Accenture Should Roll-Up Indian Services Companies

Is Accenture (ACN) still in the body-shop business model? Yep. Why ruin a good thing when it’s working, some would ask. And India continues to be a strong leverage point for Accenture’s outsourcing activities, with a new consulting center opened in the last quarter. This was also reflected in the 40% increase in staff being

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Microsoft, The Sleeping Giant

In 2008, I hope Microsoft wakes up. With Google and Apple going gangbusters, Microsoft has threats coming at it from every direction. As we discussed earlier, Microsoft earned revenues of $13.76 billion for the quarter ended September 30, 2007, a 27% increase over the same period of the prior year. Operating income, net income and

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Web 3.0 & eBay (Part 1)

Introduction Founded in 1995, eBay Inc. provides consumers with Internet platforms for global commerce, payments and communications. Since its inception, eBay Inc. has expanded to include some of the strongest brands in the world, including the eBay e-commerce marketplace, PayPal, Skype, Shopping.com, and others. Today, eBay has three operating segments: Marketplaces, Payments and Communications. The

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Pioneering Video Conferencing: Polycom CEO Bob Hagerty (Part 3)

SM: Sounds like an early version of WebEx! BH: It was a little different since WebEx is sharing files on a PC and this was displaying it in a conference room. WebEx was also a lot more successful than we were with that device. The audio conferencing grew and the company was profitable. SM: You

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Serial Entrepreneur Zack Rinat on Model N (Part 8)

SM: Besides culture issues, can you talk about the business strategy decisions that helped you survive the perfect storm? ZR: A big key for us was maintaining focus. When we started the company, our two first deals out of the gate were $2M each. Then the perfect storm happened, and we could complain about it.

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More on ADP and SaaS

Here’s Phil Wainewright’s piece on ADP and SaaS: ADP Sees incentive for SaaS. My related articles: * ADP Can Become a Powerhouse through Acquisitions * Can PayChex become a SaaS Aggregator? * Intuit Bets on SaaS, Not Yet on International * Concur’s SME Opportunity

IAC Restructuring

We did a long coverage on IAC’s strategy, and suggested that IAC needs a restructuring. Well, the company is being split up into five parts, as reported by the WSJ this morning. :: The five companies will be IAC, including Ask.com, Match.com and Citysearch; IAC’s retailing unit that includes the HSN home shopping network, Shoebuy

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Cracking the Very Small Business Market: PayCycle CEO Jim Heeger (Part 4)

SM: You decided to stay with Adobe for a few years after selling them Fotiva, correct? JH: Initially I got out and I spent a few months looking around for the next smaller thing to do, but the market had dried up so badly there were no B and C round deals going on, and

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