Our Thoughts on IT Matters

Keep Posted on Industry News and Events

   

Act Now: Splunk FYE - Pitfalls and Opportunities

Splunk fiscal year end is coming up this January 31st and as a result, many deals are set to renew or are aggressively pursued by the sales teams to close as net new business. Splunk is a clever play of words, it is derived from the word “spelunking which means exploring the information of caves. It was developed by Rob Das and Eric Swan in 2003 as a search engine for the log files that are stored in the infrastructure of a system. The main goal of the founders was to market this developing technology in bulk so that it can be deployed in almost all kinds of use cases possible. Splunk went public on April 19th, 2012, with a $17 strike price ...

Read More

VMware Fiscal Year End and Broadcom's Acquisition Implications

Dave Young
Dec. 28,2022 | Software VMware

Big changes are in store for current and soon to be VMware customers. And wherever we see big changes with our major suppliers, the fallout typically lands in two categories for their respective customers. 1) Those who see it coming and plan accordingly, and 2) those that take no action and let things happen to them. That latter category will end up paying a premium for years to come over their peers for the exact same products and services. With all the current happenings at VMware, now is the perfect time to analyze your current and or projected spend and plan accordingly so you can take advantage of this change, rather than become a ...

Read More

Act Now: Anaplan Fiscal Year End is January 2023

Scott Braden
Dec. 28,2022 | Software Anaplan

Introduction Anaplan connects people, data, and plans in real-time in its cloud environment to help customers democratize decision-making across all lines of business and business activities, from strategic to operational levels. Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) As a step beyond traditional business intelligence, Anaplan offers a cloud-based subscription for its Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) software — enabling planning, modeling, and collaboration services to power better business decisions and drive better enterprise performance. Anaplan offers a simple interface to its Smart Business Platform, combining connection, ...

Read More

Coupa: Once a Target - Now Acquired

Fred Teekens
Dec. 28,2022 | Software Coupa

Coupa’s rise in the SaaS Business Spend Management sector has been impressive since its founding in 2006. Since its stock traded at an all-time high in 2021 at over $350/share, it’s been a rocky road for the company. In a market with greater competition and an economy putting inflationary pressure on companies, Coupa has found both its market cap and stock price plummeting since that high water mark. Since the very start of 2022, Coupa has been targeted as a potential acquisition, and as of this week – that’s what happened with Private Equity firm Thoma Bravo has agreed to an $8B takeover. With Thoma Bravo, trying to acquire, they may be in ...

Read More

Snowflake Fiscal Year End January 2023 - Act Now

These days the whole world sometimes feels like a Snowflake… and by that we mean that growth is slowing, and stocks are generally down as reality sets in. Snowflake, the company, is still growing but nowhere near the breakneck speed of the good (?) old days. Macroeconomic factors may be contributing to that, but we believe that, like our clients, the market for Snowflake has figured out that deployments need to be actively managed so that the negotiated costs are not exceeded. Early Snowflake customers learned the hard way that their first agreement would ultimately set the floor for what they would spend, eventually understanding that their ...

Read More

Six More Things You Haven’t Done to Optimize Your Microsoft Costs (why not?)

We know. Making a difference can be tough in IT given the multiple layers of bureaucracy, sacred cows, and politics that is ever present in almost every organization. And of course, there are often sound and practical reasons why change is not a good idea, but what is almost always a good idea, is to at least investigate and plan for change. Only in this way are you actually ready (mentally and physically) to propose and follow through with it. So, as you read through the below items, some may sound familiar and or best practices while others could be a fresh initiative to take on that may get you on the path of significantly lowering your ...

Read More

Act Now: Salesforce Fiscal Year End is January

How You Can Win Against an 800-Pound Gorilla Salesforce became the market leader in 2013 and has dominated the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) jungle ever since. With its fiscal year-end in January, now is the best time to review and optimize your Salesforce spend. In the early 2000s, Siebel was the market-leading (and most expensive) CRM (and remained so long after it was acquired by Oracle in 2006 for $5.8 billion), until it lost so much market share that the once unassailable technology goliath finally met its inglorious end. Technically, Siebel is still part of Oracle’s lifetime support policy, but for all practical purposes, it's ...

Read More

Act Now: Snowflake Fiscal Year End is January

The Rise of the Consumption-Based Pricing Model One thing is clear in 2022: The technology industry is moving away from per user per month subscription models and moving towards consumption-based pricing models, and it’s no wonder why. With the ability to capture value from all customer consumption, the revenue-capture and resulting earnings of firms like Snowflake have significantly outpaced even the most successful subscription-based companies, and this is pushing enterprise valuations into a completely new stratosphere, providing ample incentive for technology suppliers to migrate towards consumption-based pricing models. Executives like ...

Read More

Act Now: Workday Fiscal Year End is January

Introduction Workday was ranked #1 in NET(net)'s Top 10 HCM HRMS Suppliers for 2021 blog. The cloud-based system mostly known as a Human Capital Management (HCM) platform for global workforces is delivered as a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and offers the following modules: Human resource management Business process management Reporting and analytics Benefits administration Compensation management Talent management Survey framework Employee and management self-service Program and Project Management Payroll and Workforce Management Professional Services Automation Enterprise Planning Higher Ed Student Support Spend Management Many ...

Read More

Fiscal Year End Watchlist: Veeva

Steven Zolman
Jan. 20,2022 | Software SaaS Veeva

In 2021, Veeva was named as our #1 Technology Supplier to Watch, and with good reason. In our view, Veeva had the ability to outflank Salesforce.com to make a vertical cloud for the global life-sciences industry; something that Salesforce and others failed to do. Marquee customers include AstraZeneca, Bayer, Bristol-Myers Squibb, GlaxoSmithKline, Merk, Nestle, and Sanofi. With this vertical industry focus, Veeva has enjoyed considerable success, and with its premium-priced platform, its success has come at the expense of its customers. Now, with over 50% market share in the life sciences customer relationship management (CRM) market, Veeva ...

Read More