Another interesting article...sounds a lot like Sprague at the Gilder forum broadcasted recently.
HP Exec Says ISPs Will Disappear
In Two Years
(10/27/99, 6:31 p.m. ET)
By Charlotte Dunlap, Computer Reseller News
A senior Hewlett-Packard executive stunned
ISPs gathered at ISPCON '99 by predicting
ISPs will notexist in two years.
The whole business of ISPs will go away in the next
two years to make way for ASPs supporting
apps-on-tap, or the outsourcing of software
applications, said Nick Earle, HP's senior vice
president, Enterprise Computing Business.
Earle said outshining even Moore's Law is the
phenomenon happening around Internet growth, namely
that bandwidth is increasing tenfold every year.
"Every phone company has to reinvent themselves," he
said.
Earle said AT&T told HP that the phone giant could cut
its 7 cents a minute telephone cost to 4 cents if it could
minimize IT costs by outsourcing some of its business.
ISPs took issue with Earle's grim forecast.
Herndon, Va.-based PSInet has no intention of
changing its business model and hosting applications,
said Harry Lalor, director of product management at
PSInet.
While PSINet's primary strategy is to focus on
e-commerce, it has no interest in dropping its
bread-and-butter business of providing Internet access
and Web hosting to enterprises, Lalor said. In fact, the
large ISP is on an aggressive trail to acquire all the
dark-fiber bandwidth it can get its hands on across the
globe, he said.
"The next E is E-services," Earle said.
He defended HP's e-commerce product and service
model, in which the company charges its customers
who use HP technology a percentage each time a
customer collects revenue stemming from online
business.
"We'll finance you," Earle said. "We're not a [venture
capitalist]. We may take 5 percent of your company,
but then we'll go to the next [level] and we'll help you."
He said Dell CEO Michael Dell collects his money from
his customers before delivering products.
HP is about to launch a $100 million advertising
campaign to support it. The company already has
invested a lot of money on the concept, recently making
a $1.5 billion deal with Qwest to provide storage on
demand.
"An E-service is the opportunity to make money on the
Internet, taking any asset you have, whether it's
software, storage, or computers, and making it available
via the Net to generate a new revenue stream," he said.
It is not about Web storefronts anymore, but automated
services, Earle said.
The British-born executive offered a witty presentation,
prompting chuckles with his candor. Showing an
overhead slide of a large gorilla, he suggested that
people become the 800-pound dominant gorilla in
business.
"You don't want to know about the hardware," he said.
"You don't want to know about the software. You want
to get rich -- admit it." |
