eBay、惠普等科技公司分拆，对云计算的未来有何预示？

    很少有哪句话比“这次不一样”更让人紧张。在如今的企业科技领域，时代的确是不同了，而且这样一个时代很可能会驻留一阵子。

    不是每天都上演资产超千亿美元的大企业的分拆大戏。但就在上个月，eBay公司决定剥离其快速增长的支付部门PayPal；就在上周，惠普公司（Hewlett-Packard）决定将PC和打印机部门与企业硬件和服务部门分拆。最新消息是，赛门铁克（Symantec）很可能会分拆为两家分别从事安全与数据存储业务的公司。

    另一方面，我们刚刚见证了云计算历史上最大的一笔收购交易：全球最大的软件公司之一SAP，正在收购企业报销管理服务商，软件即服务类公司Concur。

    我们暂且不去讨论这些公司价值多少钱，目前亟需搞清楚一个问题：究竟发生了什么？这些新动向只能用云计算的新转变所引发的“逆变”来解释。我之所以用“逆变”这个词，是因为今天我们所见到的模式，与过去的发展轨迹几乎截然相反。

    上一次科技话题主宰媒体圈，还是1999年到2000年的事情。在科技泡沫破裂前的那几年，我们看到了一些有趣的现象: 科技新贵强势崛起崛起，但老牌科技公司的表现也相当不错。当时扎堆上市的新科技公司超过了300家。另一方面，一些市场主宰者，比如阿卡迈（Akamai）、BEA、思科（Cisco）、EMC、Exodus、Level 3、甲骨文（Oracle）和Sun，也能够把自家的技术架构工具卖给新兴和老牌《财富》500强企业（其中很多公司当年都在忙着应战被过度炒作的“千年虫”问题）。

    所谓水涨船高。随着老牌软件公司积极向新型科技公司提供基本技术架构，这些企业也在迅速壮大。比如，思科公司的营收以50%至60%的速度增长，市值一度高达5000亿美元。很多人认为它有可能成为史上第一家市值超万亿美元的公司。

    正如你今天所见，这一幕并未发生。目前思科的市值只有全盛时期的20%。与此同时，其他在1999年到2000年大赚特赚的老牌软件公司要么退市（如Exodus），要么被收购（如Sun、BEA和Peoplesoft——这三家正好都被甲骨文收购）。如果他们目前还是独立存在的公司（如阿卡迈、思科、EMC、甲骨文、微软、IBM和惠普等），其核心计算业务的内生增长也是非常缓慢的，甚或没有任何增长。

    Few words raise more consternation than ‘this time is different.’ Yet in the world of enterprise tech today, times are different — and they are likely to stay that way for a while.

    It’s not everyday that $100-plus billion companies split themselves in two. Recall late last month, eBay’s decided to spin off its fast-growing payments division, PayPal; last week, Hewlett-Packard HP -5.89% moved to separate its PC and printer divisions off from its enterprise hardware and service groups. And most recently, Symantec’s potential split into security and data storage.

    On the other end, we just witnessed the largest acquisition in the history of cloud computing — where one of the largest software companies in the world, SAP SAP -0.77% , is buying Concur, a provider of on-demand travel and expense management software-as-a-service, for $8.3 billion.

    Beyond the question of what these tech companies are worth, it’s important to ask what’s going on here? The developments can only be described as an “inversion” caused by a new shift in cloud computing. And I say inversion because the pattern we see today is almost the reverse of developments evident in the past.

    The last time technology dominated the news cycle was in 1999-2000, during which we saw something interesting happen in the years leading up to the collapse of the tech bubble — we witnessed the simultaneous rise of not just new tech companies, but established ones too. While the number of companies going public eclipsed 300, the dominant players, such as Akamai AKAM -1.77% , BEA, Cisco CSCO -1.76% , EMC EMC -1.57% , Exodus, Level 3 LVLT -2.31% , Oracle ORCL 0.34% , Sun, etc. were able to sell both the technology infrastructure picks and shovels to both new and existing companies within the Fortune 500 (many of whom were busy preparing for what turned out to be the over-hyped Y2Kopalypse).

    A rising tide was indeed floating all boats back then: As big established companies provided fundamental technological infrastructure to new tech firms, the businesses of existing firms grew rapidly. Cisco, for example, grew its revenue at rates of 50% to 60%, topping $500 billion in market cap; it was widely expected to become the first $1 trillion market cap company.

    As evident today, that didn’t happen: Cisco’s market cap stands nearly 80% below its peak level. Meanwhile, the other large established companies that benefited greatly in the 1999 to 2000 run-up are either out of business (e.g., Exodus) or have been acquired (e.g., Sun, BEA, and Peoplesoft — all by Oracle). And if they’re still standalone companies (such as Akamai, Cisco, EMC, Oracle, Microsoft, IBM, HP), then they’re showing very slow, if any, organic growth in their core computing businesses.