IBM announced the WebSphere Commerce Suite, Marketplace Edition to help
businesses build scalable marketplaces. Among the functions of the software
are a variety of dynamic trading models, aggregated catalogs, secure membership
registration, and business intelligence and reporting functions. A particular
and notable feature of the software is that it fully integrates the WAP
and SMS protocols for wireless devices - according to IBM it is the first
marketplace software to support such wireless devices as mobile phones,
PDAs, and pagers.
Providing
wireless support to a marketplace promises to create much greater market
efficiency and inventory liquidity. Participants in an auction, for example,
can receive notice of significant events in real time when they are at
meetings, on the golf course, or watching Rocky VII at the multiplex.
The software is currently in a "limited availability" release with nine
customers.
IBM
has signed on a number of business partners to provide supporting services
to market makers. These include Xerox Connect, Ernst & Young, CheckFree,
eBX, and eCredit.com. The software also makes use of Lotus Sametime, which
allows buyer and sellers to engage in real-time conversations, much like
a private chat room or Instant Messenger.
IBM is the world's largest information technology company. There is no
doubt that having its thousands of salespeople out in the road pushing
marketplace software will have some effects. To better understand the
implications of this and other IBM announcements we requested an audience
with Dr. Pat Augur, the Director of TEC's Department 124C - Corporate
Predictions. Dr. Augur had just watched a taped copy of the previous day's
NFL game. Following is a transcript of our discussion:
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What
a rout! Didn't I tell you that they'd make it a passing game?
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Not
that we recall. Given that your time is limited, let's get down
to business. What is the biggest effect that you see from IBM's
announcement?
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When
IBM gets into a market it gives it a new kind of legitimacy. When
analysts predict thousands of vertical marketplaces and millions
of participants they aren't talking about early adopters going with
products just out of the IPO chute.
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But
companies like Ariba, Commerce One, Peregrine, VerticalNet and others
are constantly in the news and seem to be signing customers right
and left. Surely there's no doubt that electronic marketplaces are
part of the business framework by now.
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Maybe
so. But maybe you guys in the Research Department spend too much
time reading press releases. I don't doubt that companies will be
building marketplaces right and left in the next few years, but
so far the only real success stories have been functional: "So-and-so
managed to actually install their software at their first customer
site," or something similar. The revenues haven't yet started to
flow, and most of the companies that will end up being the bedrock
of the vertical market business are average companies - the kind
that prefer to be in the second or third wave, not those who are
willing to take the chance of getting washed up on the beach.
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And
this has something to do with IBM?
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When
IBM says that something is cooked enough for a product offering
that tells the business world that it's time to think about pulling
up to the table. Of course, IBM's existing e-commerce customers
will probably sign with IBM, but the halo effect will reflect on
other software makers as well.
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TEC:
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And
that leads into our next question. What about Ariba?
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Ah,
Ariba. There was something about them and IBM in the news recently,
wasn't there?
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Surely
you remember. On March 9 IBM, Ariba and i2 made a huge partnership
announcement. (See B2Big
Deal for IBM, Ariba, and i2). The companies were going to integrate
technologies, build a "competency center" and cooperate massively.
IBM will create a team of "several thousand" salespeople who will
be dedicated to selling the alliance's solution. IBM promised to
develop a team of specialists in this solution from among the 138,000
employees of its Global Services division, and said that Ariba and
i2 will acquire IBM's current e-procurement software capabilities.
IBM's recent announcement doesn't seem to completely square with
that announcement.
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Things
change, you know. Although, to be fair, they also stay the same.
It does seem to me that the IBM.Ariba.i2 alliance is still going
strong. For example, IBM and Ariba just announced that Ariba would
be the backbone of IBM's internal eProcurement solution, running
on the new copper RS/6000 models.
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That's
true. That's a marketplace that will eventually support 300,000
IBM employees buying from 14,000 suppliers. But
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Wait.
You were going to protest that this is just an internal marketplace,
weren't you?
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No,
actually we were going to ask you to find out what happened to the
coffee. But, yes, you're right about this being internal to IBM.
