I was working, we had gone completely digital "officially",( but privately we maintained physical paper records), I have practically experienced the chaos every time the centralized mail server crashed, many hard discs got wiped out in my department...it was a total mess! No records...and auditors were breathing down our necks! The private records saved us. Thereafter we decided that we may have a paperless office, but there will be a parallel office for paper!
We still have a long way to go to make things fool proof, absolutely trustworthy and reliable, safe and secure... till that happens I don't think we can create a paperless World! Till that time Bill Gates you have to wait atta boy! |
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