june2022 - 7

FROM THE TRENCHES
Think of a team of six horses with one pulling
right, one pulling left, and one digging in not to
move at all. How effective are the other three? Is
this a suitable time to reflect on which people and
technologies are paying off? In 2021, I suggested
that you look at every Software as a Service (SaaS)
subscription and eliminate the unnecessary
subscriptions allowed during the pandemic.
Think about how many streaming services and
subscriptions you have personally or as a firm
that may not be used optimally.
I rarely make " over the top " or one-size-fits-all
recommendations. However, I've been reflecting
on this recommendation for all this year. Prepare
to replace all your end-user hardware. The value
proposition became clear when presenting at a
conference in the past week. 2022 is the start of
a massive wave of technology innovation. I have
seen this type of wave a few times in my career.
Once was when the 286 chip was introduced
in the 1980s leading to rapid CPU innovation. The
next time was in the early 1990s when Windows
for Workgroups began to work. It wasn't the
innovative graphical or windows innovation of the
operating system but the peer-to-peer networking
that led to the Windows Servers and Windows
desktops of today. The next wave occurred with
centralized computing. Not so much cloud computing,
but the ability to share resources centrally
has led to many valuable innovations.
So, what's so big this year, and when will we
see the results? If the prior innovation speeds
are any indication, everything will take a few
years to align and be in place. Most of the prior
innovations took a five to ten-year cycle to be
fully realized. But innovators benefited almost
immediately, certainly with the year. And are you
an innovator? With all the market hype cycles
and innovation curves, you have heard of early
and late adopters, and many accountants are
laggards. My favorite true example of this is an
attendee who explained that she loved listening
to my presentations because I always spoke about
so many innovative items. However, she never
used them herself because her partner group
thought that speeding things up reduced profits
AND cost hard dollars. It turns out they were
billing by the hour, and taking a task from 60
minutes to 30 or 15 minutes cost them billable
time. I explained that she might want to get out
on her own, invest in the technology, and forge
her own path. She was ecstatic with the change
innovation had brought into her life.
So, this year is a significant hardware year,
and you should prepare to replace everything
you own during the next 24-36 months. Routine
replacements would be a regular cycle if you replace
hardware every 3-4 years. For others, you've been
holding on to old gear because you'd have to spend
hard dollars on replacing something that is working.
As an associate of mine, Brian Tankersley, has said
for years, " Life is too short for cheap ice cream and
cheap hardware. "
Consider this ratio. Last year, I purchased
the fastest hardware CPU available for a desktop
computer with an AMD 5950X CPU. Some of the
tasks on my prior computer went from around 90
minutes to about 5 minutes. Consider your billable
rate, not mine, and estimate the value of a task
done at least weekly that went from 90 to 5 minutes.
Sometimes this task was done more than weekly.
You've probably already done the math in your
head, but 52 weeks x 85 minutes = 4,420 minutes =
73.67 hours. At $100 per hour, that's $7,367! Do you
think my new computer cost that much? Not even
close. Both AMD and Intel claim that this year's
latest processors are anywhere from 40 to 100%
faster than last year's processors. This acceleration
reminds me of the progression from 286 to 386 to
486 from 1982 to 1989. The faster hardware enabled
software innovation. Further, with new processors
for all Apple Macs, iPhones, and the SoC (System
on a Chip) Android phones, every hardware device
is radically faster. I can easily justify replacing my
computer again this year based on the productivity
and ROI that I will see. Besides, my machine will be
a great gift for someone in my business or family.
This year's faster hardware will drive innovation
for the next decade or more. So, what's in these
designs that are so special?
■ Performance cores and efficiency cores - CPU
chips that run fast and others that conserve power
■ AI and neural cores - specialty processors that
run artificial intelligence and machine learning
loads optimally
■ Graphics cores - these graphics processing units
are being developed and delivered to provide
gamers a better experience with faster refresh
rates and response times, plus features like ray
tracing
■ Faster RAM
■ Faster Disk input/out via PCI-E Gen 4
■ Faster Wi-Fi with Wi-Fi 6E
I believe that developers will see the new
hardware horsepower and take advantage of it.
Further, if Cristiano Amon, President, and CEO of
So, are you ready to take a
deep breath, relax, and
innovate again?
Qualcomm Inc., is correct, we will need more edge
computing power. Cristiano suggests that there
will be more than one billion connected devices,
that cloud growth will be 35% year-over-year, and
that by 2025 - 64% of data will be created outside
data centers at the edge.
SO, WHAT DO I DO NOW?
Assume that every desktop, laptop, and smartphone
you own today is obsolete. Take these
devices out in the parking lot and make them
justify continued use in your firm and personal
life. All that e-waste makes me weak but keeping
obsolete technology would be worse. Few computers
or phones in use today should be in use by
2025. Technologies like 5G, Wi-Fi 6E, DDR5/6, PCI
Gen 4/5, and a plethora of cores will change the
way we use computers and phones. I've already
designed the next killer app for accountants.
My rule of thumb is that if I have seen the next
opportunity, so have many others. I want to find
innovative developers and accountants to help
make this vision real. We've done it before, and
we can do it again.
It takes a lot of effort to get a new generation of
applications to market. Besides the development,
marketing, and competition, there are threats
from cybersecurity, regulations, supply chain,
and laggards. So, are you ready to take a deep
breath, relax, and innovate again? If so, you and
your clients are sure to benefit! ■
JUNE 2022 ■ www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com
7
http://www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com
june2022

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