Enjoyment: Structure News: Google wants us to know it's serious about enterprise tech

Friday, 22 January 2016

Structure News: Google wants us to know it's serious about enterprise tech

Where We've Always Thought Enterprise Technology Was Swell

January 22nd, 2016 / by Tom Krazit

This week, we'll talk about Oracle's cloud push, why AI might not be ready just yet to be an NFL offensive coordinator, and the Diane Greene era at Google.

STRUCTURE NEWS

FACEBOOK'S ALAN PARKER COMING TO STRUCTURE DATA 2016

We've already got most of the speakers for Structure Data lined up, but we made sure to save a space for Facebook's Alan Parker (pictured here), head of the company's Language Technology efforts. Parker, a longtime Microsoft veteran who worked on Cortana and Bing, is responsible for actually applying AI research to real-world problems.

FROM AI TO IPOS: THE TOP 5 ISSUES IN BIG DATA TODAY

As we gear up for Structure Data in March, Derrick Harris sizes up the state of the industry in a nice post for our blog. Along with the two issues mentioned in the title, Derrick also points out why data has to be delivered in real-time these days and how security fears ripple through just about everything.

THE STRUCTURE SHOW: NVIDIA AND AI, YAHOO'S DONATION, FOURSQUARE'S FUTURE

You can now get your Structure updates in podcast form: we launched The Structure Show this week. Derrick and I look back on the previous week's news in hopes of figuring out how hardware affects AI research and what's next for Foursquare now that it seems squarely focused on data generation and licensing.

INDUSTRY NEWS

EUROPEANS REMAIN FAR FROM SOLD ON THE BENEFITS OF BIG DATA

The Europeans of the internet age have generally been more protective of their online privacy than others, so it's not too surprising that they would give big data a side-eye. Still, Fortune notes that skepticism persists, citing a Vodafone study on consumer preferences with regards to big data.

ORACLE CLOUD AMBITIONS MAY BE NEARING MOMENT OF TRUTH

Oracle went on a charm offensive this week, using its CloudWorld event in New York to make the case that it is a cloud-focused software company. ZDNet previewed the stakes for Oracle in executing this transition, which is being watched very closely by its investors.

ALIBABA TEAMS WITH NVIDIA IN $1 BILLION BET ON CLOUD COMPUTING

Enterprise tech companies throw "$1 billion bets" around an awful lot, but this one is interesting: Alibaba is looking to bolster its cloud-computing business by working with Nvidia to offer customers better performance on deep learning, according to Bloomberg. It stands to reason that cloud computing will be a huge business in China, and Alibaba might be uniquely positioned to win a lot of that business.

FOOTBALL COACHES TURNING TO AI TO HELP CALLING PLAYS

It might come a little too late for Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, but football coaches of the future might be able to ask something a little more sophisticated than the New York Times' Fourth-Down Bot for help when making decisions. Wired takes a look at artificial intelligence research around game theory, and how quickly that might be able to help coaches (assuming the leagues allow such technology).

BILLIONAIRE VC SAYS THAT MOST COMPANIES WILL EVENTUALLY PAY AN AMAZON "TAX"

There aren't too many young tech startups these days building their own infrastructure, and as they grow, Social Capital's Chamath Palihapitiya thinks that's going to work out very nicely for Amazon Web Services. The market leader "is a tax on the compute economy," he said in a Quora discussion picked up by Business Insider.

DOCKER BAGS UNIKERNAL GURUS - NOW YOU CAN BE JUST LIKE LINUS TORVALDS

Docker continues to manage the rise of a mini-empire (for now) behind containers. This week it acquired startup Unikernel Systems, and The Register explains the implications of the deal, which could help Docker burnish its reputation as the user-friendly container company.

BIG PICTURE

Now that Alphabet -- the holding company set up six months ago by the entity we used to know as Google to nuture special projects (including Google itself) -- is starting to take shape, it's going to be an interesting year for Diane Greene and Google's cloud-computing efforts.

Recode put together a very nice look at the state of Google's cloud operations this week ahead of Alphabet's earnings release in two weeks. It highlights the fact that Google plans to get very serious about its enterprise business this year, which we knew immediately when Google hired Greene the same week Google's Urs Hölzle told Structure 2015 attendees that he thought Google's cloud business could one day surpass its search ad juggernaunt.

Google's technology expertise, when it comes to building the platform needed for a modern cloud computing business, has never been questioned. What has relegated Google to third place in the cloud market, well behind AWS and Microsoft is the notion that it doesn't really understand how to build and sell products and services for enterprise customers.

That's not entirely fair, but Greene acknowledged in an interview with Recode that Google hasn't always been focused on enterprise customers. Google CEO Sundar Pichai is said to have changed that mentality in a big way, and Greene herself is a huge sign that Google is prepared to compete in enterprise tech.

When it comes to big data and artificial intelligence, we know Google has been pushing mightily to keep pace with its rivals at Facebook and Microsoft, as we'll discuss with Google's Jeff Dean at Structure Data. If Google can jump-start its cloud business, it could have a compelling product to offer if that data expertise can be married to a cloud business operating at even close to Amazon's scale.