Yahoo, HP and Intel have announced that they will jointly set up six virtual research centres designed to test emerging cloud computing technologies.

One of these centres will be right here in Singapore – hosted by the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA). Two other centres will be at the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign), and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany. HP, Yahoo and Intel with also host one centre each.

Cloud computing essentially refers to the concept of using vast arrays of globally distributed computers as a platform for delivering services. Many industry watchers consider cloud computing to be the next big thing in IT. Research firm Gartner predicts that it will be as influential as e-business.

These new centres will allow researchers to test software, hardware and systems that would make the large-scale resources needed for cloud computing more reliable, manageable and secure.

Check out the IDA’s press release for more details on the Singapore cloud computing test bed.

“Work is something you do, not some place you go to” – this phrase from Home Warriors, an Economist.com article, is something I cannot agree with more.

Many smart businesses have long realized the tremendous boost in productivity and efficiency that can be achieved by embracing telecommuting. It is estimated that more than a quarter of the workforce in developed economies hold jobs that can easily be done remotely.

However, effective telecommuting requires more than just e-mail and a broadband connection. A robust and well designed collaboration platform is essential if dispersed individuals are to function as an effective team. Other potential downsides include telecommuters’ alienation due to lack of face-to-face contact with fellow workers. 

The good news is that there are a number of innovative collaboration platforms and telepresence solutions emerging that promise to make the telecommuting experience more enjoyable and effective. Home Warriors provides a glimpse into some of these innovations.

Netsuite this week enhanced the capabilities of its premium NetSuite CRM+ application.

A key new feature is the Knowledge Management for Customer Service module which is designed to help front-end service staff find relevant content to handle customer inquiries. The interface also allows reps to easily add customer feedback into the knowledge base.

Also introduced are Marketing Automation features to help marketers effectively segment their target markets for more productive marketing campaigns.

Yahoo Mail users can now access their email even when they are offline. Yahoo has just released the Yahoo Zimbra Desktop as a free download for both Mac and Windows.

Zimbra Desktop is an application that you install locally on your PC. It functions like a traditional e-mail client such as Microsoft Outlook or Apple’s Mail App. In fact, the Zimbra interface has been designed to closely mirror Outlook’s general look and functionality.

Zimbra Desktop’s main benefit is that it gives you offline access to your Webmail accounts – it even works with Gmail accounts. It also throws in some productivity elements into the mix – specifically spreadsheet and word-processing applications; however, these are quite rudimentary even compared to Google Docs applications.

The Zimbra Desktop’s email features are certainly impressive – tagging, conversations threading, comprehensive search, etc. However, it does not seem able to synchronize with the Yahoo Address Book or Calendars just yet.

The Zimbra Desktop technology originates from Zimbra Inc – a company that Yahoo acquired in September 2007. Its primary product is the Zimbra Collaboration Suite – a full-featured collaboration platform that supports email, instant messaging, group calendars & contacts, and document sharing.

Networking Together – an WSJ Online article – describes how the rapid growth of social networking sites is giving small businesses an invaluable opportunity to dramatically expand their reach.

Small businesses, being more nimble and usually more approachable, are apparently better positioned to take advantage of the social networking phenomenon than larger companies. However, it does take some effort and planning to successfully leverage this medium.

The trick is to create a web presence that is compelling enough for your target audience to visit regularly and, crucially, for members to start contributing content to.

Intelligent Enterprises’ Doug Henschen reports on his Q&A session with product manager at Google Enterprise Rishi Chandra.

Chandra provides some revealing clues to Google strategic thrust. Having completely dominated the Search game, Google is taking aim squarely at the Enterprise space – and it’s chosen medium is Web Applications.

Google is clearly positioning itself as an application platform in its effort “to go from consumers to the enterprise.”

Read the full text of this interview here.

The “Enterprise Software Customer Survey 2008″ from McKinsey & Company reveals just how rapidly the business software landscape is changing.

The survey points to a accelerating adoption of subscription-based and on-demand solutions. This is clearly being driven by Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs) which are collectively spending 26% of their software budgets on web applications. However, many larger enterprises are also starting to jump onto the SaaS bandwagon.

McKinsey expects this shift to web apps to fundamentally reshape the software industry, predicting the “rise of a new generation of platforms to develop, integrate, deploy and host these applications.”

Read the full McKinsey report here.

Over the past few days, a couple of our clients have been struggling with a range of niggling PC-related issues. Both clients have a mix of PCs running Windows XP and Vista operating systems. Their problems ranged from general instability in the Vista machines to insidious malware on the XP systems.

Having switched to an exclusively Mac OS environment some time ago, I had quite forgotten the constant struggle it took to maintain system security and stability in the Windows world. This is not to say that Mac users are completely immune to such problems, but modular operating systems like Apple’s OS X, as well as Linux and Solaris, are inherently more stable than any of the current Windows flavours.

A recent Economist article reports on Microsoft’s attempts to cure the ills of its flagship OS product. Microsoft is already paving the way for Vista’s replacement – Windows 7 – expected to be released in 18 months time. However, the more ambitious goal of a “total rethink of the whole Windows metaphor” will apparently have to wait for a project code-named “Midori.” Unfortunately, this Windows core is unlikely to be ready for action until four or five years down the road.

Effectively managing its talent-base is critical for the long-term success of any business – even more so for a small businesses. Unfortunately, many small businesses treat their talent management processes as an after-thought and thus fail enjoy the benefits of having a truly motivated, high-performance workforce.

The emergence of on-demand solutions specializing in talent management has made it feasible for even the smallest of businesses to effectively implement proven and powerful performance management practices. Two such solutions that we have seen successfully implemented are Taleo & SuccessFactors. Both are web-based, Software-as-Service (SaaS) solutions that include modules for managing & aligning goals, tracking & reviewing performances and benchmarking compensation and benefits packages.

Both Taleo and SuccessFactors are designed to provide critical, real-time performance data to enable companies to better manage, motivate and engage their talent base in order to drive better business results. Once configured and set-up properly, SaaS solutions such as these are ideal for small businesses as they do not need extensive IT support to maintain.

… and it’s getting local and becoming mobile.

A survey by WebVisible and Nielsen/NetRatings found that most consumers are becoming increasingly de-tuned from traditional advertising media and are instead relying on search engines and other online sources to find products and services from local businesses.

A majority of consumers apparently associate the trustworthiness of a business with the quality of its website. User-generated reviews, local news sites and social networks are other key influencers of consumer perceptions.

Consumers are also starting to use web-enabled mobile devices to access location- and time- specific product information. Such mobile access looks set to become an important driver for local commerce.

This particular survey was conducted in the USA, but a similar survey in Singapore would likely reveal similar trends. Anecdotal reports from many of our own small business contacts echo the increasingly important role that a strong web presence plays in a firm’s marketing effort.

Click here to download the full WebVisible report from GetEntrepreneurial.com (2.11MB PDF).