Parting Is Such Sweet Sorrow
To answer that tough question, you have to re-examine your situation and weigh your options carefully.
One choice is to ride a technology to the end and take advantage of all of the experience you've gleaned over time, even in the face of rising competition from later market entrants. For example, solution providers focusing on Fibre Channel technology for SANs could start facing such a prospect as the skills to integrate such SANs become ever-more widespread.
Another alternative is to walk a fine line by ramping up your skills in a new technology to stay ahead of the market and competitors while also being prepared to drop the new skills when yet another new-and-improved technology comes along. That scenario is already unfolding with iSCSI, as two kinds of solution providers are embracing the technology: those who have been in business for some time and sense the need to ramp up with this technology ASAP, and start-ups launched specifically to integrate iSCSI SANs.
Whatever the case, storage solution providers now more than ever need to find a technology strategy that works for them. Conversations with folks in the storage channel have convinced me that we've seen the worst of the slump in IT spending. However, spending is not going to rebound quickly, and customers are a lot more cautious than ever before about when and where to spend their precious capital.
Not only that, today there are more new technologies than ever from which to choose, making it harder for solution providers to find the right mix of product strategies. InfiniBand? iSCSI? Fixed content storage? Hardware vendor-driven or third-party software management tools? Host-based vs. array-based vs. network-based storage virtualization? Decide soon, before one or more of those and other technologies leaves you behind.
One storage solution provider has rendered the issue of deciding how long to ride a technology a simple matter of watching one competitor: Dell.
"Dell is my litmus test for deciding when to get out of a technology," said Kevin Reith, manager of strategic technology at Info Systems, Wilmington, Del. "I live for customer confusion. Dell doesn't get into a product line until there is no more confusion. Then it's time for me to get out."
A simple strategy, perhaps. But sometimes the simple answer is the best one, especially when so many factors are combining to make bets on your future harder to place than ever.
Still reading and writing,
Joseph F. Kovar
JOSEPH F. KOVAR is the storage editor for CRN .