This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Agile Buzz
by James Robertson.
Original Post: Being cynical...
Feed Title: Cincom Smalltalk Blog - Smalltalk with Rants
Feed URL: http://www.cincomsmalltalk.com/rssBlog/rssBlogView.xml
Feed Description: James Robertson comments on Cincom Smalltalk, the Smalltalk development community, and IT trends and issues in general.
I guess I'm not the only one who was cynical about the Sun/MS agreement - Wired ascribes it to Sun's desperate position in the industry. The Register characterizes it as "Sun throwing in the towel". Just ask yourself - would a Sun that had experienced rising revenues for 11 straight quarters (instead of declining revenues, as they have) - have made this deal? I think not. It's no coincidence that this announcement came on the heels of a 9 percent layoffs anouncement. I'm also somewhat surprised that they promoted this genius to be President and COO. Maybe Schwartz can figure out how to stop Java from being a money spring for anyone but Sun - but I have my doubts about that.
An interesting side note on that point is this from the Wired article:
Daryl Plummer, chief fellow for emerging technologies at the research firm Gartner Inc., said the news that most concerned him Friday was that Sun's 9 percent staff cuts would be across the board - even in research and development, which Sun has fiercely protected in previous rounds of layoffs.
"Cutting R&D is a sign of fiscal responsibility," Plummer said. "However, any cuts in R&D will be unfortunate since Sun relies so heavily on innovation, and they're trying to change the mind-set of the industry - simplifying architecture, getting operational flexibility from chip design to software innovations. It's important they keep that innovation alive."
I've been wondering for years as to when the finance guys would finally blow a gasket at Sun; it looks like that happened. Not necessarily a good sign at this point, and the way Sun did cuts does not, to my mind, usually pan out. Giving everyone a haircut is a great way to cripple the good with the bad. Far better to pick winners and losers, and just shoot the losers. The more I watch Sun, the more I see a bigger version of ParcPlace Systems - losing money hand over fist, and utterly baffled as to what business they are in...
Previous Topic
