Can Watson resist the task of IBM's transformation?

A region called "Silicon Alley" (Silicon Alley) is emerging as a technological powerhouse in the eastern United States, near Manhattan's New York City and Broadway.

Unlike Silicon Valley, New York City's more media, fashion and cultural factors combine to make the technology companies stationed here look more interesting.

Early this year, Silicon Alley entrepreneurs ushered in a new neighbor, "IBM Watson Group". Watson's Chinese name translates as "Watson" from IBM's founder Thomas J.watson. This historic name refers to IBM's supercomputer, as well as related cognitive computing, artificial intelligence, natural language analysis and processing techniques.

In January 2014, IBM set up a business group named Watson, a business group that was only three times in history before IBM, and was set up during the critical period of transition. At the moment, IBM, which has a century of history, apparently hopes that Watson will be able to replicate its past successes and lead IBM again to the top of the wave of technology.

Watson Independence

"In the history of IBM, we do not often set up such a business group. "IBM Watson Business implementation vice President Ed Harbour explained that so far, only four such business groups have been set up in the history of the last century, the 360 mainframe group in the 60 's, the 80 's PC group, the 90 's Global advisory services Department, And the newly established Watson Group this year.

The point of concern is that "these four major initiatives are the time for a major transformation in the industry." Ed Harbour further explained that 1969 was the time when humans were on the moon, the need for computers to drive mainframe business; In the 80 's, cheaper personal general-purpose PCs became the mainstream of the market; In the 90, companies need specific solutions to the industry; Today, IBM believes that " The advent of cognitive computing, which will bring about fundamental changes in the way companies operate.

The so-called cognitive computing, which is different from the traditional calculation, the computer can read natural language, autonomous learning, analysis, prediction, to help people solve problems. In February this year, IBM-made Watson supercomputer, a representative of the field of cognitive computing and artificial intelligence, defeated the two-person answer master in the American quiz show "Dangerous Edge." This result shows the astonishing ability of cognitive computing, which can be used not only in games, but also in social and business development.

In fact, skeptics believe that an AI system represented by Watson, far from public life, would be "shelved" for more attention to high-end industry applications and would never be the saviour of IBM's transformation. However, the founding of the Watson Group dismissed this remark. IBM clearly believes that the ability to help his clients do more, and the commercial point of time.

IBM has set up a dedicated sales force for Watson Group, which, unlike its previous architecture, is more like an entity that can operate independently of the market. "Watson, like a start-up, wants it to grow fast," said Ken Keverian, IBM's senior vice president for strategy, when describing transformational strategies, emphasizing the importance of speed. One of the key steps to boost speed, Ken insists, is to set up a separate business unit like Watson that can run as fast as a start-up.

So, what's the speed of becoming a start-up company? It depends on the actual progress. In its 10 months, Watson's business group, while continuing to promote research and development, has been delivering cognitive technology to companies through the cloud platform. In terms of products, the introduction of Watson Discovery Advisor, Watson Analytics, Watson Explorer, to help enterprises use artificial intelligence technology to solve practical problems. On the commercialization side, there have been projects with hundreds of clients in 25 countries and 12 industries, and Watson has entered the financial, medical, retail and daily life areas.

In the financial field, Watson is deployed in the financial management and insurance business, providing better advice to account managers. Watson Analytics, which uses natural language interaction technology, gives the average person the ability to do large data analysis, and users can easily use it without having to understand programming. At the same time, the software uses a free value-added model, the introduction of a free version. In medical terms, the top three of the current cancer treatment sector is running Watson. By using Watson's literature to read, collate and analyze, doctors are able to get the latest diagnosis and treatment in a short time, as well as the supporting literature. In the field of life, Watson launched the "Watson Chef" project, which integrates analysis of ingredients around the world, develops new menus, and is like a true chef.

"All these developments, which took place in the last 9 months," said IBM CEO Rometty satisfaction and excitement at the rapid development of Watson Group. As the first female CEO in IBM's history, Rometty is leading the century-old shop for its fourth major transformation.

