亞馬遜為何讓初創(chuàng)企業(yè)又愛又恨
亞馬遜總裁兼首席執(zhí)行官杰夫·貝佐斯2016年12月14日(周三)在美國紐約特朗普大廈參加與美國總統(tǒng)繼任者唐納德·特朗普和技術(shù)高管的會面。 亞馬遜(Amazon)和其云計(jì)算服務(wù)帶動了一批初創(chuàng)企業(yè)的迅速崛起,例如Airbnb和Lyft,而且這些企業(yè)為酒店和運(yùn)輸?shù)刃袠I(yè)帶來了顛覆性的影響。人們應(yīng)該對此心懷感激。 亞馬遜網(wǎng)絡(luò)服務(wù)(Amazon Web Services)依靠向有需求的企業(yè)出售計(jì)算資源不斷發(fā)展壯大。然而,隨著它擴(kuò)張到像企業(yè)生產(chǎn)力軟件或其他文件管理服務(wù)之類的相關(guān)領(lǐng)域,它的境遇可能就不會如此順利了。 至少,有一些商業(yè)軟件公司持有這樣的想法。這些公司從AWS的崛起中獲益匪淺。然而,這些公司在穩(wěn)步推出新功能的同時(shí)還面臨著來自于零售巨頭的日趨激烈的競爭。此外,亞馬遜的云計(jì)算業(yè)務(wù)依舊在蓬勃發(fā)展,其第三季度的銷售業(yè)績同比增長了約55%,達(dá)到了32億美元。 當(dāng)前,亞馬遜正在嘗試銷售更多軟件,而不僅僅是提供基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施資源,例如計(jì)算機(jī)和存儲。Okta的首席執(zhí)行官托德·麥金諾在談到亞馬遜的這一舉措時(shí)指出,“他們可能過度高估了其提供更高級服務(wù)的能力”。麥金諾在最近舉辦的有關(guān)企業(yè)軟件和職場的專題研討會上做出了上述評論。 麥金諾對亞馬遜表示了稱贊,因?yàn)樵谒膸椭拢馩kta這樣的公司能夠比過去更快地制作軟件和開展業(yè)務(wù)。除此之外,購買亞馬遜的計(jì)算資源比購買數(shù)據(jù)中心硬件更合算,因此,亞馬遜為Okta省了一大筆錢。 職場軟件公司Slack副總裁阿普里爾·安德伍德對麥金諾的觀點(diǎn)表示贊同。他指出,對于企業(yè)來說,由于AWS和谷歌(Google)的存在,打造新的業(yè)務(wù)軟件服務(wù)從來沒有像今天這樣容易,例如費(fèi)用報(bào)告工具等。 麥金諾解釋說,但銷售數(shù)據(jù)中心基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施服務(wù)與企業(yè)軟件是兩種截然不同的業(yè)務(wù),而且企業(yè)在其中一個(gè)領(lǐng)域有優(yōu)勢并不意味著在另外一個(gè)領(lǐng)域也有優(yōu)勢。麥金諾將亞馬遜涉足新軟件服務(wù)的舉措與甲骨文(Oracle)進(jìn)行了對比。雖然后者在數(shù)據(jù)庫市場占據(jù)著主導(dǎo)地位,但一些分析師認(rèn)為,甲骨文在應(yīng)用業(yè)務(wù)上仍然不及SAP和Salesforce。 然而,亞馬遜仍在推出新的功能,例如其自有數(shù)據(jù)庫服務(wù)以及一些新服務(wù)(旨在減少管理企業(yè)軟件所需的日程情報(bào)搜集工作)。這一事實(shí)讓一些依賴于AWS的公司與其競爭時(shí)感到了些許壓力 例如,Okta銷售所謂的識別管理服務(wù),IT人員用它來跟蹤在工作中使用多個(gè)應(yīng)用的雇員。亞馬遜也在銷售類似的服務(wù),微軟(Microsoft)亦是如此。 值得注意的是,微軟并未邀請Okta參加其于3月舉行的一次技術(shù)會議,原因在于雙方服務(wù)的競爭日趨激烈。Business Insider網(wǎng)站稱,隨著這一新聞的曝光,微軟隨后又重新向Okta發(fā)出了參會邀請。 文件管理公司Box的首席執(zhí)行官阿隆·勒維表示,要與大公司競爭,新軟件公司必須確保雙方的軟件能夠相互兼容。勒維解釋道,小型企業(yè)必須確??蛻粼谑褂脕碜杂诓煌镜亩鄠€(gè)應(yīng)用時(shí)獲得簡單明了的體驗(yàn),就像他們在使用來自于一個(gè)大公司的軟件一樣。 勒維表示,“作為一個(gè)行業(yè),我們在統(tǒng)一性方面還有很多工作要做?!?(財(cái)富中文網(wǎng)) 譯者:馮豐 |
Jeff Bezos, president and chief executive officer of Amazon.com Inc., listens during a meeting with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and technology leaders at Trump Tower in New York, U.S., on Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2016. You can thank Amazon and its cloud computing business for ushering a wave of fast-rising startups like Airbnb and Lyft that are upending industries like hospitality and transportation. But while Amazon Web Services is making a big business out of selling computing resources to companies on demand, it may not fare as well as it expands to related areas like business productivity software or other document management services. At least, that’s the belief from a few business software companies that have both benefited from the rise of AWS while facing increased competition from the retail giant as it steadily debuts new features. Additionally, Amazon's cloud computing business keeps on booming, with sales rising roughly 55% year-over-year to $3.2 billion in its third quarter. “They probably overestimate their ability to move up the stack,” said Okta CEO Todd McKinnon in reference to Amazon attempting to sell more software than just basic infrastructure resources like computing and storage. McKinnon made his comments during a recently panel on enterprise software and the workplace. McKinnon praised Amazon for letting companies like Okta to rapidly build their software and jumpstart their businesses faster than the past. Additionally, with Amazon selling its computing resources for cheaper than it costs to buy data center hardware, the company has saved Okta “tons of money,” he said. April Underwood, the vice president of workplace software company Slack, echoed McKinnon’s comments and said it’s “never been easier than it was now” for companies to build new business software services like expense reporting tools because of cloud computing companies like AWS and Google. But selling data center infrastructure services and enterprise software are two different businesses, and just because one company is strong in one area doesn’t mean it will be strong in another, McKinnon explained. McKinnon compared Amazon’s foray into new software services to Oracle, which dominates the database the market but is considered by some analysts to be behind companies like SAP and Salesforce in its apps business. Still, the fact that Amazon continually debuts new features like its own database services and a new service intended to reduce the mundane legwork needed to manage corporate software puts some pressure on companies that rely on AWS while competing with it. Okta, for example, sells so-called identify management services that IT staff use to keep track of employees using multiple apps at work. Amazon sells a similar service as well as Microsoft. It should be noted that Microsoft disinvited Okta to one of its tech conferences in March due to increased competition between their respective services. After the news became public, Microsoft then re-invited Okta back to the conference, according to Business Insider. One thing newer software companies must do to compete with larger companies is to ensure their respective software works well with each other, said Aaron Levie, the CEO of document management company Box. Smaller companies must ensure that customers find a simple experience using multiple apps from multiple companies like they would using software from just one big company, Levie explained. “As an industry, we need to be better at a unified front,” Levie said. |