Povitica, Latkes and IBM

Going into the weekend I had no idea as to what the recipe of the week would be. I didn’t have a hankering for anything and I hadn’t purchase anything that needed to be cooked. Friday, my wife made a shrimp casserole that was pretty good. It consisted of shrimp, cream, cheese and very few vegetables. I plan to alter that and had it as a topping on grouper this week. However, it was what we had for dessert I want to share with you today. I had my first taste of Povitica. Povitica is a sort of bread dough that is rolled out until cracker thin. It is then covered with a filling of nuts, cheese, or fruit spreads. The covered dough is rolled and folded in a swirl and baked in a traditional bread pan. The result is quite amazing. Although, the name is English Povitica, the dish originated in Slovenia. I ordered my English Walnut Povitica from Bernice’s Bakery in Kansas City, Kan. As I don’t bake I am not offering a recipe, but I do suggest ordering one or more from Bernice’s Bakery. Sunday, after a bit of thought, I decided to pan fry some chicken and make potato latkes. A traditional latke uses sautéed onions and garlic. In my quick version I use onion and garlic powder. However, they are certainly better than most latkes you will find out there, including some disappointing ones I had recently in New York City. Latkes, enjoy!

IBM and Unified Communications

As I pointed out a few weeks ago, I have begun boning up on unified communications. As part of the research I noticed the frequent presence of Cisco, Microsoft and Polycom. However, over the course of my career, I have competed, partnered with and simply observed the efforts of one truly transformative company, IBM. So, this morning I looked to see what they are doing in the area of UC. To my pleasant surprise I discovered they wanted to tell me. In a paper dated September 2010, IBM Global Technology Services released Transforming your voice, video and collaboration infrastructure. It is a discussion of their internal efforts to evolve to UC. The objective of the paper is to position IBM as a thought leader in order to sell product but some interesting points are raised. One that applied to Broadvox and our business strategy was the road map to UC. IBM endorses the use of SIP as the underlying protocol, a good thing. And they identified four steps of their strategy to achieve UC by 2012:

1. Cost reduction through network convergence and VoIP.
2. Improve employee productivity through converged applications.
3. Improve customer satisfaction through IP video.
4. Establish business leadership through multimedia applications and process transformation.

I agreed with all except No. 3. That seemed like a stretch but don’t let that prevent you from reading the paper. It contains useful information regarding an effective transition to UC and is relevant to SMBs despite IBM’s size.

David Byrd is vice president of marketing and sales for Broadvox , and is responsible for marketing and channel sales programs to SMBs, enterprises and carriers as well as defining the product offering. Prior to joining Broadvox, David was the Vice President of Channels and Alliances for Eftia and Telcordia. As Director of eBusiness Development with i2 Technologies, he developed major partnerships with many of the leaders in Internet eCommerce and supply chain management. As CEO of Planet Hollywood Online he was a pioneer in using early internet technologies to build a branded entertainment and eCommerce website company partnered with Planet Hollywood. Having over twenty years of Telecom sales and marketing experience, he has held executive positions with Hewlett-Packard, Sprint and Ericsson.