Enterprise Technology By Phil Edholm

Last week at InterOp, Nortel created a sensation with it's commitment to Green Technology and demonstrations that Nortel data equipment is dramatically more energy (and carbon footprint) efficient than our major competitor. The Tolly Group has analyzed Nortel data products versus the major competitor and has independently verified the veracity of the Nortel claims (Tolly report).

Green thinking in IT makes both good corporate sense, but it also makes good financial sense as well. Nortel has built a Green Calculator that allows companies to analyze their ROI on Green Networking. For example, a 2,500 seat network with gigabit desktops and IP telephony would save almost $2,000,000 over 5 years with the Nortel Green Network versus the major competitor. That represents almost $800 per seat, which exceeds the equipment cost component of the network and rivals the operational costs. This will become a critical component in the overall analysis of network TCO.

Finally, a couple of single device examples are important. Comparing a similarly equipped Nortel 8600 with a Cisco 6500 , the 8600 will save almost $52,000 in energy use over 5 years. Similarly the Nortel 8300 saved over $18,000 over the Cisco 4500 in a similar 5 year period.

For the 2,500 user network above, the CO2 emissions savings are 7106 metric tons. This is equivalent to 150 large cars or 249 small cars driven 100,000 miles each in the 5 years. This is about 23 Kilograms per network port per year (7106 Metric tons/2500/5*1000). If we extrapolate this to the worldwide enterprise users of networks at about 500 million (it is actually probably larger), the total is 11.5 MILLION metric tons. That is equivalent to 656 BILLION miles of travel in small cars or 46 MILLION cars at 15,000 miles per year!!!! That is about 20% of the estimated 250 Million cars in the US.

Just imagine, if we got "Cisco off the net" instead of "cars off the road", gas might be back to $2 a gallon and we could all breathe a little easier. While this may be too much to hope for, we can all do our part by deploying green networks.

Look for the Green Calculator to run on your network in June, the results will amaze you. It will be available on Nortel.com.

I was in an office recently that had a 42" wall mounted plasma screen installed. I have always thought that this was an extravagance that more related to the occupant than business, however my recent experience has convinced me this is not the case.

Over the course of a couple of days, a number of meetings were held that I participated in. In almost every one the screen was used to present information used by the group. This included presentations as well as using the web browser to quickly find information needed during the discussion. The set-up included a dock station that could go to either the desktop monitor or this screen. Connected to the dock was a wireless keyboard and mouse so the PC could be controlled from a table or the desk.

I found this to be a very productive mechanism. Repeatedly it reduced the time and was much simpler than the "flip the monitor" I have traditionally relied on. I wonder if a good $1000 projector for the office that could be tethered would sell? The other option is one of the latest LCD screens in the 37 inch range. I need to think more about the cubicle, though the meetings that take place there are minimal, though it would be great in small team rooms.

Sorry for the lapse in posting....I went to Hawaii with my wonderful wife to celebrate our 3th wedding anniversary and totally forgot to get the posts up........I hope that is a good excuse!!!!

I saw this recent article in Popular Mechanics about "bionic contacts". The thing I find interesting about this concept is the need for continuous communications to the wearer. While I have advocated the concept of caching as a mechanism to reduce the amount of real time traffic (for video for example), this will actually define an environment where continuous communications could be incredibly valuable and change many things.

First off, it brings a new meaning to Hyperconnectivity. For example if you overlay a GPS it could guide you, whether walking or driving. With an integration of a microphone, it could prompt you with information you need during a conversation.....the concepts are limitless.

Finally, it brings closer the convergence of the real world and the virtual world. If you were wearing these, perhaps I could cause your system to actually add more hair to what you see (and take off few pounds, and make my cheeks look more GQ like and...you get the idea) . Someday it may be possible to actually change your appearance in the real world to mirror your preferred appearance in the virtual world. Of course, there is that pesky problem of what happens when the battery wears out and your real appearance comes through!!!!

Nortel has added a new blog to the Nortel Blogshere; the Nortel Hyperconnectivity Blog. It is at www.hyperconnectivity.com and will focus on posts about the events driving and being driven by the Hyperconnectivity phenomenon.

The blog will look at the Hyperconnectivity revolution from the view of Nortel's key initiatives addressing the Hyperconnectivity challenge - UC, WiMAX, 40G and Telepresence. The intent of this blog is to introduce a variety of topics that center around Hyperconnectivity and will enable the dialog to be much faster.

