Advice from HP's wireless CTO, Ozzie Diaz

Know your customers better than they know themselves

I managed to catch a panel at the Mobile 2.0 conference this week, moderated by Tony Fish of AMF Ventures. Ozzie Diaz, Hewlett-Packard's mobile and wireless CTO, Andy Kelm from Nokia, Pankaj Kedia from Intel, J.H. Kah from SK Telecom Americas, and Mark Davis, the Chief Scientist of Yahoo Connected Life. The theme of the panel was what makes mobile unique; why it is growing so rapidly; and how it is affecting our world today. 

I had a conversation with Diaz, who was himself an entrepreneur. Back in 2000, he co-founded Bivio Networks, a leading provider of deep-packet processing network appliance platforms. Diaz also led sales, partnerships, global technical consulting, and line-of-business marketing for major technology companies such as Cisco Systems, Motorola, Rockwell International, Baxter Healthcare, and AirFlow Networks.

"Know your customers almost better than they know themselves," he said. "Depending on a problem you're trying to solve, they may not perceive that this is a problem they're ailing from."

Additionally, don't bother with the little stuff, he suggested.

"Always be solving a problem which is 'north of mission critical' not casual," said Diaz. In other words, tackle real problems and those that customers will pay real money for.