We don’t always appreciate the long sales cycles of complex technology solutions or major shifts in platforms an Enterprise undergoes. All the costs of prof/consulting/managed services that are sometimes needed due to lack of IT talent or skillsets.
It isn’t as simple as “containers run on Snowflake…they will get all the container business now!”.
This reply nails it:
This is why ZM was doomed. Why Cisco is still king of networks, despite the ANET love. Why PSTG and NTNX never seem to ascend to the next level. There is simple a ton of competition in IT, and no one really seems to be doing anything completely unique.
Good. Fast. Cheap. Usually a number of ways/vendors/solutions to solve a problem.
But you can usually only ever get 1 of the 2: good/fast/cheap.
Every company’s spending cycle reflects their budget, the motivation of their BoD and C-level, and not necessarily the best long-term technology solution.
I like investing in stocks, as do most here, and it is largely the basis on which I will retire (not real estate currently, and not relying on social security and my work doesn’t have a pension plan).
But public stocks are a curse. Yes, they do it to raise money and get in the public eye, and sometimes just the act of going public leads to another up cycle of growth. But with the exception of Warren Buffett, every CEO on the planet seems short-term focused on the next Q, and acts accordingly with their budget and finances. All because they are worried about “pleasing their shareholders”.
Actually, Bezos was known for largely ignoring wall street and focused exclusively on growth, didn’t he? Amazon is partly where it is today because he did NOT fall for that public company CEO mindset.
Makes me think we need to identify other CEO’s who don’t seem concerned with wall street and instead literally do what they feel is in long-term interest of the company.
David Simon of SPG may fit in that category. One ornery dude on ER calls. Result? A-rated balance sheet/credit, and was able to accumulate and grow a friggin mall business during a lockdown in a pandemic.
Hmmm.
Dreamer