For example, recent posts discuss the challenge of working (and playing/living) in the Hyperconnected world and whether the business value of telepresence is real or not. Also, the posts on wireless technologies in the 4G world herald the promise of tuly having broadband everywhere.

I put the link up in my blogrole, so it will be there in the future.

This blog posting is not about Nortel or technology, but rather more of a personal note. I hope you will tolerate a bit of divergence from me.

It was with great sadness that I noted that Arthur C. Clarke passed away on the 19th of March. While I never had the opportunity to meet him personally, his vision (2001 - the book and movie, defining the geostationary satellite, etc.) were significant contributors to forming both my views on society, but also igniting a passion for technology and the transformations it can create.

Along with Isaac Asimov, Clark developed nuanced views into futures that were driven by the inventiveness of humans and their capability to define and manipulate their environment. Through my youth and on to today, I have looked to their vision as a view into the possible and the potential of the future. While they may not have been 100% correct, their vision helped shape our thoughts of what could be and drive us forward. While the vision of human progression portrayed by Clarke in 2001 was driving my thoughts one way, a book on the Neutrino by Asimov led me in 8th grade to beginning studying particle physics. And then that led to reading the Foundation Trilogy and it's insights into both technology and society. Together these authors challenged my views of the possible and opened my mind to the potential of the future.

In some way the passing of both of these authors marks a close to the early period of my life where I was looking beyond the confines of my environment for that which could be beyond. Though they did not create the final products that embodied their vision, they will, for many years hence, have a guiding hand in defining our vision of the potentially attainable, and for that, we will be forever grateful.

I saw this article in eWeek about the most wanted IT skills and it got me to thinking about skills as a representation of either transformation or challenge. Of the 10 skills listed, Numbers 1,2, and 10 (1 - Security, firewalls, data Privacy, 2 - General Networking, Network Infrastructure, and 10 - RF Mobile-Wireless) are all areas where the networking world is limiting the movement to advanced Information and Interaction solutions due to the complexity of what we do. While the needs in this area can be related to growth, to a great extent it is a reflection of the complexity of the solutions and the inability of the technology and the products to come down the complexity curve with mass deployments.

It is always amazing to me that complexity continues to grow in the network and in systems at this point in the maturity of our industry. As we grow to a billion network connections, it would seem to me that we should learn how to simplify the overall network as well as the other aspects such as security and wireless.

I alos found it interesting that the skill of applying technology to the business and it's associated processes is not even mentioned. In most if not all of the meetings I have with CIOs, the challenge of using technology in relevant ways to transform the business and gain competitive advantage is a, if not the, critical challenge. And there is a great sense that the skills of this role are very hard to come by and incredibly valuable. Yet this is not even represented in this view which seems to be a more traditional operational viewpoint.

I believe the focus of the next five years in networks will be just that, to simplify the overall installation, configuration and operation of the infrastructure so we can focus on the real value, which is how we can change businesses through the convergence of interaction, Information and transformed business processes.

Doug Gourlay of Cisco recently responded to my post on "Merchant "silicon by putting a post on the Cisco site on his blog. Thanks to Brad Reese for pointing out the reply on his blog on the NetworkWorld site. While Brad felt Doug's response was a "stinging rebuke", I believe that most will agree with me that it was a lame and poorly thought through analogy. While I replied on Brad's site, I thought it would be appropriate to respond here as well........as Doug was really responding to my assertion that using proprietary silicon for packet processing is antiquated and the future is building value while leveraging the power of "merchant" silicon.

In Doug's post he attempts to use an analogy to justify using proprietary silicon in Cisco products:

"Maybe an analogy will help. If a switch is like a car then the switching silicon would be most analogous to the engine and/or transmission. i.e. the core of the car and a major point of competitive advantage and differentiation. Do major automobile manufacturers outsource engine design and development to other firms? Of course not, they design and build their engines. Do manufacturers of more consumer goods like lawn mowers outsource their engines? Absolutely, they go to specialized engine manufacturers because the core value of what they offer is either a certain price point, or the value is not tied to the engine.

So the question then - is do you want to ride to work or school in a car, or on a lawnmower? I know one would get me laughed at if I was in school, the other... not so much

Applying it back to switching, I'd rather control my own destiny and align the core value creation in the silicon with the hardware and then with the software and continue to drive innovation at every tier and not saddle up on my Toro in my enterprise. (no offense to the manufacturer of lawn mowers, I am a good customer of yours too :)"

If it were only so simple to make decisions in life, but the Ferrari comes with Ferrari pricing and maintenance costs. And it sure does a lousy job of cutting the grass!!

