John Sculley Keynote, History of Disruptive Innovation, The Noble Cause

John Sculley gave the opening keynote at 7x24 Exchange here at Boca Raton on June 2, 2014.

Conference Keynote:
The High Tech Tsunami that is Changing the World

Three explosive high technologies, Cloud, Internet-of-Things, and Unstructured Data Science are converging at an amazing pace. Their derivative effects will be that every major industry will be disrupted, reshaped or even reinvented. Sculley will explain how companies like Amazon are combining exceptional customer experience, disruptive price, and same day delivery by taking advantage of advanced high technology supply chain systems. New business models like Amazon don't require a large number of higher skilled middle mangers that more traditional companies depend on. Sculley will discuss the possibility of middle managers becoming an endangered group as heavy lifting robots are joined by smart robots and the Internet-of-Things. How can corporations adapt to this fast changing world? John Sculley has a unique position as a leader in disruptive high technologies, a global investor and successful entrepreneur who is mentoring CEOs in his own companies in the fields of: the consumer era of healthcare; next generation mobile technologies; IT supply chain; and big data analytics. John will draw on examples from his current experience in the US and South Asia.

John Sculley
Former CEO of Apple and Former President of Pepsi

 

Let’s start with the end.  John discusses the Disruptive Innovation in The Adaptive Organization with these points.

- The best innovators focus on a “noble cause"

- Focus on best possible customer experience

- Disruptive Innovation is non-linear

- Disruptive innovators … see something others don’t …are passionate and relentless that “there has to be a better way"

- Are willing to commoditize their earlier innovations in order to move to the next era of disruption

Let’s go back to some earlier slides.  John describes the Noble causes illustrating Bill Gates vision vs. Steve Jobs, and the passion of Steve Jobs focusing on the customer experience

Disruption of non-linear is Kodak going bankrupt hit by the growth of smartphones.

Being able to see things others don’t see are lessons learned.

John then went into companies he has a role in or is an investor.

John is chairman of Pivot Technologies. http://www.pivotac.com/home/default.aspx

An investor in Misfit Wearables. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10405648/John-Sculley-Apple-Misfit-Shine-and-the-future-of-technology.html and Artemis http://www.fiercewireless.com/tech/story/artemis-pcell-offers-personal-cell-every-device-promises-dramatic-lte-capac/2014-02-19

This post is a bit of cheat to get insight.  I had a chance to talk to John Sculley at Breakfast.  The last time I had talked to John was 20 years in NYC, and we caught up a bit.

Peak Inside Code Conference, a place not interesting to data center executives

Here is a post on what it is like to attend the Code Conference.  It’s interesting, but I have no interest in attending.

Secrets of the Code Conference

Rebecca Buckman

Entrepreneur’s dream: Animoto’s Brad Jefferson with Walt Mossberg

One of the perennial marketing conundrums facing start-up CEOs is picking the best industry conferences to attend to boost their companies’ brands and expand their networks. This week, some lucky entrepreneurs dropped in on what may be the gold standard for tech-industry confabs: The Code Conference.

This is a schmooz event for C level executives.

It was refreshing to hear the big-time CEOs and company founders discuss their companies’ problems and learn that many of them relate to the same issues vexing smaller companies, Shank said—recruiting, dealing with product snafus, etc. Uber Co-Founder and CEO Travis Kalanick talked about not taking a salary for four years and living at home with his mother, which he said didn’t do wonders for his dating life.

See you at 7x24 Exchange Boca Raton

By this time tomorrow I will be at 7x24 Exchange Boca Raton.  Many of my friends have made going to 7x24 Exchange a regular part of our conference plans.  Some going once a year.  I go twice a year and after 6 continuous trips over the past 3 years, I always learn something, make new friends, and enjoy discussing data centers with good friends and smart people.

The 7x24 Exchange hears the same from their attendees.

3rd Data Center Downtime Social, May 2014 - Friends Relaxing and Laughing

4 years ago thanks to Jim Grice’s sponsorship we had a dinner with some data center thought leaders.  The people were some of the top in the industry and any vendor would have paid big money to be at the table, but part of why the people went to the dinner is it was about friends being able to chat and meet new friends without any sales pressure.  Vendors were filtered out.  There was a bit of an exception for people who worked at companies that are considered vendors.  It worked so well, we thought what do we do next year?

In 2012, we decided to have another social, but invite more people and get away from the sit down dinner.  Vendors could come if they behaved and were considered thought leaders by others attending.  Let people mingle more yet sit down.  We took some ideas Steve Manos started with his Lee Tech on Tap events in Chicago and applied some new ones as well.

Above is 2012

Above is the event in 2014

No change in venue.  It works well.  7x24 Exchange has been a generous sponsor to host gathering of friends.

2013 we had people fly in from Seattle, Chicago, Texas, North Carolina, New York, Southern Ca, and Georgia to spend 3-4 hours drinking a few beers and talking to people who operate and build data centers.

For 2014 it was a smaller event, but still good.  Two people flew in and asked what else was to do.  I told them Uptime Symposium was going on and the two registered for the event as first time attendees.  

Will there be a Data Center Downtime Social in 2015.  Most likely.  Especially when I get comments like this.

I wanted to thank you for your hospitality last week. It's always good to get away from the masses and have more intimate dialogue with key people.

There will be data center social at 7x24 Exchange hosted by some friends.  There was the big data center social in LV last month.  A bunch of people are getting together for their annual fishing social in July.

The idea of a data center social where friends can hang out continues to build.

Attending DCD SF, June 17, 2014 in Santa Clara Convention Center

DatacenterDynamics SF is coming up on June 17, 2014 at the Santa Clara Convention Center.  Note the change of location from SF to Santa Clara.  I’ve been to DCD in SF, Chicago, NY, London, and Seattle.

The program looks pretty full with up to 5 halls open for presentations.

Looking forward to catch up with data center friends at the event.  Note: I need to be in SF for another event that evening so I will be leaving mid afternoon. Don’t look for me at the cocktail reception.