tbaus.x - Tech & Uncategorized Other

Since the announcement of AWS and VMware teaming up to form the long expected response to Microsoft's Azure Stack there has been no tech meeting without this subject being discussed. One thing is for certain: it will draw huge numbers of today's VMware customers towards AWS and away from Microsoft. However, there is more to this than just a marketing push.  Should Microsoft be scared?   Many see the new partnership as a direct response to Microsoft's Azure Stack. And what else would it be? But thinking about it, I am not so sure if the two setups can be compared. Microsoft as a one-for-all service provider. AWS and VMware as a partnership, offering a technological choice but most of all an easy migration and operation scenario. Microsoft must have seen this coming. Their only relevant competitor in public cloud and the only competitor in the hypervisor market, both looking for the ultimate solution for their lack of hybrid cloud capability. What else would they do than t...

In my last blog post I discussed how the concept of company cars could be leveraged to kickstart the electric car revolution in the DACH market. But as I wrote that article, I repeatedly drifted off into ranting about company cars as a concept in general. The sections were quite readable, so I just cut-pasted them into a new article: this one. The general idea is, that we should switch from fuel powered cars to electric now . But we should actually abandon company cars completely in the long run, shouldn't we? What about a roadmap that would go a little something like this: 2017 - Companies to adopt Electric Cars as Preferred Company Car 2019 - 75% of Company Cars are Electric 2021 - Total Number of Company Cars dropped by 50% 2025 - Almost no Company Cars in the DACH market A bit optimistic, right? But hey, who knows what we will actually see happening - the Merkel administration has been know to find drastic solutions to challenges out of nowhere. And if the usual sceptic...

The trigger to start the car (r)evolution in the German market especially is not by political-agenda rubbish, advertising or subsidising purchase of new (!) electric cars. Who does really think that such activities ever will change anything sustainably? Instead, let's look at what could be a powerful trigger: company cars. Companies naturally lease the expensive flagship models that private owners can't afford. And electric cars are just as if not even more expensive than gas-operated ones.  Often times Germany is seen as the automotive country. The country that offers unlimited speeding on the Autobahn. Volkswagen. BMW. Daimler Benz. Audi. You name it. But do we lead in electric or self driving cars? No, we don't. The manufacturers, especially BMW, do their part and push zero fuel models into the market. But honestly speaking, who can afford these beauties? I know zero people who own or lease an electric car on private budget. But I also don't know anyone who actua...

This article will look at the future of public transportation - as it was envisioned back in 2011. When I had joined my first employer after university - CSC - in 2012, it was through a university project that led to an internship, which led to a full employment. I want to talk about this project, which focussed around public transportation and its future. Together with a some of my co-students I engaged with the folks at CSC Germany to produce a set of (back then) innovative use cases for public transportation, leveraging mobile technologies of all sorts. The result was documented in a short video clip, which you will find at the end of this article. But let me first tell you about the making of and the background. From the very start of the project I found the subject at hand to be extremely interesting and compelling. Not only did it fit well into my political / social point of view, but it also felt like something that needed to be addressed very urgently. The market leaders, a...

Hi everyone. I want to try out something new, so here we go, my first blog series - the subject is  Transporation . It’s a subject that’s really heartfelt to me since many years. I first got in touch with the incredible relevance of private and public transport to the economy, the environment and many other things that matter to us as human beings, in 2011. I don't think most people actually ever think about it. So that is why I think this blog series is necessary, both to get things off my chest but also to make people aware and provoke a debate here and there.  The amazing thing is that the transportation industry is like a spider web, nothing can be touched or changed without impacting a number of other components. Many see this as a problem - a showstopper even. But I personally think that this is just the effect that is so great: the chance to just tip one of the domino stones and see the rest fall in place all by themselves. So, if more employees would take the ...

One of the worst habits I have come across in post-graduate work life is the inability of companies and teams to execute on the things that were planned, promised or sold. The excuses brought forward are as countless and rich in their variations as the people that express them. From top level managers to workers in the lowest trenches – they all excuse and try to ditch the blame instead of owning the problem and standing up bold even in times of failure. There is one thing all businesses and industries have in common, and that is the requirement to actually execute on your ideas. On your plans. Strategies. Initiatives. You can spend weeks on planning and visualizing, debating and lecturing. At some point you’ve got to either leave it or execute it. The problem with most “office work” now is the lack of reliable and accurate measurement methods. A lot of trust in employees is required, allowing for a lot of failure and chaos. A good reference to that is the concept of `Work in Prog...

Many times during my professional career and my time at university I was confronted with people questioning the value of PR, Marketing, Messaging and Communication Skills of staff. People say that only action counts, as words don’t mean a thing. Words are wind. And I totally understand where people saying that are coming from, I really do. Because in private life, this is totally true. But if people apply that mind set to work and politics, to business life, they’re so wrong. Of course, we could ignore them. The issue is that these people sometimes end up in leading positions and ruin teams, campaigns and entire companies with their negative view on the use of words. This article is a very short, yet honest and hopefully inspiring view on the value of words and their potential to business and movements alike. Now, no matter what we think about the subject – many times, actually ever since, the written or spoken word has been essential for mankind to achieve, convince, negotiate or...