Thursday, January 04, 2007

Juggernaut

A Juggernaut is defined as a force that will crush everything in its path. I think that Green Technology is that force, and like the pod on the right, it's just about to burst open. Others agree; it's an "unstoppable trend", a "revolution". With everyone making predictions (and disagreeing with those predictions), and making more predictions, here are a few of my own:
  • More "RoHS Like" regulations - They are already being mandated in Europe, and China is now not far behind. Prediction number one is that we will see a deluge of these restrictive laws; a recent poll suggests that U.S. industry is begging for the feds to pass legislation before each state does. It's going to drive up costs temporarily, but consumers and business are ready for it. In addition, we are going to see a lot of efficiency-driven laws that indirectly support technological solutions over traditional ones; the green taxes on fuel coming out of the UK are one such example.
  • More CapEx into Opex - Vinnie said this best, but companies are finally going to sort out what is overhead (OpEx) spending, what is strategic (CapEx) spending, and what is tactical (a mix) spending when it somes to IT. Opex will get crunched 30 percent for starters, 60-70 percent in 5 to 7 years. CapEx will rise to take advantage of business-centric tech innovation.
  • No More Space Heaters - Laptops and virtualization will kill off the under-the-counter corporate PC in three to five; the Pocket PC might take a few scalps as well. Most of this time will be spent managing your existing IT staff and convincing them that they are not out of a job, because there's plenty of other green business projects to do.

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