Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Worth reading: New mobile analyst blog

The team over at CCS Insight has just started blogging.

Ben, Geoff and Tom have already made some interesting posts from Mobile World Congress.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

IDC lures another analyst away from Ovum

Jonathan Arber has left Ovum to join IDC as a senior research analyst covering the European consumer mobile market.

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Why small analysts are important

If you don't get why smaller analyst firms are important, then you should read the latest post from Dale Vile of Freeform Dynamics.

It contains a clear, well argued and powerful explanation on the value that these 'boutique' analyst companies can bring.

Do go and read the whole piece. There's a lot more to it than I'm able to share here:

On Commercial Impact
"The earlier in the decision making cycle you can engage, the more chance you stand of closing a deal...This kind of ‘upstream’ shaping of mindsets, thinking and objectives...is influenced by a whole range of inputs...Many boutiques play predominantly in the upstream space, with hard hitting blogs, far reaching media relationships, and deep community ties into various buyer communities and constituencies."

On Market Insight
"The other reason quite a few boutiques tend to be entertained and promoted by in-house AR people is the value their executives and other spokespeople get from a different kind of dialogue. The average level of ‘been there, done that’ experience and general level of talent within smaller firms tends to be higher than in larger ones, and analysts are far less constrained in the way they interact."

Friday, February 01, 2008

Gartner and the Institute of Industry Analyst Relations

I know. Two posts in a day.

Still, I wanted to blog about the great IIAR (Institute of Industry Analyst Relations) meeting yesterday (hosted by CA, thanks very much Geoff Dorrington).

Aaron Yaverski (GVP High Tech Provider Product Management) and Andrew Rosenblatt (Product Development) from Gartner came in to discuss some of its plans for the "Gartner for AR" product.

It was a very interesting conversation - and "it was very encouraging to see Aaron and Andrew proactively soliciting views and opinions from the European AR community on what we would like to see in the future."

I stole that line from a post written by Ludovic Leforestier at the new IIAR blog. You should pop over there and read it in full.

I'd echo his closing comments: "I’d encourage you to share your views and thoughts with Gartner - either by commenting on this blog or talking to Gartner directly. It looks like there are going to be some good and interesting developments happening later in the year. Now is our chance to make sure our voices are being heard."

--------------------
FYI, I am a board member of the IIAR

Analyst asks "Is it just me, or is webcasting completely useless?"

Dean Bubley of Disruptive Analysis explains his problem here.

So, think about Dean's advice when you're planning a briefing with him: "The old way works better - either email a PDF/PPT, or a link to download it. Then use a normal phone call or audio webcast."