Being constructed from highly-specialized information processing and storage units; designed for high density plug "n" play implementations where future expansion, serviceability, versatility, scalability and flexibility are considered to be priorities blade computing offers enterprises of all sizes many benefits. A lot of which are not immediately apparent as the actual blade units are carefully secreted away in self-contained housing units known as blade enclosures.

The Blade Computing Model

Distributed centralized specialization and resource rationalization are the fundamental tenets of the blade computing model. This means that blade enclosures such as the HP C7000 depicted in Figure 1 can be deployed in geographically dispersed locations to provide an organization with a distributed specialized central processing and servicing functionality less prone to organization-wide single-point-of-failure scenarios.

Unlike the bastion host, standard rack mounted servers or even traditional clustered servers the blade computing model generally uses more specialized units dedicated to performing fewer more specialized computing functions and processes.

To this end; many blade units are shipped with various combinations of different hardware and support systems normally associated with computers and server-class devices absent. This is because those specific functionalities are provided by the blade chassis/enclosure.

Having the blade enclosure provide many of these integral functions rather than having them duplicated by each individual blade component type saves considerably in the numbers of components incorporated into the manufacturing of each blade unit. This as you can imagine provides substantial cost savings including transport charges. In other instances other specialized blade units will be dedicated to these “missing” functionalities.

In this way many systems that have been massively duplicated and hence often grossly underutilized in the more traditional server and computing models are not to be found in the same massive numbers in the blade computing scenario. This has resulted in blades that are specialized for processing, network, storage, Input / Output (I/O) and memory subsystems.

“A blade for every function” is the phrase that comes to mind. The IBM HS20 Blade server pictured in Figure 2 has provision for two compact high-performance 2.5” SCSI hard drives.

If you need more processing power then add a blade that is loaded with multiple multi-core CPUs and oh-la-la, more processing power to brag about is yours. Similarly if it's more memory for those graphics rendering intensive applications that you require, then add a memory blade. You can even get “general purpose” blades.

Task and component specialization along with purpose-driven blade design are but two of the ways that blade computing provides greater economic rationalization and more efficient use of computing resources at all levels within the blade system.

Space and Energy Savings

The idea behind this approach is that through removing many of these over-duplicated under-utilized components considerable space savings are achievable. In addition; removing the need for at least one power supply unit (PSU) per server results in a considerable reduction in the numbers of power supply units (PSU) built into or supplied with each individual server unit.

This not only saves considerable space it also reduces the overall excess thermal energy produced during normal and stress level operating conditions. The less floor space occupied by your data center, communications, networking and computing infrastructure the less cooling it requires and the less rent you have to pay.

The result of reducing the amount of excess (waste) thermal energy production during processing is that substantial savings can be delivered on cooling solution energy requirements. This also serves to deliver the “green points” or the carbon production reduction contributions that companies are now being asked for by government, environmentalists and the general public alike.

Everyone who has placed their hand at the top rear of a switched-on ATX tower PC is only too well aware of the amount of heat that the PSU generates. Factor in the fact that the PSU is the most common component of all computers to fail and you see the sense in replacing thirty or forty cheaper PSUs with two to four more robust and reliable units.

From a big picture perspective; the fewer more expensive higher performing more efficient power supply unit solution actually has a far cheaper setup cost than the former multiplicity of PSUs solution. The HP Blade Enclosure pictured in Figure 1 only uses two superior Uninterruptable PSUs and this particular system has 16 blade servers installed.

Through the wholesale removal and replacement of older technology PSUs with dedicated leads from DC units of superior performing, less failure-prone, higher quality redundant sets of PSUs blade computing can indeed deliver considerable energy and accrued downtime loss savings.

Remember; that traditionally, it has been PSU issues that contribute nearly 75% of all IT service-related site visits. Because; datacenter downtime is the most expensive of all outage types experienced by enterprise today, reductions in this area immediately deliver considerable fiscal savings.

The Blade Enclosure

The big thing in blade computing is the engineering technologies encompassed by the blade enclosure. This is what makes it all possible. Here are some of the support features that the blade enclosures deliver:

Unit Housing - Each blade enclosure is capable of providing housing for multiple blade servers at far higher densities than traditional rack mount implementations. In fact; up to three times the number of units in the same 3D space.

Specialized Support - Blade enclosures provide housing and specialty support for specialized blade units e.g. compute, memory, storage etc.

Connectivity - The blade enclosure provides the specialized interfaces by which each individual blade units are connected (plugged into) to the chassis. As IBM make a big point of in their advertisements this can be done as a hot install without the need for attention to cabling.

The reason for this is that each blade enclosure is engineered to be preconfigured and “pre-wired” ready to accept additional post-implementation reconfiguration regardless of whether they be removals, additions or just rearrangements of the blade units housed within each enclosure.

Utility Services - The blade enclosure is usually responsible for the provisioning of redundant utility services such as electrical power and cooling for all units contained within each enclosure. I say generally since some implementations even use external power supply systems that are shared among multiple blade enclosures for additional cost and space savings.

Transformer related functionality is one aspect of power supply that does generate considerable excess thermal energy as a by-product and having this particular power supply function external to the blade does reduce the ambient temperature within each blade enclosure considerably thereby delivering additional energy consumption and fiscal savings.

