A case study in statistical significance versus vendor spin
Talk of an increasing number of users migrating off Notes and Domino is more apt to be gossip at cocktail parties than "hard evidence of anything other than due diligence in the market," according to Brill. In fact, sales of new licenses grew during the second quarter, Brill said.
That sounds like good news, but Brill's summary of the report doesn't tell the whole story, said Austin, vice president and fellow at Gartner and also the author of the report, in a blog post on Saturday.
For example, from July 1 in 2009 to April 30, 116 different clients booked one or more calls with Gartner analysts seeking advice on migrating away from Notes for e-mail, and no Microsoft customers called Gartner for advice on whether to migrate to Notes and Domino for e-mail, Austin added in a second blog post on Sunday. That disparity is a significant factor, Austin said.
Austin stressed that Gartner's research is based on substantive data and very serious discussions with professionals with serious issues and concerns.
IBM, Gartner in Blog Tiff Over Notes Report - PCWorld Business Center
2 comments:
Yeah, or perhaps not. This comment on Tom Austin's blog seems about right.
Is this really a surprise to anyone? Do you deny that anyone has migrated away from Microsoft/Exchange to Lotus Notes? I wonder why they didn’t call you first to see if this was a good idea? Can you give a reasonable explanation as to why they didn’t call you first? Could it be your past reviews of Lotus Notes and narrow interpretation of its capabilities?
You are gauging industry trends based upon the fact that no one called you for your advice on a topic that they can pretty much guess what your general answer would be; before they make the call? This is a proper conclusion to be made by an industry analyst – no one called me – so no one must be doing this? Hmmm….
As a former collaboration-focused industry analyst, and in my current Microsoft role, I have visibility into the global IBM/Microsoft competitive dynamics, and Tom Austin's take is consistent with the patterns I've seen.
There are occasional migrations from Microsoft to IBM Lotus, but they are typically when an organization that has deployed IBM Lotus products acquires a smaller organization that previously deployed Microsoft products (and those migrations don't always stick, e.g., when people in the acquired organization who are familiar with Outlook are instructed to start using the Notes client instead).
The vast majority of migrations I've seen over the last several years are from IBM Lotus Notes/Domino to Microsoft Exchange and SharePoint. That was the primary pattern I saw as a Burton Group industry analyst during 2003 - 2008, and the pattern has recently accelerated, following the release of SharePoint 2010.
It's also consistent with the job market dynamics over the last few years, with Notes/Domino employment opportunities in decline and SharePoint opportunities on a steep growth curve.
Post a Comment