Specsavers embraces Azure and AWS, recoils at Oracle's 'wow' factor Oracle's cloud has been judged too risky, too expensive and not up to scratch by Specsavers, which is aiming to complete an AWS and Azure combo next year. And, in another plus for Microsoft, Specsavers (the British optical retail chain) is adopting Office 365 over Google Docs, saying Microsoft is cheaper. The move comes as …
Any Specsavers franchisees on here?
For everyone else, Specsavers is a franchise, the practices aren't owned (all the franchise fees flow tax free to the channel islands).
Who is responsible for the patient data that AWS/Azure gather? Is it the franchise or some vague corporate body that's part of Specsavers? What about NHS patients?
Don't forget that the Optometrist isn't just finding a prescription - they're often first to pick up diabetes or brain tumours.
'Should have gone elsewhere' to keep your data private.
Quite. And the poor sod who is going to have to pick up the pieces is probably the one who wanted to keep things in house all along. Bit like Farage securing the out vote and then buggering right off to let everyone else sort out the impending catastrophe.
Don't get me wrong, I don't thing cloud is actually the real risk here. Revolutionary rather than evolutionary change at scale is as we all know an excellent recipe for potential disaster. If I was on the board of Specsavers I wouldn't let anyone draw up the plan if they weren't going to be around when it's executed. Madness!
Usually people like that are brought in precisely because existing staff are unwilling to get on board with the corporate strategy and unable to properly explain why not. There are lots of people making careers out of being the person kicking off these changes. Once the company is properly bought into the strategy they can leave because their (quire rare in IT) skills are no longer required - that skillset being forcing strategy through. The person taking over needs the skills in IT to make the solution work, and those skills are widely available.
Whether the corporate strategy of moving to the cloud at all costs is correct is another discussion. I was simply addressing the fact that he isn't running away, he's done what he was there to do and the board would have known that up front.
The thing those companies all have in common though is that these days they have a great user experience that's flexible and moves with the times. Not sure I'd consider that "in the lurch" from a board perspective so much as having a competetive advantage and lower overall costs.
In fairness to MS, Google are perfectly free to launch a messaging and VOIP service to compete. They have the resources and the skills.
In this instance, it's not dodgy business and bundling from MS; their catalogue and pricing actually make a lot of sense.
Yes, MS may indeed be cheaper.
However relying on the "cloud" and MS instead of their own system might be a false saving. That and the IBM deal may break the law.
There is no evidence that IBM's hyped system delivers anything yet. Specsavers are are essentially going to give IBM data and outcomes (with INFORMED permission of customers?) that eventually IBM MIGHT make sense of.
"However relying on the "cloud" and MS instead of their own system might be a false saving. "
in 2010 you'd have had a point. In 2017? There's sufficient data to show that while cloud does go down* it's generally better service overall than on premises systems were for the vast majority of companies. O365 is in use by a huge number of companies and users and from personal experience the telephony is better than what came before as it's being run by the best people available, not the available people in the team and a 5 day course.
*Google especially loves going down, no such thing as bad PR and all that. They are exeptionally bad though...
O365 is in use by a huge number of companies and users and from personal experience the telephony is better than what came before as it's being run by the best people available, not the available people in the team and a 5 day course.
You are talking VOIP (Lync), here, right ? ROFL
as it's being run by the best people available We had trouble getting proper support, not sure where you work, to our standards MS support personnel were numpties ...
And when they're in the cloud, they'll just have lock in and vulnerability to price gouging to AWS and Azure instead, unless they reimplement their projects twice* to make them work properly in both environments..
*Even if the application code is the same, bits of the infrastructure will need to be different eg networking, safe storage of keys etc.
Specsavers is putting all new apps on AWS and Azure, with existing apps being rewritten rather than ported. Forty per cent of the IT estate is currently non-cloud and the rest is set to float by the end of 2018. Specsavers has seven data centres globally but will retain just two for backup.
To follow up, I assume you mean this part. These are kept for "Backup" not for holding the data.
And why are the data centres BT's? You normally host your own kit in a datacentre and yes the connections between these are leased but that has nothing to do with the stored data.
Google Hangouts, here in Canada, is as free as Skype, and the quality (both video and audio) is as good. It runs on a browser, no program(me) required. Hangouts user interface not so great, it's almost as if they *don't* want you to use it. I think I preferred it when it was Google Voice or Google Talk. But in any case we're talking free vs. free. Is something different in the UK?
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