When it comes to IBM's transformation, it has to mention the story of the 90 's, when IBM's legendary CEO, Gerstner, saved the company from sinking into the Abyss, and his theory of "who says elephants can't dance". But the Rometty face of this transition, the elephant IBM not only to dance, but also to compete with other animals race. Because the world has changed.

The speed of the cloud era

"We have undergone a variety of transformations. If this is any different from the past, it is that the pace of transition is much faster, "Rometty said in an interview.

There is no doubt that with the development of technologies such as mobile, cloud computing and large data, we are experiencing a time of rapid technological change. "With the help of new technology, competitors are launching solutions faster than ever," said Ken Keverian, senior vice president of strategy, blushes the pace of competitors.

An increasing number of IT infrastructure and business applications will be based on the cloud architecture, the consultancy Gartner said in its 2014 Industry trend Assessment report. The cloud computing market is expected to reach $250 billion trillion by 2015. 2016, it is estimated that more than 1/4 of the world's applications, 85% of new software will have a cloud version.

Cloud computing not only subverts the enterprise hardware architecture, but also changes the way enterprises consume software. On the other hand, with the development of mobile Internet, the consumer market is affecting the enterprise-level market. The emergence of new trends, all of the traditional business impact. In fact, IBM, with its transformational genes, has long foreseen these trends and developed a transformational direction called cams. This first-letter word represents cloud computing, large data analysis, mobility, and social interaction.

In the area of cloud computing, IBM bought SoftLayer, a cloud-computing service with $2 billion trillion, and built 40 data centers around the world, including the mainland, while investing $1 billion to build PAAs cloud computing platforms Bluemix. While investing in new projects, cloud strategy has become a business model that runs through all business, and IBM strives to cloud traditional software. Despite fierce competition from Amazon's AWS Cloud services, IBM is still dominant in hybrid cloud and cloud markets for big companies, and SAP is already using IBM's cloud infrastructure to deliver services, and SoftLayer has new mobile Internet enterprise customers such as WhatsApp.

In the field of large data analysis, IBM has formed a complete enterprise-wide data analysis tool. At the Insight 2014 summit, IBM launched a cloud-based tool chain for data preparation, real-time analysis and sharing of three links to companies. "We view the data as a new natural resource," Rometty. Just as natural resources need to be "mined", there is no value in data that has not been analyzed and processed. And IBM is hoping to "give enterprise ability" way, digging bokhary data.

On the other hand, the high-end aspect of large data analysis is Watson technology. "Watson is a very important core of IBM's Big data strategy." It is like the Data analysis field doctoral degree product. Ken defines Watson's position in this great transformation.

In the field of mobile and social interaction, the so-called interactive participation system, IBM has worked with Apple to provide enterprise-class applications on Apple devices, while the two sides will jointly sell.

IBM, known as the transformation of the gene, as an evergreen tree in the technology industry, IBM in its hundred years history has undergone three major transformations: The 60 's transformation to the mainframe field, the 80 's transition to the Personal PC field, the 90 transition to the software services and consulting fields. For IBM, which lacks strategic competence and no shortage of smart talent, the fourth transition strategy has always been clear. But this time, the new trend of the impact of unprecedented speed, leaving IBM to transform the time is also shorter, the environment more brutal.

Not long ago, IBM gave a poor third-quarter earnings performance, with revenues and profits falling year-on-year. Notably, IBM has experienced 10 consecutive quarterly revenue declines. To set aside more space for the transition, IBM has announced that it has abandoned its original customized revenue targets.

But in the external environment, the market competition is more intense. In Gerstner's famous book, who says elephants can't dance, he mentions that if elephants can dance, the ants should leave the stage. Seasons, when the technology industry entered the 21st century, the ants may have left the stage, but the leopard, monkey and other animals. And the game, not "dance", but to "race."