I guess I hit a nerve with my comments in my blog. While I agree with Doug that Cisco pricing is Ferrari like, the performance numbers of their products generally do not bear out a value proposition that justifies the product pricing. Witness the Tolly tests that indicate that most times the Nortel products are faster and Gartner identifying Nortel as a "Visionary" in networking in the 2007 Magic Quadrant Analysis. In fact, Cisco products typically cost 2 times other “merchant” offers in the Ethernet space, a fact borne out by recent Del ‘Oro data that shows while Cisco delivers only 37% of Ethernet ports, it receives 73% of the Ethernet market revenue. Over time you can only demand Ferrari pricing if you are delivering profound performance advantage...something not delivered in Cisco networking products.

Like Doug, I like analogies to illustrate a point, but I believe they should be at least vaguely believable. The analogy Doug has chosen is flawed and almost laughably absurd. Who would ever consider a buying decision that was a choice between a Ferrari and a lawnmower? However, if Doug wants to use an automotive analogy, let’s use one that is closer to reality; the choice between a Ferrari F430 and a Chevrolet Corvette (we will use the standard model Corvette in keeping with Doug’s analogy of “merchant” engines, not the higher performance Z06). Both are very similar, (kind of like Ethernet switches), each being a 2 seat car with a V8 engine and designed for performance over people or luggage hauling. And they follow Doug’s analogy, in that the Corvette is based on a broad range of “merchant” parts from the General Motors inventory, while the Ferrari is highly optimized with virtually every part factory built in Modena.

In fact, Road and Track just compared these two in their January 2008 issue, so we can use some real facts in this analogy for a change. While the review decides for general use it is a toss-up between the two (in the review, two editors out of four choose each of these cars as their favorite), the F430 does have a 12% advantage in acceleration, a 2.8% better slalom time and a 1% better skid pad grip level. So, if we grant the F430 a 5% overall performance improvement at the limits of use (none of which can be achieved on public roads or in normal networks), the F430 must be a better buying decision, right? However, the F430 costs about 4x the Corvette (slightly higher pricing differentials to those in networking). And the Ferrari gets 25% less fuel economy (again similar to the networking world), in a world where fuel economy is critical. And the costs to maintain Ferraris are legendary ($3,000 tune-ups and $8,000 clutches every 10K miles). So then, the choice is simple; 95% percent of the performance for 25% of the price and operating costs that are 25-50% less. Does the Ferrari look good now? By the way, the Corvette Z06 gets 98% plus of the Ferrari performance for one third the price and the new Z01 will be faster for less than half the price. I guess Doug would call these cars derivative due to their “merchant” roots in GM and the base Corvette.

In the end, people who buy a Ferrari do it for two reasons; they have so much money that the cost/performance trade-offs do not matter to them or they buy their cars so others will judge them by what they drive. I guess buying Cisco is similar, either you like to waste money or you buy on brand only. Comparison shopping yields different answers, as reflected by Gartner in their recent advisory to evaluate alternatives in the networking world.

I do not drive a Ferrari, do you?

I started to reference the issue about the question whether the Internet bandwidth was going to become an issue in a post response last year. At the time I referenced a report issued by the Nemertes group that predicted that the capacity of the Internet would become an issue between 2010 and 2012. The post I did about Microhoo and Google competing to introduce new services and capabilities began to highlight this issue in my mind as well. Then last week I had a meeting with a key technology executive from a major North American service provider who indicated their bandwidth is growing 40% per year and they have begun the migration to 40 Gbps in their fiber backbone.

The combination of these three events led me to revisit this critical question; "will the inability of the network to deliver bandwidth become an issue?" If you read the Nemertes report entitled "The Internet Singularity, Delayed: Why Limits in Internet Capacity Will Stifle Innovation on the Web", it details a view that both the core of the network and the edge (especially the shared bandwidth at the edge) will not grow as fast as a projected demand growth. Essentially this model predicts that somewhere between 2010 and 2012 the available bandwidth will not keep up with bandwidth demand growth. If you refer back to the discussion of bandwidth in I did last year, this will coincide with the critical video transition in the network. If we map 40% growth from today forward and assume that the carriers are moving to 40 Gig backbones over the last 6 months due to capacity demands, hen sometime in 2011 the 40 Gig fiber solutions being installed today will be at the same load points as the current 10 Gig solutions were last year. This would mean that to meet the 2012 demand, 100 Gig fiber solutions are required (or additional fibers). Of course, this all caries out into the metro and access networks.

