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IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

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Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#331

Post by jessriedel »

nickysielicki wrote: post #48

I do not understand how IBM stays in business. As far as I’m concerned the only cool engineering thing IBM does anymore is POWER, which has a sort of unique memory architecture but otherwise is well behind everyone else. What else did they do in my lifetime? They took a profitable RedHat and gutted it, they took the best Laptop line and sold it to Lenovo and almost ruined it, they tried to be a front runner in ML but…

The number 2 experimental quantum computing group in the world is at IBM Research.

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#332

Post by dymk »

samarama wrote: post #220
absoluteharam wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most big tech companies got out of or significantly scaled back their blockchain business, it is solution chasing a problem. The web3 people apparently haven’t caught on yet https://petri.com/blockchain-bust-microsoft-joins-ibm-with-b...

The problem is infinitely printable FIAT, controlled by corrupt and incompetent politicians that is very slow and very expensive to to transact overseas and mutable. The solution is 100x faster, cheaper, more secure, immutable, less prone to fraud and limited in supply. It’s a very simple calculation.

> less prone to fraud

whut

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#333

Post by andi999 »

rdtwo wrote: post #203
wussboy wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I spent 10 years at a small (<80 people) CX company that was full of intelligent, motivated employees. We were smart and quick and lean and did very good work. But we never dragged in big deals because no one at the company had that swagger/access to high-levels. The scenario you describe is dumb and ruinous and, unfortunately, true.

Big deals can really put a company in danger. If the company you work with closes or cuts the deal or whatever you could loose half your revenue. On top of that big clients can be really needy especially dinosaurs companies that aren’t nimble. They take forever to pay, have lots of meetings and unreasonable expectations and expect lots of free stuff and service because they are incapable of processing Non standard in…

Well, dont forget it takes 6-12 month for your company to be registered as a suplier in the ERP.

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#334

Post by belter »

jahewson wrote: post #288
rileyphone wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gives me the unpleasant thought of how much value is destroyed and lost in these mindless corporate acquisitions. Incentives are broadly misaligned with what we should want as a society, instead investors want a payday as well as founders, and the acquiring corporation wants a fresh coat of paint and has access to the finance that can make it happen and only hurts 10 years later. In the end promising human efforts ar…

OTOH the average startup is garbage held together with duct tape that naturally falls apart without the founding team who created it. By the time of acquisition it’s usually reached a point of technical debt bankruptcy. This goes hand-in-hand with an over-heated sales team pushing hockey-stick growth that will crash back down when those brand-new customers churn at the next renewal - because the product, while nice-l…

After being on the inside of many of these, can confirm 100%, this post could not be more accurate:-)

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#335

Post by RHSeeger »

nradov wrote: post #307
jac241 wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would guess that most people entering NP programs at this point have less than 3 years of work experience as a nurse, a job where you are not diagnosing, coming up with treatment plans, performing procedures or doing any other physician tasks. I don't know if 500hrs of shadowing after a 2yr part-time online only program that you don't need any nursing degree or experience to enter would count as highly trained or s…

Is there any evidence that patients of NPs actually have worse outcomes? Given the current physician shortage would it be better to wait to see one, or get an appointment with a NP right away?

My expectation is that the outcomes would be similar for the common issues, and would start to deviate as you got into more uncommon problems. A doctor will have a lot more "background knowledge" to be able to consider things that are outside the every day. At least in my mind, it's not unlike someone in software development with a degree in it vs not. For most things, the person without a degree will do a fine job; but for some things, they won't be able to consider many of the possible options/tools, because they just haven't been exposed to them.

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#336

Post by Edman274 »

samarama wrote: post #220
absoluteharam wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most big tech companies got out of or significantly scaled back their blockchain business, it is solution chasing a problem. The web3 people apparently haven’t caught on yet https://petri.com/blockchain-bust-microsoft-joins-ibm-with-b...

The problem is infinitely printable FIAT, controlled by corrupt and incompetent politicians that is very slow and very expensive to to transact overseas and mutable. The solution is 100x faster, cheaper, more secure, immutable, less prone to fraud and limited in supply. It’s a very simple calculation.

I thought shilling operations don't operate on Sundays. Do they not give you the day off?

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#337

Post by pmlnr »

threeseed wrote: post #299
HollywoodZero wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just like Oracle. No one talks about Oracle. But they're still around. We did a major tech project to migrate off of Oracle after an acquisition of a large org that was running it. It was a year-long effort to migrate. But it was worth it since Oracle renewal costs were going to be nearly 50% of our IT budget.

a) Oracle is proven at scale. b) Large global talent pool of Oracle experts. c) First-class professional support. Not everyone is looking to innovate on their database. Many just want something that is reliable and easily supported.

>c) First-class professional support

Ah, this was a sarcastic comment! It was, right?

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#338

Post by jackcosgrove »

perardi wrote: post #103

I worked for one of the companies that IBM acquired to make this non-product. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-merge-healthcare-m-a-ibm/... I have no idea what they got for the money they spent. Merge Healthcare was the most miserable work experience I have ever had. They had patents, I guess, but the actual technology was garbage. And the owner was…a piece of work, let's say that. https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/67…

> Merge Healthcare was the most miserable work experience I have ever had.

Was it the orange ties?

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#339

Post by Damogran6 »

aunty_helen wrote: post #141
JediPig wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so I worked at IBM cloud, and can confirm this. They bought a cloud service, that by itself, and if left alone would been great. Soft(....something...) was the company... then IBM came and changed everything. I remember the SVP / President of ibm cloud showing up... talking 3 hours about how her son is so great and that we should 'follow' his example... after hour 3, man goes and interrupts and asks a question that w…

I’ve sat in an all hands like that before. Literally 50k$ an hour being wasted listening to some guy we’ll only ever see once talk about his sons 18th birthday. Weird experience.

Owner of the company spent half the meeting talking about how they take their grandkids anywhere in the world they want to go when they turn 16...I look at the audience paying rapt attention and I'm thinking 'this is a little odd'

Then he mentioned the 'merger of equals' and I thought 'this isn't good news'

Narrator: It wasn't.

Re: IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts

#340

Post by 35fbe7d3d5b9 »

rdtwo wrote: post #203
wussboy wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I spent 10 years at a small (<80 people) CX company that was full of intelligent, motivated employees. We were smart and quick and lean and did very good work. But we never dragged in big deals because no one at the company had that swagger/access to high-levels. The scenario you describe is dumb and ruinous and, unfortunately, true.

Big deals can really put a company in danger. If the company you work with closes or cuts the deal or whatever you could loose half your revenue. On top of that big clients can be really needy especially dinosaurs companies that aren’t nimble. They take forever to pay, have lots of meetings and unreasonable expectations and expect lots of free stuff and service because they are incapable of processing Non standard in…

I saw this play out first hand: a local digital agency run by a friend essentially ended up "captured" by a major player in the aerospace industry, to the point that 65-75% of their business came from $BIGCO. They grew by 100%+, had employees flying all over the world to set up for trade shows, and were making money by the truckload.

Then Covid hit, nobody wanted to fly, and $BIGCO took an earnings haircut and decided to cut back. My friend had to let dozens of people go. It ended up costing him his company because he'd neglected bringing other work into the pipeline.

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