| In a presentation yesterday about Microsoft and cloud computing, CEO Steve Ballmer said his company is all about the cloud, even products that didn't start there. "The inspiration for what we're doing now starts with the cloud," he said, proceeding to lump Windows Phone, Xbox, Bing, Windows Azure and SQL Azure as all part of the cloud universe. Then he continued, "Microsoft Office and Exchange, and SharePoint, which are the back-end facilities in that professional set of tools are all really focused in on the cloud today. This is the bet, if you will, for our company." Part of me thinks that Microsoft's labeling needs to be more in line with cheese products in the dairy section of supermarkets. There's cheese, then there's cheese food, or more correctly, processed cheese, cheese spread, cheese products and imitation cheese. Some of the Microsoft stuff looks more like processed cloud and perhaps even imitation cloud. (I have my own label, cheese-like food). Not surprisingly, Dynamics products were not mentioned, although their future is clearly linked to the Azure platform. To a certain extent, I tend to think Microsoft's current approach with Dynamics could be labeled "imitation cloud" until Azure gets going. |
The drumbeats are getting louder and faster for the launch of
Get your money now or later? That's probably the best way to explain 
Exact, which has seen a lot of its resellers adding other lines, has put together a new channel program. Labeled the NexGen program, it is supposed to provide "the communication and strong support platform each partner needs to thrive selling and supporting Exact solutions," according to the official announcement. It was also designed to expand the product portfolio for new and existing resellers.
Bob Scott has been informing and entertaining the mid-market financial software community with his email newsletters for 10 years. And he has been covering this market through print publications for 18 years, first as technology editor of Accounting Today and then as the Editor of Accounting Technology from 1997 through 2009. He has covered the traditional tax and accounting profession during the same time and continues to address that as executive editor of the Progressive Accountant.
