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Dear Colleagues,

Earlier yesterday we announced that Ben Verwaayen has been named CEO of Alcatel-Lucent and Philippe Camus has been named as the new Chairman of the company.

Some of you may know Ben - as one of our largest customers, and as an industry veteran whose career crossed several of our paths over the past several years. He is a well-respected global leader. He understands our business. He knows our customers. He understands our challenges and appreciates our opportunities. He has a proven track record leading a large organization through change. He will be able to step in ‘immediately’ and provide the continuity and stability needed to keep the business focused on serving our customers and executing our plans.

Likewise, Philippe brings to his role of chairman a rich set of global and multicultural experiences. As the former head of EADS, he is an experienced business executive of a large global company who has a good appreciation of the value of technology. Further, through his work with Lagardere, he has a good understanding of the media industry, which is increasingly relevant to the solutions we bring to customers.

I believe our strategy is right and is taking hold. After a difficult start in 2007, we have demonstrated good progress in many areas over the last 9 months. I believe that Philippe and Ben are a strong and complementary team who will work well together to lead the company going forward.

So I leave the company in the coming week proud that we made history in our industry by taking the first and bold step to create a true world leader in our segment. We are one company, we have created a strong foundation with great assets and talented people. I will not forget the dedication, the hard work and commitment you have demonstrated as we embarked on this journey. And a journey it is… We have weathered many challenges, we have accomplished a good deal and of course there is still much more to do. I am confident you will get it done.

I will keep special memories of the people I have gotten to know over the years; I will always value the determination and spirit of the people of Alcatel-Lucent and the pride you display in what you do each day.

I know Alcatel-Lucent is a company with a bright future. I care deeply about your success and will be watching with pride as you become the undisputed industry leader. You all have my very best wishes.

Pat Russo

But I have upgraded my browser, dammit! It’s Google Chrome, and I’m warming to it. Chrome is fast with a clean user interface, and makes Gmail and other Javascript-heavy sites run like greased lightning.

However, unless I’m completely mistaken, this is the third time TelstraClear has joined the mobile market. It had its 029 product for ages, which was basically onsold Vodaphone accounts and devices. That deal ended acrimonously in June last year, when TelstraClear and Vodafone parted ways.

TelstraClear also started work on a 3G network in Tauranga, but that too was canned last year. At the time, TelstraClear was rumoured to have struck a wholesale deal on Telecom’s CDMA network, and that has now come true.

While any competition in the NZ market is badly needed, TelstraClear mobile offering isn’t all that attractive. For starters, it’s part of a landline/broadband/calls bundle, so if you only want mobile service, you’re out of luck.

Second, TelstraClear is reselling Telecom’s existing CDMA/EV-DO Rev 0/A network service. Telecom has promised to keep it going for five or so years after it launches its new WCDMA network, but where does that leave TelstraClear’s customers? Will TelstraClear continue to resell and source CDMA devices, or will it too migrate to WCDMA that requires different handsets and devices?

To be a true Third Entrant in the mobile market, TelstraClear should offer cellular service without forcing customers to sign up for everything and the kitchen sink bundles and also tell people what it intends to do with the service in a year’s time.

Did a very interesting with Neil Roodyn, a Regional Director for Microsoft (kind of an honorary Super MVP title) but wasn’t given anywhere near enough time unfortunately, to talk about Windows Mobile and other things.

Also popped into see Maurico from Geekzone, who is a Windows Mobile MVP as well, talk about err, Windows Mobile together with Rick Anderson. Good talk actually, in particular by Rick who is very animated and keeps a fast pace with witty comment. Mauricio kindly asked me to wave from the audience, which I did, much to everyone’s amusement. Cheers for that, Mauricio… revenge will be sweet.

Normally, economies going south are compared to what happened in the thirties or late eighties/nineties, so I was curious to see Darling talk about the forties, or 1948 to be exact. I didn’t know that the bottom fell out of the UK economy then, so I did a bit of googling… and found Britain in Transition by Alfred F Havighurst.

1947 seems to have been a year of ballooning deficits, but Havighurst quotes The Economist, which in 1948 wrote:

“1948 will stand as an example of what can be achieved by economic planning which is based on clarity of thought and backed by political courage.”

According to the Economist, 1948 was the year when the UK economy floored the accelerator and took off. Curious stuff. Maybe Darling meant some earlier or later era, but he’s certainly correct that British voters are left “pissed off” by the present miserable economic climate and Labour not really offering any way out of it.

I’m guessing that fairly soon now, blogs all over .nz and elsewhere will name the two men facing charges of murdering 14-year-old John Hapeta, as they’re not “news websites” as such. Or are they?

While I can understand some of Judge Harvey’s concerns, banning online news sites from naming the two accused is rather pointless. Unless of course Harvey seeks to make a Canutean point about the limitations of judicial power in the online age.

Virtualised Hitlerjugend?

It has a certain, Thirties quality to it, especially with that stiff-arm gadget salute, no?

Update Tried the site above on a Windows machine, and in the NO IMAGE box, you can slap in a picture of your liking (or likeness). The text above the box reads:

“Upload a picture of yourself and our master masons will carve your likeness into the Statue of Liberty. All hail you!”

Uh, HAIL2U?

For completeness, here’s a pic of the Statue of Liberty:

Rumours are currently flying around that Telecom New Zealand’s new WCDMA/UMTS network that is being deployed by Alcatel-Lucent currently won’t see a full launch end of this year, as was previously announced.

Instead, June 2009 is when it will go alive. The launch this year is only a “soft” one, internally.

Anyone else have more information?

Gmail down

A rare sight in the past, but Gmail does seem to have more problems these days than before. Gmail’s web interface been inaccessible for me since 7.30am today at least, or about two hours. I can however get mail via IMAP4 and send messages too, using Google’s SMTP servers so for me, it’s a minor nuisance than a real problem.

Still, it’s not a good look. With an increasing number of people and organisations using the various Google Apps, Big GOOG has to be careful so as not to undermine their confidence in cloud computing.

I’m not so sure, but wouldn’t be surprised if Vodafone doesn’t call its new customer forums something along those lines.

I’ve had a quick look in forums and well, they seem to be working. Not much content yet. It’ll be interesting to see how this particular experiment goes for Vodafone: will people behave or will the forums degenerate into a massive flame-fest?

Either way, it was probably necessary for Vodafone to come up with an area on the Internet like the forums. Having people talking directly to you is probably immensely scary for a big, anonymous corporation, but it’s far better to keep the discussion on your own turf than elsewhere on the ‘Net.

I expected Voda to set up camp on Geekzone, but the relationship between the two seems to have gone sour over the issue of customer service.