In 2010, when Netflix was still early into its shift from DVD rentals to online movies and shows, it started using Amazon Web Services, the retailer's cloud computing division. Now that Netflix streams 100 million-plus hours of video every day, it's sticking with Amazon partly because of Amazon's scale and features, and partly because switching vendors "would be a significant multi-year effort," says Yury Izrailevsky, Netflix's vice president for cloud and platform engineering.
Larry Boroff, director of automation systems engineering with FORTE, outlines the fundamentals behind balancing the need for flexibility, efficiency, technology and cost control.
A drive for cost savings and energy efficiency has brought a wave of new players and capabilities into the commercial building automation market. Rather than competing directly with the giants of the established building automation system (BAS) market, these new entrants are bringing additional managed data services to help drive greater efficiency.
High-tech firms have had to deal with volatile demand as consumers preferences have rapidly changed in view of innovative products and services. Market velocity is so high in this sector that products and entire companies can go from "high flier" to "crash and burn" very quickly. Even leading companies with strong brands have to continue to develop revolutionary products and new business models to stay relevant.
Camstar Systems Inc. has released the NPI (New Product Introduction) Accelerator for manufacturers. The tool is intended to help users design, test and speed up the NPI process.
Valogix LLC, a vendor of inventory planning and optimization software for small and mid-sized businesses, has created the Valogix Inventory Planning SuiteApp, built on the NetSuite Suite Cloud Computing Platform.
Avnet provides leading-edge supply chain visibility solutions to OEM customers that have extended global supply chains and significant contract manufacturing operations. These supply chains often are highly complex and very geographically dispersed.