Surface RT can help small businesses reduce IT costs

Microsoft caved to market pressure and sagging demand this week by slashing the price of the Surface RT tablet by 30 percent. The Surface RT is better-equipped for business than rival tablets, and at $350 ( $470 once you add a Touch or Type keyboard cover, which it requires to be truly functional) it straddles the line between tablet and PC, and could help business customers rein in IT costs.
The Surface RT isn’t for everyone. It can’t run traditional Windows software, so businesses or users that depend on specific applications or custom software can’t just toss out their PC and use a Surface RT. For a variety of use cases, however, a device with email, Web access, and Microsoft Office is sufficient.

The Surface RT can replace a Windows PC for many users. The Surface RT includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. With Windows 8.1, the Surface RT also gets Outlook, and Microsoft just updated the OneNote MX app to allow it to connect to Office 365 accounts. Microsoft has also made many of its tools available across iOS and Android, but the integration of the Surface RT with Microsoft software and services sets it apart from other mobile devices as a business tool.
It's true a business can supply users with standard Windows laptops—with the full Windows operating system, more internal storage, a real keyboard, and possibly a DVD or Blu-Ray drive—for roughly the same money. But when it comes to weight and battery life, no $500 laptop can come close to what the Surface RT has to offer.
Many businesses are purchasing tablets for users to use in addition to their standard desktop or laptop PC. In that case, you have to consider the cost of both the PC and the tablet. A Surface RT, on the other hand, can conceivably function as both and allow the business to cut IT costs while giving employees greater flexibility and mobility at the same time.
Let’s face it, small and medium businesses need professional-grade networks and PCs, but most don’t have dedicated data centers and many don’t even have full-time IT staff. They rely on simple, cost-effective technology. The Surface RT can augment a Windows PC better than other tablets thanks to Windows 8 and the tight integration with Microsoft software and services, and—for the right users—the Surface RT can be a primary device that fills the role of both PC and tablet in one. 

BIS to global central banks: Time to reduce stimulus

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke hinted that the central bank would pull back on stimulus measures later this year.

But a powerful group, representing global central banks, wants more.

In its annual report, the Bank for International Settlements suggested that global central banks should stop relying on stimulus to grow their economies and instead encourage authorities to speed up reforms.

"We are past the height of the crisis, and the goal of policy has changed -- to return still-sluggish economies to strong and sustainable growth," said the BIS, a consortium of central banks like the Fed and the European Central Bank.

"Can central banks now really do "whatever it takes" to achieve that goal?"

Related: Fed sets road map for end of stimulus

The report stated that the initial purpose of stimulus programs was to do "whatever it takes" to prevent financial collapse.

But at this point, the BIS called the programs "cheap money" which delays needed reforms in the economy and the financial system.

Investors have been skittish around any kind of central bank pullback talk. U.S. markets fell two weeks in a row after the Fed suggested it could start easing up on its controversial stimulus program, which is pumping $85 billion a month into the U.S. economy.

 

Central Bank action in China and Europe also has people on edge.

The People's Bank of China, which maintains tight control over the banking system, has been taking a tough line with Chinese lenders. It refused to inject cash into the financial system last week despite rocketing short-term borrowing costs, rattling investors.

The ECB, meanwhile, is in a wait and see mood and seems poised to move in the opposite direction.

The bank says it is ready to do more if an economic recovery fails to materialize later this year. It has discussed negative interest rates to ease a credit squeeze by encouraging banks in depressed southern Europe to lend more money to businesses and consumers.

Europe is constantly wrangling with the long-running debate over spending cuts and tax increases that have formed the core of the eurozone's response to its credit crisis. In recent months, European policymakers have gone out of their way to acknowledge that there are limits to austerity programs.