Supporting Infrastructure - It is the job of the blade enclosure to provide infrastructure support such as communications, networking and various interconnects for all blade units housed within it as well as blade enclosure-to-blade enclosure interoperability.

Today this tends to be through the utilization of fiber optic networking technologies as they deliver the greatest performance, least excess thermal energy production and the greatest immunity to noise, Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) and environmental aberrations. Fiber optic networking and communications technologies are also more resistant to interception than copper and RF technologies.

Physical Security - The blade enclosure provides the physical security for those elements housed within it. Compartmentalized accessibility means that to physically access any individual blade component one need not necessarily be granted automatic physical access to every other blade unit housed within each blade enclosure by default.

Platform Management - The enclosure also either links to an administrative unit or contains an administrator interface that allows for authorized authenticated administrative functionalities to be performed upon all units contained within each enclosure. In circumstances that require it; remote administration is also possible.

Blade Unit Manufacturer Variation - Different manufacturers do have different ideas of what should be included with each blade as well as what should or should not be provided with the blade enclosure. However, it is all of these elements in combination that make the blade computing platform.

Blade Computing Benefits

The benefits of the blade computing platform include:

Minimum Size Limit Restrictions Removed - Removal of the 1U minimum size limit requirement which the traditional rack mounted server platform is stuck with. This permits greater freedom and initiatives for blade system designers and increases the overall versatility and adaptable flexibility of the blade platform as a technology and each blade enclosure and blade unit as an enterprise asset.

Higher Unit Densities - Instead of the 42 unit maximum of the standard rack it is not unusual for blade systems to hold up to 100 or more individual blade units per blade enclosure. These higher densities translate into greatly reduced floor space being occupied by the data center which in turn reduces the amount of cooling required thereby producing greater energy cost savings and a far more rounded, greener, less carbon producing computing solution.

Specialization - Through blade unit specialization further additional significant size reductions are achieved and will no doubt continue to do so. These all combine; a little by a little, eventually producing massive savings organization-wide. Larger enterprises will obviously derive greater initial savings here. The rest of us will benefit from the domino effect this produces.

Improved Energy Efficiency - The “Greener IT” motivation is becoming an ever increasing influence in technology today and will undoubtedly continue to do so in the future. Not only does blade computing reduce an organization's energy costs it also represents a much “greener” computing initiative.

Organization-Wide Consistency - Through organization-wide component consistency blade units can deliver a more uniform organizational computing environment throughout a geographically diverse enterprise.

Scalability - Enterprise scalability issues are greatly simplified with blade computing. If you require more processing power then you simply install additional compute blade units into select blade enclosures throughout the enterprise or data center.

Redundancy - For mission critical functionality and the truly paranoid blade enclosures do allow for varying degrees of redundant multiplicity of systems in highly customizable configurations and arrays.

Future-Proofing - The concept of using the blade enclosure to provide infrastructure services to multiple blade units allows much greater freedom in future proofing an organization's information technology and infrastructure investments. Even when fully loaded upgrading can mean swapping out lower performing or lower capacity blade units for better performing higher capacity units. Once again real estate savings are a strong driving factor here.

Recyclability - Blade units swapped out of their enclosures can be reused in other enclosures or even in blade enclosures at different geographical locations. In this way upgrading can become more of hand-me-down oriented which does prolong the useful life-expectancy of IT resources considerably. Through reusing units already manufactured considerable carbon production savings can be realized.

Flexibility - In today's economic climate business requires its processing facilities and solutions to be built around genuine flexibility from both the hardware and the software perspectives more than ever before. Here is one area where blades can excel by using general purpose blade units for general purpose processing tasks and specialized blade units to deliver specialized processing services where required.

For example; web page retrieval and database searches do not require the advanced vector processing that many rendering applications demand. Through the blending of special purpose blade units with general purpose and storage blades all of these computing tasks can be performed within the same enclosure.

The additional administrative flexibility offered by blade computing allows the system administrator to selectively and electively assign and reassign resources between applications/customers. Physical configuration changes can be made on the fly without the need to power down every unit within the enclosure or to attend to laborious cabling issues.

Virtualization - Another technology that the blade enclosure does lend itself to with remarkable agility is the implementation of multiple virtual computing environments. The advent of massively available mainstream multi-core microprocessor technologies have played a large part in the expansion of the deployment of virtualization technologies hosted on blade server “farms”. Once again this is all about the rationalization of information technology resources usage.

Distributed Centralized Processing - Blades are particularly suited to a distributed central processing ethos. This makes them especially desirable for Web 2.0 applications, Software-as-a-Service (S-a-a-s) and cloud computing.

Thus web hosting and cloud computing service providers can distribute their resources more evenly on a usage basis. It is most profitable to have your facility in as close a proximity to your market, customers or user-base as possible without paying for highly prominent real estate or the rents these sites ask. Ideally as close as possible to the physical location of the Internet backbone would be the most desirable of all locations for a blade center.

Additional Information - Check out ServerWatch.com if you would like to find out more about various specialty servers and new developments in the server industry.

