Does it matter what software platform choices companies make? This question came to mind recently after I had read some articles about Oracle’s woes with security flaws in its Java platform. I realised that any company that had chosen this platform was massively affected. At the mercy of others First some history…Sun Microsystems created the Java programming language. Many years later Oracle bought Sun and inherited Java. Java is used by many companies to build enterprise applications. In the early days of Java, Sun thought … Continue reading →

The South African government is often slated for not doing enough to promote new business creation and technology innovation. However, there are actually several incentive schemes that companies can benefit from if they are building software products. This article reviews one such scheme: SARS’s Research and Development Tax Incentive Programme. The programme was launched in 2006 with the intention that companies could get tax relief for their research and development spending. However, there were several types of R&D that were specifically excluded. These were: exploration … Continue reading →

Many IT managers and business owners are apprehensive about outsourcing certain aspects of their IT operations, especially their software development function. They’ve probably heard scare stories about failed software outsourcing projects. Those failures are likely to be off-shoring projects which failed due to differences in time zones, work ethics, culture and language. However, outsourcing your software development to a local provider is a decidedly less risky proposition and carries more advantages than disadvantages. In fact, there are a several scenarios where outsourcing may be the … Continue reading →