On the surface, it would appear that the natural growth of bandwidth, combined with the transition to video is raising a distinct possibility that sometime between 2010 and 2012 there will be an inflection that, unless driven by new technologies and capabilities, will begin to impact overall service levels. The critical question is whether this event will coincide with new apps and services that can only be realized if unencumbered by such a "slow-down". Would the take-up of YouTube be as dramatic if the performance was highly variable and often degraded significantly. Would the new user community wait if the variability for downloading a video was very high, occasionally taking minutes instead of seconds. It seems to me that this concept, combined with the explosive generation of services that a Microhoo versus Google competition may engender, has a high probability of creating a period of instability and reduced expectations. This is both a challenge and an opportunity, but will only be realized as an opportunity if we begin moving forward with technologies that increase bandwidth and simplify the network switching environments.

I was intrigued by the announcement of a Creative Technology Video Conferencing System called InPerson recently. The announcement of this system was of interest on two levels, first that it is essentially a small video player with a camera and the necessary internals to do video conferencing, and second that some \ continue to mis-understand the value of video in a business setting. While most video systems are going upscale in terms of size and bandwidth to more directly equal the face-to-face experience, this is a move down below the PC. While it is larger than the Nortel video phones, it still lacks the size and capability to meet the needs of the "selling" part of the Video Blog 2 from last year (Video Blog 1 was about how humans communicate). I believe the next big market in video is in the fringes (selling and Grandma) of the charts. In the selling arena it becomes a logical extension of Facebook and YouTube into the combined real-time introductory domain and then extended to seeing those you have relationships with. This had a lot of interest in Japan, but never took off in the west. Perhaps now with iPhones and equivalents it will take off. However, it is not a business service and will not garner $1,000 plus as the device cost.

So, I wonder if this is less a business product than a consumer niche, but the price point makes that problematic. I believe that most business people who would use video at this level already own a PC and could use that.

Finally, I found it interesting that the InPerson device got one thing right...the camera is on the bottom of the display screen!!!!! For those of us that are follicularly challenged, not having the camera on the top of the monitor minimizes the inevitable glare........PC makers take note, with the aging of the population, making the camera friendly to us is critical.....

I was reading an article in Newsweek entitled "Not Made in Japan". The article detailed the challenges that the corporate, educational, and cultural structure(s) in Japan are facing when trying to compete in a world that is driven not by incremental improvement, but rather by innovative leaps. The article details the failure of DoCoMo to leverage it's leadership position in the Japanese market and in handset technology into the rest of the world and the loss of capitalization it has faced in this failure. It further discusses how Sony, originator of the Walkman, lost theMP3 market (even in Japan) to the Apple iPod through a lack of innovation in interfaces and design.

In reading the article I could not help but see the similarities to corporate structures that impede innovation. Stove-pipe organizational structure, hierarchical management chains and anti-rewards for risk and innovation were detailed as critical barriers in Japan, as they can be in a large enterprise.

While we continue to have some (maybe more than some at times) of these issues in Nortel, I find that there are active efforts at many levels to transform the organization and culture to enable the rapid innovative thoughts and delivery necessary to compete in the new marketplace. We are investing more in incubation, in common engineering, and in driving integration across the organizational boundaries. The oft referred to "atom" chart of the key segments Nortel has leadership in; enterprise/carrier, wireless/wired, applications/infrastructure, and common services and solutions is a way of showing that the big challenges will only be solved by breaking down our traditional barriers, both within our organization, but also in the market.

The advent of Hyperconnectivity, driven by the arrival of Metro Ethernet, IP everywhere, 4G networks, and Unified Communications is blurring the lines in our customers minds (and devices, tools, locations, etc.), so we have to begin to think across those boundaries. John Roese has had a significant impact in breaking down the walls and driving this transformation. He really gets the challenge that innovation is different than incremental improvement (both are important, but one is transformational, both for customers and for us).

Having been involved in driving some of those transitions, I resonate with the article and it's premise that the challenge facing Japan is huge, if not monumental. Change can only happen with strong leadership and a maniacal focus to innovation and transformation. Reward has to go to risk and failure as well as success. We have to remember that as we move forward as a company to never let organization and culture get in the way of rewarding innovative thought and those who take the risk of seizing cross-organizational opportunities. While we are not yet perfect (who is?), however, the realization that change is essential is a critical first step.