As I said on Twitter a few days ago:
My Team of 2008 award goes to IBM’s Eight Bar at Hursley Labs. RedMonk celebrates makers and doers – these guys exemplify getting on with it.
As regular readers will know I regularly ding IBM about its lack of a really strong grassroots-led innovation story. The company is great at top down, but bottom up, not so much. Which is why I rate the EightBar team so highly. Competition in this category was obviously very strong- I can point to any number of awesome teams in software development. BT’s Osmosoft were a pretty strong second, but what tipped EightBar over the top for me was the contribution the Hursley crew made to Chris Dalby‘s HomeCamp. When about ten people come down from Hampshire on a Saturday to share their knowledge its heart-warming and hopefully planet cooling.
That’s the charm you see – HomeCamp is all about home automation, using home metering to improve the sustainability of our home lives. Andy Stanford Clark, IBM distinguished inventor, is building a community around IBM messaging microbroker technology (MQTT) for home consumption. Hursley is best known for Big Middleware generally and MQSeries specifically. Oh sorry did I say MQSeries? I of course meant WebSphereMQ. Seeing Hursley technology applied to home automation hacking, used by people that had never touched an IBM tool before, is pretty mind-blowing.
EightBar is trying to build A Smarter Planet.
Another reason EightBar won it for me was the emergence of epredator 2.0 – Ian Hughes went through a stage earlier in 2008 when he came across as a negative influence – but towards the end of the year he is seemingly re-energised and ready to help EightBar make even more of a go of it. EightBar – activist evangelists.
So well done Andy, Dale, Ian, Graham, Laura, Nick and anyone else in the cluster. I bet Roo is kicking himself for joining the BBC and missing out on this ever so prestigious award 😉
Have a great Christmas folks!
knolleary » Blog Archive » Links for 2008-11-20 to 2008-12-18 says:
December 18, 2008 at 3:06 pm
[…] James Governor’s Monkchips » My Team Of The Year Award: IBM EightBar, Hursley Labs – "My Team of 2008 award goes to IBM’s Eight Bar at Hursley Labs. RedMonk celebrates makers and doers – these guys exemplify getting on with it." […]
Sandy Carter says:
December 18, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Hats off to the team!!! A very innovative team!!!!
Smarter planet is bigger than a company or even a country! This is a larger than life transformation that
this team recognizes!
Sandy Carter
Andy Piper says:
December 19, 2008 at 10:10 am
Awesome. Thanks James 🙂
The thing I’ve loved about being in the eightbar tribe for the past few years is that we’re just collaborating and sharing ideas – and things really just take on a life of their own.
On being part of a tribal movement « The lost outpost says:
December 19, 2008 at 11:14 am
[…] I’ve been standing on the shoulders of giants for the past couple of years and I completely recognise that. It’s awesome that this little group, loose band, motley assortment, whatever we are – this body of interested techies and thinkers has been identified by top analyst James Governor as his Team of the Year. […]
Roo Reynolds says:
December 19, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Good to see you (and so many IBMers!) at HomeCamp the other week.
Kicking myself? No. Not at all. I’m delighted for the Eightbar crew and incredibly proud to have been a part of it.
Small Business Marketing says:
December 22, 2008 at 7:34 am
IBM has always had small groups like these innovating in quiet. You canfind them at all of their labs and plant locations.
My 2009 Team of the Year Award says:
December 30, 2009 at 5:11 pm
[…] year the winner just screamed out at me, when I started considering it, so no runner up. Last year I chose a team that I know personally, the IBM Eight Bar crew from Hursley Labs. This year I chose a team I […]
James Governor's Monkchips » My 2009 Team of the Year Award says:
December 31, 2009 at 9:43 am
[…] year the winner just screamed out at me, when I started considering it, so no runner up. Last year I chose a team that I know personally, the IBM Eight Bar crew from Hursley Labs. This year I chose a team I […]
James Governor's Monkchips » Hacking Politics with IBM Middleware: open data, mashups, uh WebSphere says:
April 30, 2010 at 11:54 am
[…] just any folks either- the Attick are closely associated with the IBM Hursley EightBar cluster, my team of the year in 2008. IBM middleware geeks as open data hackers. Now that is what I am talking […]
Hacking UK Politics with IBM Middleware: open data, mashups, and uh… WebSphere says:
April 30, 2010 at 5:51 pm
[…] just any folks either- the Attick are closely associated with the IBM Hursley EightBar cluster, my team of the year in 2008. IBM middleware geeks as open data hackers. Now that is what I am talking […]