Thursday, November 04, 2010

What does this mean?

I was just minding my own business when Tom Lapp, Co-Inventor of FileEngine, forwarded me a story from EWeek.com that includes this 'strategy' comment by a Microsoft executive:
“We are going to lead with the cloud,” Microsoft COO Kevin Turner said during a speech at the company’s Financial Analyst Meeting July 29. “Leading with the cloud actually helps better position Microsoft to sell more on-premises products than we ever have before. … Very strategically, it signals a very clear commitment to our customers and our partners.”
How could a C level exec attempt to convince intelligent finance managers that delivering cloud based solutions will accelerate sales of on-premises solutions?? Maybe Google should sell on-premises solutions to promote sales of Google Apps?

I had never heard of the term 'on-premises' solutions before. Was that Windows Server 200x? Almost sounds cooler when you call it an on-premises solution. (See my older blog entry here on how Windows server is like a puppy trying to find a place to pee.)