It isn't the same kind of thing that the WebSphere Marketplace Edition
does. Is that the important distinction?
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Dr.
Augur:
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Well,
let's look at the facts. With i2 as part of the mix it should have
been clear that the original alliance announcement was mainly about
supply chain issues. |
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TEC:
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But
was it? IBM's own press release listed three "critical aspects of
accelerating the B2B economy" that the alliance would address. These
were:
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Full-service marketplaces
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Integrated supply chain
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Open services
And
the announcement went on to state "The companies will integrate
their technologies to provide a comprehensive open market platform,
which will be resold to both vertical and horizontal market makers
through IBM, i2 and Ariba channels." So it certainly looked to us
like IBM would be making Ariba's software the basis of its own marketplace
solutions. In fact, that's what you told us to expect.
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Dr.
Augur:
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Ridiculous!
I would never have suggested that IBM would put all its eggs into
one basket. |
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TEC:
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We're
not sure about that, Doc. Here in our notes it says |
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Dr.
Augur:
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Are
you going to believe your notes or me? |
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TEC:
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Never
mind. What we want to know is, what does the future hold for IBM and
Ariba? |
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Dr.
Augur:
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If
you mean the alliance, it's still going strong. Doesn't this recent
press release say... oh, here it is - "The alliance will focus on
providing solutions for large corporate exchanges." So where's your
problem. The alliance is for the largest customers, and IBM will sell
its own solutions to everyone else. Just as I predicted. |
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TEC:
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Maybe
you did. But isn't that emphasis on "large corporate exchanges" a
fairly new qualification? Certainly Ariba wouldn't want to be thought
of as a solution that only the top tier of companies could use. And
its hard to see why IBM would need several thousand sales people for
a market that's limited only to companies big enough to create their
own supply chain marketplaces. There aren't that many companies like
GM and Ford, after all. The whole Global 2000 only has two thousand
companies in it. |
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Dr.
Augur:
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And
if IBM wanted to put five or six sales people at each one, what's
it to you? |
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TEC:
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And
more important, the "corporate exchanges" part of the limitation seems
to be a shift in emphasis. It wasn't too long ago that IBM was saying
"the integrated solution [will deliver] greater cost savings, efficiencies
and competitive advantage to global corporations and marketplaces." |
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Dr.
Augur:
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How
did you make your voice do that? |
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TEC:
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I
was just adding italics to the last quote. Doesn't it seem to you
that there's been a change in what this alliance really means? |
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Dr.
Augur:
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Ah,
meaning! What is meaning, anyway? I agree that the words have changed,
but words are slippery. When IBM says "marketplace" do they mean a
corporate exchange like the one they are using Ariba's software to
build for themselves or a publicly available vertical market, or even
an MRO market, the way B2B commerce started back in the last millennium?
You know, I could see back then they way things would be turning out.
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TEC:
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But
the last millennium was less than six months ago. Let's just focus
on IBM and Ariba. Do you think that the way this alliance is going
to turn out is more like the current limited statement about large
corporate exchanges or more like the earlier statements? Will IBM
and Ariba end up being competitors in the mid-market? |
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Dr.
Augur:
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Is
that all you want to know? I'll get right on it. Give me a call in
a couple of months. Right now I'm looking into that other question
you asked, about whether the big ERP vendors are going to try to move
into e-commerce. |
Companies with interest in becoming market makers will welcome this announcement
simply because it provides another option - especially for those who still
believe that "nobody ever got fired for choosing IBM." Companies that
already rely on other elements of IBM's WebSphere Software platform will
be particularly interested because of the possibility of simplifying integration
costs.
However,
most companies with current serious interest will probably choose not
to wait for general availability of the product, which is expected for
September 2000 on the AIX platform only, with other platform support promised
but yet to be announced. So there is no overriding reason to delay an
urgent selection decision as a result of this announcement. But those
who are looking to the future will want to watch how the product performs
before general availability and how quickly support for other platforms
can be implemented.