12 Things IBM didn't see coming ...

1. The Initial Need for Business Computers in the 1950s.
2. The PC as a commodity with inevitable shift of hardware production to China.
3. The Rise of Cloud Computing leading to the Fall of the PC. IBM could not conceive iTunes and that is the killer app of the decade.
4. The Emergence of the Smart Mobile Device as the universal communication gadget. If you are always in the users purse or back pocket, you have an insurmountable edge. The Apple App market is the single greatest source of software innovation for the past decade.
5. The Death of Email. Up to 90% of email is junk. When there is more noise than signal, users turn the medium off.
6. The marginalization of Super Computers. Is Big Blue or Watson really going to affect the market place like the iPhone or iPad?
7. Overblowing issues like YK2000. Failing to see critical issues like viruses, trojans and security issues.
8. Failing to see that humans are social and see computers as a social tool. Computers must be designed for humans not vice versa.
9. Failing to see that half of all users are women. And they have a whole different approach to technology that it should be simple and intuitive. They do not appreciate nerdiness and no one thinks Ctrl-Alt-Del is intuitive.
10. Failing to see that keyboards are only a transition to voice computing and the 'next'.
11. Failing to see the importance of the hand and touch to product design and marketing.
12. Thinking that a 50 year pedigree in office technology means anything in Cutting Edge Technology Design. You are only as good as your last gadget. No one today uses anything made by IBM.

If IBM were better managed, it would be where Apple computer is today: the Largest Tech Company. Most Innovative Company. Most Valued Company. The largest seller of Music and Media in the world. The Company in everyone's pocket and hand. The toddler's favorite toy.

We would be using IBM smart phones. Using IBM media cloud sites.

Jobs is dead. But, IBM is history

(From a reader comment on a recent economist article on IBM)