Proprietary Standards and Technologies

Many great technologies have failed simply because they were proprietary in nature. This is particularly noticeable when a proprietary technology faces competition from a whole bunch of interrelated technologies; from multiple manufacturers/vendors, that are based around an open standard.

Part of the reason is due to the very competitive nature of economies founded upon open market products and services and part is due to the restrictive nature of monopolistic proprietary technologies.

Compatibility and Interoperability

It is the area of commonality between various technologies that standards provide which ensures that the products and services from one manufacturer/vendor are compatible and interoperable with those of other manufacturers/vendors.

To illustrate the importance of the role provided by standards consider for a moment that you wish to manufacture a network interface card (NIC). Let us assume that you have the option of selecting from only two different specifications for your NIC. One of which is a proprietary and the other is an open standard.

Proprietary Standard - If you wish to rely upon a set of proprietary technologies you will need to enter into negotiations with the owner of that proprietary technology before you can use it or even begin to develop something similar yourself. The owner of the proprietary standard also has the prerogative to deny you out of hand any access to or use of their standard.

Open Standard - On the other hand; if you were to base your product around an open standard, then all you need do is approach the relevant standards authority for that technology and obtain the appropriate documentation regarding the specifications that your product must comply with. While this can sometimes be a little Draconian more often than not it is a boon.

One element of considerable weight here is that if your product is fully compliant with the prescribed standard; you can with considerable confidence, state that it will work (interoperate) with other products or services that are also based upon the same open standard specifications. All you need do is a little testing to verify the fact. This is something that proprietary technologies cannot deliver with any degree of certainty.

Open Systems Interconnect (OSI) Reference Model

A classic example of an interoperable open standard is the OSI Reference Model. Here we have a seven layered network protocol processing stack. All of the functions and requirements for each layer of the protocol processing stack are clearly stated and precisely defined.

As a manufacturer/developer all you need do is to ensure that the implementation you produce complies (abides) with the guidelines and specifications as stated in the OSI Reference model. If so; you will be able to rest assured that your processing stack implementation will be compatible with and interoperable with those produced by other; potentially unknown to you, manufacturers/developers.

The beauty here is that you do not need to know the nitty-gritty of the other manufacturer's processing stacks for both systems (yours and theirs) to reliably function interactively. In the case of the OSI Reference model this would mean that a successful conversation can be conducted between geographically separated end-systems. If this sounds familiar; it should, because this is indeed the way in which the Internet works.

Standards Definition, Documentation and Evangelism

Using the Internet as an example again we note that it (the Internet) is in fact a bunch of open standards-based technologies that the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) among others define and thoroughly document; each in their own areas of specialization.

In addition to the definition of the various standards and the production of the relevant accompanying documentation these organizations also actively pursue an evangelistic policy of ensuring that said documentation is widely known of and readily available and accessible to one and all.

The goal here is to ensure that all past, present, future and would-be hardware and software developers have a pertinent set of basic reference specifications to act as the core foundation upon which to build their products, applications and services.

Standards and Rapid Application Development (RAD)

Developing products compliant with the prevailing established prescribed standards means that new products can be brought to market considerably quicker than would otherwise be the case. Much of the development of today's information technology evolution and initiatives are squarely aligned with a Rapid Application Development (RAD) ethos.

Underpinning the RAD ethos are the principles of modularity, compartmentalization and reusability. The later point of reusability is of particular importance in software engineering as it facilitates a much faster delivery to market of new/improved technologies, products and services.

Metaphorically speaking the RAD ethos can be summed up as follows: if there is no truly good reason to reinvent the wheel; why bother?

IEEE 1394 (FireWire) v Universal Serial Bus (USB)

Let us have a quick look at an open standard and a proprietary standard to see what effects their open or closed inclinations have culminated in to date. The two I have elected to use to demonstrate this are the IEEE 1394 (FireWire) standard and the USB (Universal Serial Bus) standard. Both are directed toward providing a one interface does all for peripheral device connectivity and I/O operations.

With both technologies targeting the same market (peripheral device connectivity and I/O) they were fated to be in direct head-to-head competition with each other.

FireWire - In marked contrast to the open USB standard, the superior performing (in comparison to USB) IEEE 1394 (FireWire) started its life as a proprietary protocol. This meant that royalties had to be paid or some form of cooperation/peering needed to be negotiated in order for a manufacturer could use the technology.

Because FireWire is a bus this fact impacted motherboard and I/O adapter card manufacturers directly. The end result manifested as fewer numbers of more expensive devices being manufactured.

USB - To compound this even further; once the open USB protocol and standards were released, uptake of IEEE 1394 enabled devices dropped dramatically as a diverse array of substantially cheaper USB counterparts began to appear on the market.

Global Considerations and Influences

As with all things involving massively large-scale factors on the global stage, standards can become very loose and modified to reflect local objectives (political and otherwise) by a multiplicity of organizations in numerous countries.

Hence, it becomes necessary to formally develop and implement formal control, development, ratification and wide-spread implementation processes for standards development, documentation and implementation applicable from both generic and singularly specific perspectives.

