L@C member H-J Jeanrond exposes "The perversions of the stock market: Posing tough challenges to SAP’s next product cycle"

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L@C member Hans-Josef Jeanrond, strategic analyst and consultant, exposes the dysfunctions of financial markets being unduly focussed on short term financial results. This short-sightedness forces software companies with sometimes incompressible development cycles to make decisions that run against their best interests – and hence against the best interests of long term investors. Reconciling the different time and expectation horizons of customers, engineers and investors is a challenging task for the new company management.

Here’s the intro in French:

SAP a pu développer R/3 pendant plusieurs années et investir un montant substantiel, sans être perturbée par des analystes financiers et des investisseurs à la bourse insistant sur des gains à court terme. C’est une des raisons pour lesquelles SAP avait un produit pour les nouvelles plateformes client serveur quand aucun autre éditeur n’était à un stade comparable de maturation. Aujourd’hui, étant cotée à la bourse de New York (NYSE) et les fondateurs étant devenus minoritaires, SAP n’est plus dans une telle situation privilégiée. Deux informations apparemment anodines dans la publication de ses résultats pour le premier trimestre 2008 font apparaître la pression et les effets potentiellement néfastes des exigences de la “communauté financière” auprès de l’industrie du logiciel. R/3 : le succès d’un projet R&D de long terme, affranchi de pressions financières à court terme

Read the full article, “Les aberrations de la bourse : un défi important pour SAP et sa prochaine génération de produits”, on CIO-Online .com

L@C co-founder launches new marketing consultancy: SO’xperts

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SO'xperts logoCo-funder of the Lunch at the Circle, Sophie Callies, has recently launched a new company, SO’xperts, specialised in marketing performance managment for technology enterprises. It’s web site is www.so-xperts.com

A consulting company specialized in marketing performance management for the high-tech industry, SO’xperts mission is to help marketers and top management address four principal business challenges: how to acquire and keep customers, how to enter new markets, how to drive excellence in execution and how to measure marketing contribution to the business. What makes it unique is a comprehensive approach – from marketing strategy and benchmarking to performance improvement – that helps companies identify and pursue market opportunities while optimizing programs and resource allocation.

Co-founder of the Lunch@the Circle, Sophie Callies has a track record in driving marketing performance at worldwide levels in companies such as Apple, Netscape, AOL Time Warner, Alcatel and Cartesis.

You can reach Sophie here.

L@C TV: Giffor Morley-Fletcher on Making your web site business effective in a world with broadband & SEO

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Here’s the video from the latest Lunch at the Circle event, with Gifford Morley-Fletcher, strategy director at Skive.

— Gifford mentions the BP Rally Game in his introduction and you find it here.

— Some other examples can be found here.

— If you want to listen to Gifford’s full presentation you can download the full audio mp3 podcast here.

— If you want to see some photos from the event you can take a look at Emmanuel Vivier’s photo album here.

Here’s a sample:

Lunch time at L@C

Lunch time at L@C

(Thank you Emmanuel Vivier, www.culture-buzz.com)

Some more background:

Strategies for success in promoting your business on the internet in the next 18 months

with Gifford Morley-Fletcher, Strategy Director, Skive

Gifford Morley-Fletcher

Gifford Morley-Fletcher

Gifford will approach this subject from two angles: the fabled “SEO” and the power of broadband. SEO is one of the buzz words that basically just means “how do you get your site noticed by search engines and thus by customers”. It is critical for any web site to take into account how search engines rank web sites. It can, literally, be a matter of life and death for a business web site if you are on the first page or the tenth for search engine results. And it is not just a question of “build it and they will come”. You have to know how to attract search engines, and customers. The second aspect is that the increasing uptake of broadband has changed the way to build web sites and make people notice them – today you can offer “rich media”, video, animations, sound etc, in a way that was not possible just a few years ago.

And if you don’t believe that it’s important how you manage your web presence and think about how to appear from a search engine perspective, consider this: What do you think you will find if you do a Google search on “miserable failure”? You’ll be surprised. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3298443.stm)

Gifford Morley-Fletcher has worked in New Media since 1994, making him a bit of a ‘web dinosaur’. He is currently based in London as Strategy Director at Skive, an award-winning digital strategy and design agency based in London, responsible for developing interactive web sites, games and promotions for brands such as Reebok, Playstation, McDonalds and Gillette. During his career, he has worked in all areas of web development and online marketing, most recently spending 4 years in Paris where he was a founder of LSF Interactive, specialists in SEO, Paid Search and online lead generation.

