According to this story on CIGear , Microsoft may be abandoning their much hyped Response Point phone system designed for Small to Medium sized Businesses.
This is not the first time Microsoft has pushed into a new market and then radically shifted their focus leaving their partners and clients in a lurch.
If you’ll excuse the expression, Microsoft continually throws ’stuff’ on the wall to see what sticks.
What happens to those businesses that invested in the product Microsoft abandoned? Sooner or later, they will take a loss. Those losses are a proportionately larger part of their balance sheet than Microsoft’s cost to develop. In other words, it hurts the client more than it hurts Microsoft.
Microsoft will survive even if they produce a string of terrible products for a year straight. Unfortunately, if your company invested in terrible products for a year straight it’s very likely you’d have to close the doors.
The lesson here is that it’s important to choose your partners/products/services wisely, especially in this economy. For small consulting firms that invested time and effort into Response Point, this move by Microsoft hurts. For their clients, the pain is even worse.
We are not just picking on Microsoft. Almost every large vendor has taken a misstep in the market. Google, Cisco, Dell, HP and others are just as guilty. So, how does a company choose a good partner, product or platform?
Here are a few guidelines:
- Do your research, or take the advice of trusted experts. (that would be us!)
- Stick with best-in-class.
- The cheapest solution is rarely the least expensive over the long run.
- Is there a clearly defined long term lifecycle for this product/service?
- What is the vendor’s track record with new products?
- Wait until a company/product reaches Critical Mass.
- Don’t live on the bleeding edge.
Network Velocity uses these guidelines (and more) before we recommend a product or service. So, look to us first. If you’re not a client, feel free to use our guidelines or consider contacting us.