International Organization for Standardization (ISO)

It was for these reasons along with many others (too many for me to list here) that the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) was formed. Globally speaking ISO is the premier general purpose standards organization today.

Think of ISO as being standards architects. Their mission was; and still is, to define the framework upon which standards applicable to both current and future technologies, protocols, products and services will be built.

Other Standards Organizations

Besides ISO there are a considerable number of other standards bodies and/or organizations throughout the world. As with ISO, some of these organizations have considerable presence and influence on the global scale while others don't.

However; unlike ISO they tend to be more specific, focusing their attentions and coverage to a numerically smaller more specialized range of interrelated (family) technologies. Some of the alternative Information Technology (IT) standards organizations with a global presence include:

• The Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
• The International Standards Organization (ISO)
• The Internet Society (ISOC)
• The Internet Architecture Board (IAB)
• The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
• The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
• The Electronic Industries Association (EIA)
• The International Telecommunications Union (ITU)
• The Motion Pictures Experts Group (MPEG)
• The Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG)
• The National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST)
• The American National Standards Institute (ANSI)
• The Telecommunications Association (TIA)
• Request For Comment - rfc-editor.org.
• The Project Management Institute (PMI)
• Payment Card Industry (PCI)

The Need for Collaboration and Partnerships

Note that many of the above organizations cover a considerable range and diversity of topics and technologies and that there can be a considerable degree of overlap of interest and authority between these organizations in a number of areas. The reasons for this state of affairs are historical, geographical, demographical, technological, fiscal and as a regulatory consequence or convenience.

Importantly; the majority of the larger authoritative organizations were originally founded some time ago in different geographical regions. Originally; each organization bore greater responsibility for its individual primary sphere of influence.

However; over time and with the advent of and continued exponential expansion of publically accessible mass air transport the world became a smaller place. These factors when combined with the arrival of a host of new technologies in the information revolution resulted not only in the formation of new authoritative bodies but existing ones expanded their influence into other areas both within and beyond their original sphere of local influence.

We have since experienced considerable clouding of technological realms to the extent that many of the original standards organizations saw fit to work on various technological standards collaboratively. For example; a transoceanic submarine communications cable required that both ends adopt and implement compatible technologies as well as entering into a mutually agreeable infrastructure costs sharing arrangement.

The settling upon this cooperative collaborative approach was also heavily influenced by the limited jurisdiction and regulatory enforceable control that each partner held or could exert in the others domicile country, state or city.

Goals, Objectives and Ideals

Most of the organizations listed above have as their driving goal the ideals of assisting engineers, manufacturers and business in solving basic production and distribution issues through the development of appropriate technical standards and specifications. Here are a few of the benefits that regulated standards and standardization deliver:

• Development of safer, cleaner, more efficient manufacturing, distribution, and supply of products and services thereby promoting easier and fairer trade practices beneficial to one and all
• To assist governments with a technical basis for health, safety and environmental legislation
• The dissemination and interchange of technology
• Safeguarding the rights and expectations of consumers and end users of existing and emerging technologies, products and services including the delivery of said technologies, products and services with a specific set minimal baseline Quality of Service and Expectancy

Payment Cards Industry (PCI)

In the case of the Payment Cards Industry (PCI), failure to comply with these standards generally results in the merchant/business having their trading rights revoked. This is a serious matter and as a result, merchant/business compliance is in excess of 99%.

The adoption on a global scale of the PCI standards is so universally high primarily because compliance is mandatory and the penalty for non-compliance is so high (removal of merchant privileges). We have also seen a wide adoption of the ISO 9000:2000 family of standards in the areas of quality control, quality management and quality assurance.

International Standards

Here are the highlights delivered through adoption of international standards:

Business Benefits - Local and international trade and business benefit from the "level playing field" that International Standards deliver to all competitors at both the regional and global market levels.

Consumer Benefits - Consumers in general benefit greatly from the adoption of international standards delivered by worldwide technology compliance and/or compatibility. This translates into ensuring the delivery of a greater all-round variety and diversity of products and services. These benefits to the consumer are further compounded by way of greater manufacturer/vendor competition delivering a superior competitive pricing of the products and/or services which they the consumer consumes.

Government Benefits - Governments implementing a consumption-based taxation structure (GST, VAT etc) reap great fiscal benefits as consumers and end-users consumer or use more products and services and business profits increase.

Government policy making is also more streamlined as standards based legislation can be enacted in whole, in part or with amendments by numerous countries. This also helps to create greater legislative uniformity on a global front with a commonality of illegality. What is illegal in one country is also illegal in most other countries. The same standards are being applied to the citizenry globally. This in turn promotes understanding and empathy which helps to increase tolerance and reduce conflict.

An example of consistency in cross-national boundaries legislation can be found in the European Union's privacy laws. It is important to understand that if any country external to the EU does not comply with the EU's requirements in this regard then great difficulty will be experienced by those attempting to conduct business with every EU member nation.

It is pity that real value of water is not realized. So much water is wasted. Indeed, we have no civic sense and so much water goes down the drain when we keep the taps running even when we are not using water.

God is so kind to us. He has given us so much water whether when we deserve it or not. When it rains , tons of water flows down to the seas and ocean through the water channels as we fails to harness it. It is of paramount importance that we should build dams , tanks and reservoirs to store for the lean summer season when water is scarce even in the rivers and canals.