More info on the digital strategy, design and production company as well as rich media agency Skive here.

The Future of Interactivity

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FOR YOUR INFORMATION:

The American University Clubs of France
Cordially invite you to attend a speaker event on

The Future of Interactivity

April 15, 2008

This event will feature three guest speakers who will address the topic of the Future of Interactivity from three very different perspectives.

· Youth trends and a GenY perspective. Day in the life of a Gen-Yer and how new social media is integral to their lifestyle and social behavior. Addressed by Chauncey Zalkin, youth trend spotter, writer and brand strategist.

· Communication perspective and the impact of social media and web 2.O on reputation management, public relations and journalism. Addressed by Silvia Cambié, cross- cultural communications and social media expert.

· IT Perspective and how to embrace, understand and control the innovative power of new technology at a boardroom level. Addressed by Pauwl Lunow, who coaches CIO’s and teams on integrating new technology into business processes.

DATE: April 15, 2008

TIME: 7:00 – 9:00

ATTENDEES: AUC members and Guests of AUC members and speakers

PRICE: 25 Euros. Check must be received by April 7th. Includes wine,kir, beverages & light snacks

LOCATION: L’Echangeur 66 rue des Archives 75003 www.echangeur.fr
Centre Européen sur les Pratiques Innovantes de la Relation Client

REGISTRATION: You must go to the AUC site to register at http://www.etheryl.net/AUC/ and send check for 25 Euros payable to AUC – AMERICAN UNIVERSITY CLUBS OF FRANCE; mail to: Bassem Maalouf 13 rue Anatole France 92800 Puteaux, France

L@C TV: Carlos Diaz on Enterprise Social Software, founder and CEO of blueKiwi, vidcast

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Lunch at the Circle’s Per Karlsson interviews Carlos Diaz, founder and CEO of blueKiwi on February 4, 2008 at the Restaurant Maceo, Paris.

You can also listen to the full MP3 sound podcast with Carlos here.

You can download the video with Carlos Diaz here if you prefer to watch it off-line (go to the page with this specific video and you will find the download links).

Social software… FaceBook, SecondLife, Wiki… It’s just for kids or teenagers, right? Wrong! Perhaps.

There is a new breed of “enterprise social software” emerging that potentially may change the way we work and the way we collaborate. As well as the way hierarchies work in organisations. You can also think back to the days when millions of dollars were invested in enterprise “knowledge management” solutions. And change the scenario to something that may actually work and that costs only a fraction. And that is implemented and managed by line managers – not the big IT departments.

But first you have to understand what it is and start imagining what you can do with it. This is what Carlos Diaz will tell you.

Carlos Diaz is founder and CEO of blueKiwi, a French enterprise social software company. Gartner recently listed blueKiwi on its pick list for the top “Team Collaboration and Social Software” solutions. In fact, blueKiwi was the only European company on the list… (“blueKiwi has successful deployments of Web-based open collaboration solutions where the emphasis is on information sharing, strengthening of employee relationships and expert identification.” -Gartner 2007.)

Before founding blueKiwi Carlos was CEO of GroupeReflekt, a consulting company and web agency that he founded with his brother in Limoges ten years ago and recently sold to the Belgian company Emakina.

More info:
blueKiwi: http://www.bluekiwi-software.com/

Strategies for success in promoting your business on the internet in the next 18 months

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Dear L@C friends here’s the next event:

Strategies for success in promoting your business on the internet in the next 18 months

with Gifford Morley-Fletcher, Strategy Director, Skive

Gifford will approach this subject from two angles: the fabled “SEO” and the power of broadband. SEO is one of the buzz words that basically just means “how do you get your site noticed by search engines and thus by customers”. It is critical for any web site to take into account how search engines rank web sites. It can, literally, be a matter of life and death for a business web site if you are on the first page or the tenth for search engine results. And it is not just a question of “build it and they will come”. You have to know how to attract search engines, and customers. The second aspect is that the increasing uptake of broadband has changed the way to build web sites and make people notice them – today you can offer “rich media”, video, animations, sound etc, in a way that was not possible just a few years ago.

