This Week in Enterprise Tech, Episode 4

SaaS sprawl, the future of Slack, are virtual employees for real this time?, AI safety, Databricks' unusual market move, and and the evolution of robotics, all on this week's episode.

👋 Hi and welcome to The DX Report — the research hub of The DX Institute all about Digital Transformation, the Digital Experience, and the Digital Enterprise. I’m industry analyst, author, and speaker Charles Araujo, and I’m all about providing insights and analysis for enterprise IT leaders as you make the big bets about your organization’s future!

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If last week was a slow news week, this one was packed! We had a lot of ground to cover in this week’s episode of This Week in Enterprise Tech — and all of it is critical for you to understand as an entperise IT leader! Check it out.

This Week in Enterprise Tech, Episode 4

This week, Hyoun Parkof Amalgam Insights and I take on six of the most important topics that should be considered by the CIO Office.  

1.  The Wall Street Journal explored how multiple companies have 10x'ed their SaaS vendor portfolios over the last decade. We discuss IT-LOB responsibility splits, key SaaS categories to watch, and adoption trends as well as some representative vendors such as Zylo, Productiv, Vendr, Bettercloud, and Torii. 

2.  CNBC pointed out how Salesforce co-founder Parker Harris is more hands on with Slack, which has been both a long-standing priority for CEO Marc Benioff and a revolving door of executives as of late.We discuss the future of software UX & why Generative AI is not enough. 

3.   Techcrunch noted a $25 million funding round for EMA which focuses on explicitly selling AI as a virtual employee. We discuss the need for trust and what can be learned from prior attempts over the past decade such as IBM Watson.

4.  United States Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announces $10 million for a new NIST AI safety lab. How much will this affect AI standards, governance, and purchasing decisions? We take into account both the Senate's official stance as well as modern governance standards & a Washington Post article on this topic  https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/06/nist-ai-safety-lab-decaying/

5.  The Wall Street Journal explores how market darling Databricks is avoiding the IPO while seeing record sales. We compare Databricks to publicly traded Snowflake and other companies that have successfully increased valuations by prolonging the path to IPO, such as Uber. And we explore how Databricks' private status is helping with AI acquisitions Glean and Mosaic ML. 

6.  The MIT Technology Review analyzes how robots are intersecting with AI and enabling humans to explore inaccessible frontiers ranging from deep sea exploration to collaborating with cockroaches. We explore how robotics affect telemedicine, field service, and the future of work as CIOs are held responsible for innovation and empowering employee productivity. 

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