We need water for drinking , bathing , clothing , washing and irrigational purposes. Thus, we need a lot of water daily. we must utilise it properly without wasting it.

It is something deplorable that even more than that 55 years after Independence still people in several villages and slum areas do not get pure and enough drinking water.

We'll have to take some urgent measures in regard to management of water as the underground table-table in many States , paricularly northern States , is falling sharply. If we fail to adopt a viable policy regarding water , we may have to fight disputes and battles for water as we used to fight for petrol and other resources of energy.

Topping the list of highest paid CEOs is 43-year-old Nabeel Gareeb of Pakistani origin, CEO of chipmaker MEMC Electronic Materials since April 2002 with a total compensation package of $79.6 million.

Gareeb joined MEMC as CEO in April 2002. Gareeb's appointment came after Texas Pacific Group purchased the company from its German owners in 2001 and recapitalised the business.

Prior to joining MEMC, Gareeb was the Chief Operating Officer of International Rectifier Corporation, a leading supplier of power semiconductors, where he was responsible for worldwide operations, research and development and marketing.

He joined International Rectifier in 1992 as Vice President of Manufacturing and subsequently held other senior management positions. Gareeb immigrated to US from Pakistan more than 25 years ago. He holds an MSc in engineering management, and a Bachelors in electrical and electronic engineering.

Jen-Hsun Huang, Nvidia

Second on the list is Nvidia Corporation co founder Jen-Hsun Huang. Huang founded graphic chip maker in April 1993 today commands a pay packet of $45.9 million. He has being President, Chief Executive Officer, and a member on Nvidia's Board since its inception.

Under his leadership, Nvidia emerged as a leading name in programmable graphics processing technologies and one of the semiconductor industry's largest fabless companies.

Huang also serves on the Rand Corporation's Board of Trustees and is a member of the Committee of 100, an organisation that addresses issues concerning the Chinese-American community and US-China relations.

Prior to founding Nvidia, Huang held engineering, marketing and general management positions at LSI Logic, and was a microprocessor designer at Advanced Micro Devices.

Huang holds a BSEE degree from Oregon State University and an MSEE degree from Stanford University.

Jonathan Schwartz, Sun Microsystems

Jonathan Schwartz, chief executive officer and president of Sun Microsystems is the third highest-paid young tech CEO with an annual package of $13.5 million. A member of Sun's board of directors, Schwartz became company's CEO in 2006, succeeding the Sun's co-founder and current chairman of the board, Scott McNealy. 

Schwartz was promoted to president and chief operating officer in 2004, and managed all operational functions at Sun -- from product development and marketing, to global sales and service.

A leader behind many of Sun's open source and standard setting initiatives, Jonathan's been an outspoken advocate for the network as a utility with more than just value for the computing industry -- but as a tool for driving economic, social and political progress.

Prior to his position as COO, Schwartz served as Sun's executive vice president for software, its Chief Strategy Officer, and held a variety of leadership positions across product and corporate development.

He joined Sun in 1996 after the company acquired Lighthouse Design, where he was CEO and co-founder. Prior to that, Schwartz was with McKinsey & Co. Schwartz received degrees in economics and mathematics from Wesleyan University.

Shantanu Narayen, Adobe Systems

Forty-four-year old electronics engineer from Hyderabad, Shantanu Narayen, became Adobe's CEO last year. His annual compensation is at $12 million.

Narayen joined Adobe in January 1998 as Vice President and General Manager of Adobe's engineering technology group. In January 1999, he was promoted to Senior Vice President, Worldwide Products and in March 2001 he was promoted to Executive Vice President, Worldwide Product Marketing and Development. 

In January 2005, Narayen was promoted to President and Chief Operating Officer of Adobe. Prior to joining Adobe, Narayen co-founded Pictra Inc in 1996.

Together with the ex-CEO Bruce Chizen, Narayen spearheaded the $3.4 billion acquisition of Macromedia Inc in 2005, expanding Adobe's software platform and solutions and strengthening the company's presence in key markets ranging from enterprise and vertical industries to mobile devices and multimedia publishing.

Narayen is a frequent speaker at industry and academic events. He serves on the Advisory Board of the Haas School of Business, University of California at Berkeley.

Narayen holds a bachelor's degree in electronics engineering from Osmania University in India, a master's degree in computer science from Bowling Green State University, and a master's degree in business administration from the Haas School of Business.

Dara Khosrowshahi, Expedia

At no. five is CEO of Expedia Dara Khosrowshahi with a total compensation package of is $4.9 million.

Founded as a division of Microsoft in October 1996, Expedia was spun off in 1999. The company was later purchased by USA Networks in 2001.

The 39-year-old Khosrowshahi became CEO of Expedia when it spun off from IAC/InterActiveCorp (IAC) in August 2005. He joined IAC in 1998 as vice president of strategic planning. Prior to this he worked at Allen & Company LLC from 1991 to 1998, where he served as vice president from 1995 to 1998. 