And if you don’t believe that it’s important how you manage your web presence and think about how to appear from a search engine perspective, consider this: What do you think you will find if you do a Google search on “miserable failure”? You’ll be surprised. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3298443.stm)

Gifford Morley-Fletcher has worked in New Media since 1994, making him a bit of a ‘web dinosaur’. He is currently based in London as Strategy Director at Skive, an award-winning digital strategy and design agency based in London, responsible for developing interactive web sites, games and promotions for brands such as Reebok, Playstation, McDonalds and Gillette. During his career, he has worked in all areas of web development and online marketing, most recently spending 4 years in Paris where he was a founder of LSF Interactive, specialists in SEO, Paid Search and online lead generation.

– Wednesday March 19

– Lunch starts at 12.15-12.30 and ends at 14.00

– Inscription: By email only and I will confirm.

– Pre-registration required

L@C TV: Stefan Engeseth on Detektive Marketing

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Interview with Stefan Engeseth, November 9, 2007 at Restaurant Maceo, Paris.

“Detective Marketing”…? Stefan Engeseth describes it like this: “to find what’s hidden in the blind spot and to see what your competitors don’t see”. Creative and unusual marketing. Understanding customer requirements differently. Detective Marketing is a concept Stefan created that focuses on “detecting” hidden possibilities and unrealised potentials in companies. It’s built around a structured methodology but Stefan will bring it to life with several examples, both surprising, amusing and unusual. Stefan comes to Paris specifically to speak at the L@C.

Stefan Engeseth is author, consultant and speaker. He is founder and CEO of Detective Marketing Consulting. Stefan’s ideas range from innovative and future-oriented to bordering on the far-fetched. Yet, they all build on the universal truth that without innovation and visions, companies will not grow in today’s highly competitive business world. “The question is, how far are you prepared to go?” Over the years, Stefan Engeseth has worked as a consultant with many international companies and Fortune 500 corporations. He has been described as on of the world’s leading experts and speakers in his field.

Stefan has written two books: “Detective Marketing: Creative Common Sense in Business” and “ONE: A Consumer Revolution for Business”. He is currently working on his third book.

More info:
Blog: http://www.detectivemarketing.com/
Jack Nicholson on advertising (for fun): http://www.detectivemarketing.com/jack-nicholson-vs-advertising/
Books: http://www.detectivemarketing.com/books/

Enterprise Social Software with Carlos Diaz, founder and CEO of blueKiwi, February 4, 2008

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— Monday, February 4
— Enterprise Social Software with Carlos Diaz, founder and CEO of blueKiwi
— “Social Software: a new opportunity for enterprises”

Social software… FaceBook, SecondLife, Wiki… It’s just for kids or teenagers, right? Wrong! Perhaps.

There is a new breed of “enterprise social software” emerging that potentially may change the way we work and the way we collaborate. As well as the way hierarchies work in organisations. You can also think back to the days when millions of dollars were invested in enterprise “knowledge management” solutions. And change the scenario to something that may actually work and that costs only a fraction. And that is implemented and managed by line managers – not the big IT departments.

But first you have to understand what it is and start imagining what you can do with it. This is what Carlos Diaz will tell you.

Carlos Diaz is founder and CEO of blueKiwi, a French enterprise social software company. Gartner recently listed blueKiwi on its pick list for the top “Team Collaboration and Social Software” solutions. In fact, blueKiwi was the only European company on the list… (“blueKiwi has successful deployments of Web-based open collaboration solutions where the emphasis is on information sharing, strengthening of employee relationships and expert identification.” -Gartner 2007.)

Before founding blueKiwi Carlos was CEO of GroupeReflekt, a consulting company and web agency that he founded with his brother in Limoges ten years ago and recently sold to the Belgian company Emakina.

More info:
blueKiwi: http://www.bluekiwi-software.com/
Sofinnova Partners on blueKiwi and Gartner: www.sofinnova.fr/blueKiwi

– Monday February 4
– Lunch starts at 12.15-12.30 and ends at 14.00
– Inscription: By email only and I will confirm.
– Pre-registration required