McNealy's 10-Year Plan: Attack IT Complexity Issues

During his conference keynote speech here the Sun chairman, CEO and president reiterated Sun's vision of bundling all of its software into its Solaris operating system. He said this should be complete by the end of Sun's fiscal year, in June 2003.

The plan to bundle the Sun ONE Java-based software into Solaris is part the network computing vision, which McNealy has championed for several years.

McNealy said only by providing a custom, pre-built "network server system" based on open standards will Sun solve the complex issues of disparate and proprietary technology in large computer systems, and allow for the future promise of Web services.

"Complexity is driving people crazy," McNealy said. "People are going nuts with the complexity of their IT environment[s. In the next 10 years, we'll be building computers on the network, out of the network. We're building a network server system to deliver services [that evolve over time. The current system is not set up this way."

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Once this vision is in place, McNealy said solution providers that currently focus on integrating systems will have to refocus their businesses on providing custom business processes for companies that already have prebuilt IT systems in place.

"Only the computing industry has made it so complex [to build infrastructure that there are more people doing systems integration than there are doing [research and development," McNealy said. "How many people are trying to fix what engineers created? But you still need business process engineering,that will touch every bit of business. ... That's where systems integrators can add value."

To achieve its network computing vision, Sun's focus has been on R and D, on which the company spent nearly $2 billion in the last year, he said. This focus has not been popular with Wall Street, McNealy said, but he stood firmly by Sun's plans because he said it will save customers time and money in the long run.

"We're getting drilled for our R and D investment, and we say, 'How can you not spend money on R and D?'" McNealy said.

In fact, McNealy even said in a QandA after the keynote that he almost hopes the IT spending environment continues to have its current difficulties for "another few years" so Sun,as well as IT customers, can build for the future rather than get mired in projects using currently available infrastructure products.

"[I want the economy to be rough so people don't buy much of this old [infrastructure and let us drive the network computing architecture," McNealy said.

During his keynote, McNealy, in typical fashion, touted Sun's network computing strategy over Microsoft's "welded shut" .Net strategy and IBM's method of creating infrastructure so complex it takes millions of dollars in IBM Global Services to make it work.

McNealy also resurrected his infamous Top 10 lists, giving attendees not 10 but 13 signs that the entertainment industry in Las Vegas has been affected by the industry slowdown. The one that garnered the most laughs was No. 5, "CEOs auditioning for "Jackass the Movie, Part 2."

In addition, McNealy outlined several ways companies can cut IT costs in the short term, many of which Sun itself has implemented. He also offered Sun's services to help customers implement these changes, even giving out his e-mail address so customers can reach him directly.

One of the cost-cutting measures McNealy highlighted was server consolidation, saying Sun reduced its server count by 30 percent and saved $12 million in one year through this move.

McNealy also demonstrated Sun's recent move to use a combination of Java card technology and Sun Ray thin clients to eliminate the need for employees to have personal offices on Sun Silicon Valley campuses. He performed a similar demo at an industry conference in San Francisco earlier this year.