After the keynotes at Enterprise 2.0 yesterday, I had an interesting discussion with Anant Jhingran of IBM that I thought I’d pass on. 

Considering that the majority of vendors here at the conference are startups or at least relatively young, I wanted to find out what role an established company like IBM sees itself playing in a Web 2.0 world. 

Anant told me that he thinks an important consideration of Web 2.0 that is sometimes overlooked is integration with existing technologies. You must “live with the old as you embrace the new,” as Anant put it.

Picking up on McAfee’s point that Web 2.0 requires giving up some measure of control, Anant said an experienced company like IBM is better able to help customers integrate collaboration technologies into existing infrastructures while maintaining adequate levels of security and compliance. 

True or not, giving employees the benefits of Web 2.0 while maintaining some measure of control on IT’s part was one of the hot topics yesterday. I also spoke with some reps of BEA Systems, and they stressed it as well. I think this is another sign that Web 2.0, though still in its infancy in many ways, is showing signs of maturing.