Reread those three statements a few times (recognizing that the verb "mechanize" has to be in an electronic world context) until you release how profound and prescient a thinker John was. I don’t want to put words in his mouth, but I think that he would say that almost everything IT does today is some form of automation (as software applications simply automate what would otherwise be manual processes). Further, automation in the IT industry is, as a result, always a work in progress with no end in sight. In fact, you could say that automation is one means of measuring IT progress--what stage are you at in applying automation and where do you need to go? That means that a vendor can claim some connection to or benefit from automation, but how far that automation has progressed and what it delivers is the important thing.
One high-level worry about automation (or robotics, which is an instantiation of automation) is that it will take jobs away or lower the skill levels that are necessary to complete a job. On the whole (not select instances), that hasn’t been the case, as the benefits have outweighed the negatives.
A lower-level concern is the loss of control. What you had planned for the automation to accomplish may result in different outcomes that significantly alter a job or process. That is why automation often has to be introduced with training wheels, so to speak, before it is allowed to ride by itself. Note that at some point you have to let go and see where the process takes you.
Now, on to iWave. As pointed out, automation in the electronic world tends to be a work in progress rather than a well-defined endpoint. A lot of work has been done by many to advance the state of storage automation, but iWave appears to be doing some interesting work in that arena that should attract our attention.
But first, a word about the company. No, it is not owned by Apple, even though a lower case "i" starts its name. Instead, iWave is a part of the Hall Financial Group. So, although it is a small company of fewer than 50 employees, iWave has access to financial capital rather than having to deal with the vagaries of trying to obtain venture capital whenever the need arises.