Khosrowshahi received a BA in engineering from Brown University in 1991

Francisco D'Souza, Cognizant

At no. six is thiry-nine-year old Francisco D'Souza, president and chief executive officer of Cognizant. D'Souza who has been the company's President and CEO since January 2007 has an annual compensation package of $3.7 million.

Prior to this he was the Chief Operating Officer for Cognizant's global delivery, marketing and sales, business development and client services operations. He has also led the company's North American and European operations.

Earlier, Francisco held key positions at The Dun & Bradstreet Corporation in marketing, strategic planning and new business development in Germany, US and India.

Born in Kenya, he has Bachelors degree from the University of East Asia. He has also done MBA from Carnegie-Mellon University.

There is a tool that every trader use to control the damage you can accept in a trade. It is called stop loss order. It is an automated order that the trader enters following a newly opened position. This preset order tells the broker's computer when to get out of the trade. You may usually enter this value as points in percent (pip) or as dollar value.

Now the question that most traders face is, where to put the stop loss. No one wants to place an order too close to the actual trading price and get out of the trade in a small fluctuation. At the other end, we don't want to loose too much money at any trade.

The answer to that question is highly personal in my opinion. It depends on your account size, your appetite for the risk, how crazy you are, etc. But there is also some commonly accepted  ways of defining risk levels.

Most of the traders go for a fix percentage of their account as an acceptable loss. So if you have 10.000 $ in your account and you never want to loose more than 5% in a given trade, your maximum loss should be 500$. Now that is the step one.

The biggest mistake of beginner traders is to get this as a fixed position for a lot. So if you are trading one standard lot, this would be approximately 50 pips. This may be a large, or not enough range depending of market conditions. Let's take a look at the chart below.

It is the 1h chart at the time I am writing this article. The market is extremely volitile these days and you can see the pair has moved between 196.800 and 194.400 during the day (which is a 240 pips range).  If we decide to get in a trade now, 50 pips stop loss will be hit very easily.

Let's go to 4h chart and see the support levels for a long trade (buy trade).

First support level below the actual position is around 193.300, about 150 pips below.  It is likely that the pair may test this value one more time before going higher. So if we get in this trade right now, we should be ready to tolerate this back move until the support is broken.

So our 50 pips is not enough. We still want to keep our percentage fixed. We, then, should reduce the trade size. Instead of 1 standard lot, we should trade with 1/3 lot.

The problem at this point is that not every broker accepts less than 1 lot trades. If you do not have an account to tolerate 150 pips within the percentage you have already defined, you should not enter in the trade. Doesn't matter how good the trade is, how much money you can make, how likely that the pair will move in the direction you want. You don't have enough money to get in that trade.

First rule I have learned in forex trading is to be able to let it go. It happens often that the market is to volatile so that the risk is not acceptable for my account size. Yes these are the times you can make a lot more money than you can usually make. But remember, these are the times that you can loose a lot more money than you usually loose.

I hope it helps to my fellow new traders. Let me know if there is anything you want to see in my future articles.

How many times in your career have you heard the boss say (usually through gritted teeth) "I don't care, just GET IT DONE"? When you control the processes and procedures that your business utilizes, you save the company time and money while increasing the company's conviction that they've hired the right person for the job: you. Business process management software helps you model a process that you believe may help your company, and decide if it's worth investigating further. Once you've decided on a process, utilize BPM software to set up a workflow and integrate all the technologies that you must accommodate, across a wide variety of systems, data bases, applications, and yes, even cranky people.

Pull real-time data from your BPM system and use it to conduct "what if" or "if this happens, then we" analysis. Time-phase the model, so that you can determine potential problems, bottlenecks, and areas of improvement. Utilize past data and determine what actions had the greatest impact on the company. Model similar actions based on real time data, and earn that trip to Hawaii for "most valuable suggestion"!

Business process management software today allows you flexibility, management control, accuracy, the ability to control costs and processes, and most importantly, gives you results. Though there is an initial cost investment for the software and as short learning curve, you can afford to invest in the software that puts you right where you want to be: firmly in control.

Here are seven ways in which these new tool could make a better management:

