This morning, it was snowing between 10 and 20cm in Zurich.
Happy not to travel by car ;-)
http://www.flickr.com/apps/video/stewart.swf?v=63881
http://www.flickr.com/apps/video/stewart.swf?v=63881
via Ed Cone
Ed is pointing to a very interesting document from Forrester about the reactions of CIOs, classified by sectors. Including the Finance & Insurance industries.
For the Insurance Industry, the analysis of Forrester is quite aligned with what we are perceiving at Innoveo.
The analysis is very recent and was presented during a webinar on December 11, 2008.
For a while I had a discussion about the guitarist Steve Lukather with a friend of mine and I have discovered that Steve is not the most well-known guitarist, although he has played on over 1’000 albums in the last years!
Some information about
Steve “Luke” Lukather (born October 21, 1957) is an American Grammy Award winning guitarist, singer, songwriter, arranger, and record producer best known for his work with the rock band Toto.
Lukather has also released several solo albums and, as a studio session guitarist, has arranged, composed, and recorded on over 1000 albums.
Lukather was recently voted #1 guitarist worldwide in over 40 countries at VoteNumber1.com.
While his work with Toto is predominantly based on pop rock music, Lukather’s solo work spans many genres including rock, prog, jazz and funk.
Lukather has been nominated for a Grammy twelve times, and has won five awards.
[…]
Influenced by blues-rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page, jazz guitarists such as Larry Carlton, and jazz fusion players such as Al Di Meola and Frank Gambale, Lukather is known for fast, melodic lines that often combine blues phrases with jazzy ‘out’ notes.
His vibrato is very pronounced and his exaggerated wide bends are instantly recognizable.
Well versed in theory, Lukather can follow chord charts and changes as a jazz musician would, and this enhances his value as a session musician. In interviews, he has explained how he thinks of the guitar in a “chordal cluster” format, and not the typical “linear scale” format.
You said many times that your heros are Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Stevie Ray Vaughan, George Harrison and so on… You also got to work with Jeff Beck at one point… I just wondered if you ever got to meet these “heros” you’ve mentioned as being so important in your (musical) life and how it was to finally be “face to face” with them?
Luke: All these players are so awesome and have inspired me more than words. Jeff Beck… I have known him and played with him many times. We did a record together that never came out ’cause he wanted to get into electronic music but he’s a main influence and a great friend. Jimi… Well I never met him but if he was alive I would most certainly know him. Major influence. Clapton… I did his Behind the sun record and played live with him with Elton John at the Hollywood Bowl. WAY cool. Jimmy Page… What a gentleman. He made a point to take me aside and tell me that he really dug my playing, I have never worked with him but I would love to sometime. I felt up my first girlfriend summer of 1969 listening to Led Zepplin 1, hahaha. SRV… never met him but I LOVE his touch. What a player! George Harrison… Well HE is the reason I play the guitar. I met him right after we lost Jeff Porcaro and I talked him into playing with us at the tribute at the Ampitheatre in L.A. What an honor. He took me out to dinner that next year and Bob Dylan was there, Jim Keltner, Jeff Lynne and we had a jam at Jeff Lynne’s house after. What a trip that was.
Among others, he has played with/for:
http://www.stevelukather.net/Discography.aspx
via Judith Hurwitz
One of the first “predictions list” for 2009 for software companies.
Very interesting insights!
Wow, good food for thoughts!
I am excited also to be able to read the new version of the book “SOA for Dummies”, written, among others, by Judith Hurwitz. Innoveo should have there its own chapter, hopefully ;-)
I was establishing a list of 3 different choices for a friend of mine, in order to organize a good (whatever that could mean ;-) business lunch with one of his customer.
I am not the “Guide Michelin” but I know some of the restaurants in Zurich, and, to my very subjective mind, these 3 below are very good and interesting, as they are all 3 offering “something special”.
Surely not exhaustive, the question was “3 possibilities”, not 10 ;-)
via Judith Hurwitz
Extremely interesting post from Judith. She is listing the 10 characteristics of software companies that will make them fail in the coming economical downturn phase.
So, are you “in” or “out”?
As said before, heavy snow again ;-)
First snow yesterday evening.
And it is snowing again right now ;-)
Congrats to all my American friends, colleagues and readers!
You did the right choice ;-)
Pure joy after these 8 very difficult years, for everybody…
At Innoveo, we are member of the swiss made software community, since our creation.
“swiss made software” is the new label of the Swiss software industry. International software companies like Google, IBM or Microsoft have discovered the Swiss values – quality, reliability and precision – in software development and have established important research and development centers in Switzerland. If you are looking for Swiss values and innovation, openness and flexibility in software, choose your partner from this site.
Our software product – Innoveo Skye – is now also listed in the new product part of the swiss made software website.
Description: Innoveo Skye is a generic, flexible insurance sales solution. It supports an unlimited number of products and services, all lines of business (life and non-life) and all sales channels. Industrialize
Technology: Insurance-specific, J2EE (TM) based IT solution on commercial (Weblogic (TM), Websphere (TM), …) and open source (JBoss (TM)) infrastructure stacks, together with a wide range of business-oriented services.