Sleeper also suggested that consultants should establish relationships with software vendors that are aggressively developing technologies in the Web services arena. He recommended finding a smaller, emerging firm instead of forging a relationship with an established firm. "If you look at tech innovation in the past, it's almost always started in the periphery with smaller companies who have an idea, bring it to market, and it gradually spreads out among larger vendors," Sleeper said. "One major reason for that, to make a blanket generalisation, is that people in [established] companies generally solve problems that they already know about, and they do the things they know how to do." For example, companies like IBM, BEA, and Oracle are developing Web services strategies based on the products they have on the market and the way they've traditionally solved problems, Sleeper said. While those types of solutions have value, the most groundbreaking work will more likely take place, for example, in companies of 50 people or fewer who have a technical vision they're trying to bring to market. Another reason Sleeper believes in creating ties with smaller organisations is the creation of a new software niche. The hope for Web services innovations is that they will create better interoperability among systems and support a diverse set of technologies within organisations. Better interoperability, however, will mean that information and processes will be running across multiple systems, none of which will be able to provide a way to manage all those interactions and provide a good view of all the data. That's where the software innovators will come into play, Sleeper said. Because major platform vendors' products, by their very nature, won't do a good job of manufacturing interactions with other products, neutral intermediaries will have an opportunity to play that role. "A lot of the most promising startup companies are very explicitly focused on that challenge of managing and mediating the infrastructure," Sleeper said. Among the star performers, Sleeper mentioned Blue Titan, Talking Blocks, AmberPoint, Infravio, and Grand Central, which is an ASP that may provide similar benefits. "Those small software companies are looking to consultants and systems integrators as a major way of delivering their technology to customers," Sleeper said. "I think consultants can get a lot of benefit from actively pursuing the early-stage innovators and developing some expertise in these solutions today before everyone else does."
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