1. They enable a manager in a business to see and understand the whole business infairly simple terms. Our economic life and our technology have become so general and complex as to make it very hard for a man to see the whole of even a simple and small business. Accounting is obviously the oldest and most successful tool for this purpose; indeed, the general accounting system with which we are all familiar is a very good example of a special-purpose tool in this management tool kit. It is, however, as I think most of us know, a special-purpose tool which will do only a few things, though it does those superbly. In essentials, all tools, whether operations research, statistical decision-making, or any other- operate on very similar basic methods, they try to find a simple and universal way of looking at the business as a whole which enables a manager to understand this very complex and very diverse thing that is the modern business enterprise.
2. The second basic contribution of the new management tools is that they make it possible to take decisions with respect to one area of the business without “sub-optimizing.” We all know that the actual action and decision in business are very rarely taken for the whole business. Of necessity, in departments, in divisions or what you have. Most problems with which people in management deal are problems within one area of the business, problems of manufacturing or of selling, of labor relations or purchasing. Now all of us know, indeed, we know it so well that it really should not have to be said that the only reason why we have these functions is that they contribute to the business. They are not the ends in themselves. And we all recognize that properly speaking, there are very few actions or decisions in any one of these areas which do not have the real impact on other areas.
3. The next contribution of the tools, the next thing the manager should expect and demand of them, it is that they present to the manager all the alternatives of action possible in a situation. Full knowledge of these alternatives, and of their risk and implications, is probably the most important factor in sound decision-making. All of us, inevitably, tend to see one course of action as “obvious.” To see the full range of alternatives, obviously, is essential.
4. The manager should expect and demand of these new tools that they show him what risks there are in each course action, what assumptions underlie it, and what efforts and resources will be needed to carry it out successfully. The manager, in other words, demand of the new tools that they show him exactly what is he being asked. Within limitations, that is, within a strictly financial frame, this is, of course, what we expect our accounting system to do for us.
5. These new tools can determine what measurements are appropriate to a certain decision and to a certain area of the business. Let's have an example, anybody who has - whether as a personnel or manufacturing man knows, for instance, that a very small number of people, very rarely more than 10% of the plant, account for 90% of absenteeism. He knows that a very small number of people account for majority of accidents and sickness. He also knows that very small number of jobs usually account 90% of turnover in the plant, or that practically all turnover occurs during the first six months of man's employment.
6. The new tools can help the manager to find out who should know about decions and about things that go on; who should have information, when he should have it, and in what form. They can greatly help, therefore, with the communication problem of a business, especially the communication with management which, as we all have learned, is the really important and decisive aspect of this problem. Let me again say the closer we come toward automation, the more important this will be. For automation depends above all on really good and effective internal communication within management.
7. Finally, these new tools can tell the manager what to look out for in the future. They can show him what things he has does not know when he makes a decision, what facts he just guesses at, and what things he had therefore better look out. They can also show him what he expects to happen in such a way that he notices right away when it does not happen, early enough, perhaps, to change a decision before it has come the wrong decision.

Let me repeat that I have not say managing is entirely a logical, systematic, scientific process, but it is very much like medicine or law, in both of which you need experience, you need intuition, you need “feel.”

As a typical consumer and a marketing practitioner, here are some of my comments and observations on the visual presentation of these two competing fast food chains. I encourage my readers to present their own views or personal comments.

Logo

McDonald's logo has not changed much since it was created by Jim Schindler in 1962 from the idea of Dick and Mac McDonald. This arch-shaped logo, a merger of two golden arch images with McDonald's name incorporated in the image, became very famous not only in America but the world over.

The Jollibee logo on the other hand was inspired by the changes in its original name “jolibe” to Jolly Bee and then later changed it to what is now known as Jollibee by changing the letter “y” to “i” in the word Jolly. Improvements were made later by creative advertising people including the design of the Mascots and other Jollibee images. These simple brand image innovations were inspired by Manuel C. Lumba, a management consultant who served as the original mentor of Tony Tan Caktiong , the majority owner and founder of the now-famous Jollibee food chain.

In the above visual presentation, it appears that the Jollibee logo is stands out because it tends to present an active, fun and jolly image while McDonald's logo seems to look just like a corporate image that identifies its existence as a leader in the food business.

Mascots

Mascots, in this article, may be referred to as fictional images of persons or animals that are used to promote certain products or services.

In the above images, my personal impression is that the McDonald mascot has the edge in terms of “recall” that it can generate. The main McDonald mascot, popularly known as Ronald McDonald, is presented as a happy and accommodating mascot, always smiling and his hands waving always at customers or anyone passing by the store. Though the Jollibee Mascot is a happy-looking image, it is not presented as a friendly and accommodating as projected by the McDonald's Mascot

Store Fronts

Store Designs and Images are very important part of the total marketing mix. In this category, it seems that Jollibee has the edge. In the Philippines, Jollibee Stores or outlets are well lighted and the exterior signage is placed prominently on top of the main entrance. These store signs when lighted serve as additional source of lightings and illumination.

Signage

Signage is very important in enticing customers to visit the outlet. The store signs of these two competing brands are very well designed and executed. However I will favor McDonald's main store sign because of two distinct qualities; First and foremost is the yellow color of the McDonald logo. Yellow color is neither a “stop” nor a “go” if you relate it to traffic lights. And when you are driving in the vicinity of the store, you are actually slowing down as if you are approaching a traffic light that changes from green to yellow and ultimately to red where you are expected to stop. When you are driving on a “yellow”, it would therefore be easy for you to drive in to the McDonald outlet.

The other attraction of the McDonald's signage is the big “M”, which is actually an image of two arches joined together. From a distance, the yellow arch is very visible especially if you are driving in a highway where you pass by a McDonald outlet.

There are other visual materials that are being used by both companies in promoting their products but the major or dominant signage that are featured in this article will determine each company's strength and weaknesses in terms of generating revenues through the proper and appropriate use of visual images.

My comments and observations on the images contained in this article are based on my personal observations and not intended to take sides or favor any of the competing brands.

“Market segmentation is the process of splitting customers, or potential customers, in a market into different groups, or segments”

The Process of Market Segmentation:

Mainly there are three steps involve in market segmentation.