Not long ago, on the same day that Rometty led an executive at the IBM Summit in Beijing, Amazon hosted the AWS Cloud Computing Conference in the United States, offering a low-cost enterprise-level database, Aurora, and a range of cloud tools. Beyond Amazon, IBM is facing an increasing number of cross-border intruders. The intruders include internet giants like Google, and entrepreneurial upstarts like Dropbox.

In the face of competition, IBM's answer is speed and scale. "Our new business now has a scale of 20 billion dollars, which has surpassed the size of many of the world's largest companies," Ken responded, "We have a growth rate of more than 20% per cent a year in cloud computing, large data, and interactive participation systems." Ken stressed that for IBM, it is important to maintain the speed of transition, or you will miss many opportunities.

In the opinion of analysts, the speed of transition is not just a loss of opportunity, the speed of the ship will determine whether IBM can continue to sail on the sea. It is noteworthy that the speed of Watson's business is not equal to the speed of IBM as a whole. Undoubtedly, Watson has played a steering role in the restructuring, and to complete the transformation of the task, but also rely on IBM's overall transformation.

The clout of an elephant

In recent moves, IBM seems to have really "run". In just a few months, IBM has announced the collaboration of Apple, SAP, Microsoft, Twitter and Tencent, and has established the China Power Alliance in the OpenPOWER context, and has established a joint venture with power technology with mainland Chinese companies.

Until then, it's hard to imagine IBM working with Internet upstarts like Twitter. And a series of movements, more like the pace of the Internet company, so that the industry and the media have speculated that the next to work with IBM who will be? Cooperation is just an outward appearance, and the intrinsic essence is, where is IBM's advantage in attracting partners? Or what is the "elephant race"?

As a long-term service company, IBM considers itself a big advantage in understanding the enterprise, and as a company that studies future technology, IBM thinks it understands technology and future trends. So, this combination of status is the so-called first layer of the emboldened, that is, "link the New World and the Old worlds."

"Our customers like new technology very much, but they also need us to help." Because they need new technology to be able to connect with their business to run existing systems. "It's impossible for new web companies to combine two worlds," Ken explains. Because they only know the latest things, but they don't know much about the things that are available. ”

The discrepancy, which has also been confirmed in ready-made customers, said at the forum that Mengniu executives say the food company is using IBM's technology to help the product traceability and to help consumers understand the product. Companies that do leather shoes are also using IBM's technology to achieve faster product cycles.

In addition to the first layer from the "link" of the emboldened, the second layer of confidence is derived from the future of technology into commercial applications experience. It is undeniable that, under the long-term "high value" strategy, IBM's experience in the transformation of technology has been quite mature. Whether Watson's artificial intelligence, or the human brain computer, these things in the laboratory, through these experiences, will be converted into the source of profits.

With cloud delivery technology, IBM seems to have found a more convenient way to transform the customer base from big businesses to small and medium-sized enterprises and even individual developers. This channel is IBM's launch of the PAAs cloud computing platform Bluemix. The PAAS, the acronym for services, allows developers to deploy applications directly on their infrastructure without considering the underlying architecture.

"Bluemix's current core target users are small and medium enterprises and individual developers," said Jim Comfort, general manager of global information technology services, in his interview. But when asked if "IBM has a genetic service for small businesses and individual developers," Jim simply responded by recruiting new generations of engineers on campus to strengthen understanding of the new generation of people. Obviously, IBM needs more action to eliminate the doubts of small and medium-sized developers.

In short, whether it is linked to the new and Old World, or the future of technology conversion capabilities, are IBM in this transition race capital. Watson Group This fulcrum, pry move the transformation, and decide the success or failure of the transformation, or whether IBM can use these capital, complete the metamorphosis of the whole body.

The elephant who has completed the transformation and the speed of Ascension is promising, but Ken, vice president of strategy, admits that "a company as big as IBM could take more time to speed up." ”

(Responsible editor: Mengyishan)