7 dispatches
One of the most exciting technological developments from the semiconductor side of things is the rapid development of the ecosystem around the open-source RISC-V instruction set architecture (ISA). One landmark in its rise is that the architecture appears to be moving beyond just behind-the-scenes projects to challenging Intel/AMD’s x86 architecture and ARM (used by Apple and...
Silicon nerd 🤓 that I am, I have gone through multiple cycles of excited-then-disappointed for Windows-on-ARM, especially considering the success of ChromeOS with ARM, the Apple M1/M2 (Apple’s own ARM silicon which now powers its laptops), and AWS Graviton (Amazon’s own ARM chip for its cloud computing services).
There’s been a fair amount of talk lately about proactively regulating — and maybe even breaking up — the “Big Tech” companies. Full disclosure: this post discusses regulating large tech companies. I own shares in several of these both directly (in the case of Facebook and Microsoft) and indirectly (through ETFs that own stakes in large companies) Source: MIT Sloan Like many,...
Technology in the 1990s and early 2000s marched to the beat of an Intel-and-Microsoft-led drum. Source: IT Portal Intel would release new chips at a regular cadence: each cheaper, faster, and more energy efficient than the last. This would let Microsoft push out new, more performance-hungry software, which would, in turn, get customers to want Intel’s next, more awesome chip.
When Steve Jobs first launched the iPhone in 2007, Apple’s perception of where the smartphone application market would move was in the direction of web applications. The reasons for this are obvious: people are familiar with how to build web pages and applications, and it simplifies application delivery.
Genius? Source: Softpedia Regardless of how you feel about Microsoft’s products, you have to appreciate the brilliance of their strategic “playbook”: 1. Use the fact that Microsoft’s operating system/productivity software is used by almost everyone to identify key customer/partner needs 2. Build a product which is usually only a second/third-best follower product but make sure...
Working on tech strategy consulting case for 18 months ingrains a thing or two in your head about strategy for tech companies, so I thought I’d lay out, in one blog post the major lessons I’ve learned about how strategy in the technology sector works. To understand that, it’s important to first understand what makes technology special? From that perspective, there are three...