Identifying Target Markets:

First, it is necessary to define the markets the organization is in, or wishes to be in, and how these divide into segments of customers with similar needs. The choice of markets will be influenced by the corporate objectives as well as the asset base. Information will be collected about the markets, such as the markets' size and growth, with estimates for the future.

Understanding the Value required by Target Market:

Once each market has been defined, it is necessary to understand what value the customers within each of the segments it divides into are looking for. This value is most simply thought of as the benefits gained from the product or service, but it can also encompass the value to the customer of surrounding services such as maintenance or information. This step also encompasses what the customer is prepared to give in exchange, in terms of price and other criteria, such as loyalty. This step of "Understand value required" also includes predicting the value which will be required in the future.

Understanding Competitor Value Positioning:

'Understand competitor value positioning' refers to the process of establishing how well the organization and its competitors currently deliver the value that the customers seek. Again it involves looking into the future to predict how competitors might improve, clearly a factor in planning how the organization is to respond.

From these three processes, the relative attractiveness of the different markets and, within each of them, their different segments can be evaluated. One tool of relevance here is Porter's five forces model (1985), showing the forces which shape industry competition and hence the attractiveness of a given market, or of a given segment. The output will be some form of analysis, and one way of summing up much of the key information is in a portfolio matrix. Such a matrix provides a sensible basis for prioritization amongst the many possible product/ segment combinations which the organization could address.

Levels and Basis of Market Segmentation

The following is a brief review of the "predetermined" approaches frequently used in market segmentation.

Products and services

The problem with segmenting markets according only to the products or services offered, or the technology type, is that in most markets, many different types of customers buy or use the same products or services. For example, if a mail company organizes itself around express packages, or around mail sorting, it is unlikely that the company will ever get to understand fully the real and different needs of, say, universities, banks, advertising companies, direct mail houses, manufacturing companies, retailers and so on. However, by understanding which particular features of the product or service appeal to different customers, along with features associated with all the other aspects of a purchase, such as the channel, we have a route for understanding the motivations behind the choices that are made. This is because it is through these features that customers seek to attain the benefits they are looking for. Once this is understood, the needs- based propositions required for different segments can be developed.

Demographics

Variables such as sex, age, lifestyle and so on, when used to define segments, are by implication claiming, for example, that every 30-35-year-old will respond to the same proposition.

Just reflect for a moment on the students in my years at school; would I expect them all to be wearing the same clothes, taking the same types of holidays, pursuing the same interests and driving the same cars? When someone wakes up on their birthday, do they become a stereotype associated with that age? For administrative convenience i would like the answer to be "yes", but the answer is "no". In business-to-business markets, customers are frequently segmented around business classification lines, which implies that all the companies in a particular sector, such as financial services, have exactly the same requirements and will respond to a single proposition. This approach could well be ignoring one or more of the following:

• Different divisions and departments existing behind the business descriptor may have different applications for the product or service you supply. For example, would the mail company mentioned earlier find that the advertising and promotions department has the same requirements and specifications for mail services as the sales ledger department?
• The requirements of, say, advertising and promotions departments may well be the same regardless of business type;
• Even within a single division of a company, there may well be different applications for the product or service you supply which, in turn, may have different specifications attached to them;
• Segmentation along business classification lines assumes all the companies within the classification employ identical people with identical values. Businesses, of course, don't buy anything; it's their employees we have to sell to!

Although demographics on their own cannot define a segment because they do not define the proposition a segment requires, they have an important role to play in a segmentation project. This background information about customers can be used to identify the particular profiling characteristics associated with the customers found in each segment. In other words, demographics helps identify who is found in each segment which, in turn, will help you determine how to reach them.

Geography

Rather like demographics, segments based on geographic areas, however tightly defined, assume that everyone in a predetermined area can be expected to react to a particular offer in exactly the same way. Even at the postcode level this does not appear to work; simply if we look along our own street. Has everyone got the same furniture, do they buy from the same shops, eat the same food? Once again, however, although geographic areas on their own cannot define the propositions required by segments and, therefore, cannot define segments, they, too, have a useful role to play in a segmentation project. This particular type of background information about customers can be used to identify the most likely locations the customers in each of the segments may be found and, therefore, further help you determine how to reach them. A further consideration with respect to "geography" is its use in international market segmentation.

Channel

Routes to market are becoming more sophisticated and complex, and are also becoming an increasingly important component of many winning customer propositions. Channels in themselves, however, do not define segments as they are simply the means by which customers and companies connect with each other. It is only when you understand the motives behind the channel choices made by customers that the channel component of a needs-based proposition can be developed. However, even if channel does not feature as a key component of a winning proposition, it is, along with demographics and geography, background information about customers that should be tracked during a segmentation project. It could well be that some segments can be associated with particular routes to market; therefore it is the channel(s) they use that provides the means for reaching them with their specific proposition.

Psychographics

Here we have another customer insight that can contribute to a segmentation project but, on its own, cannot define the entirety of a winning customer proposition. However, by identifying internal drivers of customer behavior that can be associated with specific segments, psychographics can help define the most appropriate promotional stance to take. This not only provides the means of catching the attention of target groups in an ever cluttered world of communication, it can also provide the means by which you isolate and reach particular segments.