Good morning Pittsburgh!  This week, our tech-industry news re-cap will look into what Microsoft has to offer the iPhone, (for free!) trends that are revolutionizing the retail industry, diversity within the tech industry -- NOT in Silicon Valley, and the two main business opportunities to follow in 2015.

Microsoft Office for iPhone

            Yesterday, November 6, the full version of Microsoft Office was available to download onto the Apple iPhone.  Right now, the version available to the iPhone is very limited due to the small nature of the phone, and only works if you have a subscription to Microsoft’s Office 365 service.  The new mobile version of Office for iPhone, iPad, and soon Android, will let anyone create and edit documents for free. 

Read more here

Tech Diversity on the East Coast

            Silicon Valley may be the technology heart of the industry, but they don’t have anything on the tech workforce in the DC area.  The DC, Maryland and Virginia are have the highest percentages of tech diversity in the nation, according to Census data, a model that Silicon Valley should strive for.  Silicon Valley’s dominant workforce is overwhelmingly white, male and Asian.  In order for tech giants to continue competing in a global marketplace, they will look to include more women and minorities. 

Read more here

Innovation is the Motive

            In recent days, innovation proves to be the name of the game in the retail industry.  Increasingly, retailers are tailoring their services to create and ultimate customer experience.  Retailers are becoming more forward thinking in order to tie digital to physical in-store, by morphing product and channel focused “customer experience” to “experiential,” using community and entertainment as their primary differentiators.  For example, a Manhattan retailer, STORY, has continually changed everything in store, from products to fittings to events based upon different themes, like “love” or “made in America.”  They are described as a monthly magazine, meets art gallery, meets retailer concept. 

Read more here 

Digital and Industrial Internet of Things

            There are two particularly important business opportunities unfolding next year in the electronics and high tech industry.  The first has to do with the growing importance, broader use, and more extensive leveraging of digital as the industry’s universal language and central driver of all key strategic decisions, investments, goal-setting and performance metrics – Digital.  The second is the unprecedented rise in proliferation and commercialization of the Industrial Internet of things. 

Read more here

I hope everyone has a great weekend!  Join us again for next weeks Tech industry review.