Archive for April, 2010
Posted on April 30, 2010 by Atul
Global Services -Outsourcing Firms in the Gulf Boot Up.
Traditionally outsourcing companies have provided service for back-office operations. But countries such as the UAE, Egypt, Jordan and Morocco have been making efforts to build up infrastructure, people and funds to grow the sector. And industry experts believe the outsourcing industry has been growing at 20 per cent annually in the Middle East.
Amin Khaireldin, Strategy Advisor and Board Member at Egypt-based Information Technology Industry Development Agency (Itida)Information Technology Industry Development Agency, said: “In Egypt we put resources in a business park-like Smart Village. From the premises services such as financial analytics are conducted by 200 analysts for a Dubai-based company. Technical as well as packaged implementation services (PIS) are the focus.”
Business process outsourcing (BPO) is another area gaining relevance in the region. BPO involves the contracting of operations and responsibilities of specific business functions (or processes) to a third-party service provider. “Gulf-based companies are now considering taking BPO services from outsourcing firms in the Gulf. And Itida has been making investments towards acquiring international standards in this segment,” said Khaireldin.
IT service companies such as Patni Computer Services (PCS) have noticed this change in this region. Derek Kemp, President (Emea), PCS, said: “The Gulf economies have been building resources for a three-tier model. This is mainly onshore, nearshore and offshore. They are trying to inject the culture for IT services. However, not all countries in the GCC are human intensive as the scale is not available. But the growth potential is immense, for instance, a country like Egypt has been able to grow in its GDP because of outsourcing. The opportunities from oil, gas, telecom and financial services are immense.”
According to Kemp, long-term contracts in outsourcing have started happening, which was not the case earlier. “Traditionally the market in the Gulf depended on buying rather than a service model. Therefore, now even companies based in the Gulf are looking at working on an outsourced model. This attitude change will raise the profile of the region.”
He also explained that although the market size is small the ICT (Information and computing technology) spend in the region would help other sectors grow. “The ICT spend in the region is the same as in the UK. Markets are flat in the UK currently and US is starting to pick up while continental Europe has picked up in offshoring.”
Khaireldin said the UAE is not human intensive, but it provides high-end financial services. “For low- and mid-level services human capital is essential along with low labour costs and incentives.”
Gulf states are looking at upgrading skills of graduates in the BPO and PIS segments. “PIS is expected to hit $3 billion (Dh11bn) by 2020 from the current $200 million in the region,” Khaireldin said.
Source: zawya.com
Posted on April 29, 2010 by Atul
Spend Matters: D&B Morphs and Grows Its Overall Supply Management and Risk Strategy Part 3. Author: Jason Busch
In the first two posts in this series (click here for Part 1 and Part 2),I covered the history and context behind D&B’s Supplier Risk Management toolset. This solution set includes supply risk content, predictive analytics and an underlying technology platform for monitoring the supplier lifecycle. In this post, I’ll provide details on the specific solution elements, and in a final installment of this series I’ll offer a peek into the data elements and categories D&B uses in predictive forecasting around supply risk. Let’s begin by covering the basics of D&B’s supply risk solution platform today.
D&B’s Supplier Risk Manager solution, which combines past elements of the Open Ratings solution with broader supplier management lifecycle capabilities, enables risk management across four broad process areas: certification, monitoring, analysis and mitigation. D&B Supplier Risk Manager further offers a set of seven modules that map to the four Supplier Lifecycle Risk Management process areas including: supplier locator / identification, certification, alerting, score-carding, supply base analysis, surveys and assessments. The toolset, while focused primarily on risk, has material overlap with supplier information management tools from AECSoft, Aravo, Ariba, CVM Solutions, Emptoris, and others. However, the predictive risk scoring and alerting within D&B Supplier Risk Manager appears to be fairly unique.
The Supplier Risk Manager Alerts module — which falls under the “monitoring” phase of the supplier lifecycle — provides real-time alerting based on changes in a variety of underlying data elements. User customization allows companies to “set thresholds on over 25 data elements,” including D&B’s Supplier Stability Indicator (SSI), designed to predict near-term “90-120 day financial and operational stability” in suppliers, as well as their Supplier Evaluation Risk (SER) rating that “predicts the likelihood that a company will obtain legal relief from creditors or cease operations without paying creditors in full over the next 12 months.” Other configurable alerts include special claims indicators (e.g., operations, liens and claims, natural disasters), EPA, OFAC and debarment indicators/OSHA incidents, supplier performance benchmarks and deviations and government control lists. In addition, the Alerting components enable companies to look at their portfolio of risk distribution based on all monitored suppliers identified by the company, showing “the risk distribution of all the suppliers on [a] watch-list compared to the benchmark.”
Outside of the alerting component, D&B provides additional core functionality, which begins to show increasing overlap with other companies (including D&B channels/competitors in the procurement and supplier information management arena, such as Ariba). For example, D&B’s Supplier Risk Manager Certification module provides a scalable means to certify and onboard suppliers in a manner that is closer to industry leaders like Aravo than to what original supplier portals looked like years ago. Specifically, the Certification component lets companies collect information from suppliers in a self-service, manage-by-exception manner. It also lets users customize questionnaires and the requested information from the suppliers, as well as upload documents (e.g., around supplier diversity, insurance certification, quality certification / metrics, etc.). Other capabilities tied to Certification (or ongoing supplier development process) include an Assessments Module that lets companies gather information, for example, on supplier lean manufacturing processes, and then conduct, in D&B’s words, “a gap analysis methodology that compares the supplier against industry best practices.”
D&B’s Supplier Risk Manager Supply Base Analysis module provides added capability to analyze different risk factors across and within the supply base — and to take mitigating steps as a result. The Supply Base Analysis module provides specific views such as risk, diversity, file analysis and corporate hierarchy. It can help companies answer questions such as: what am I buying, and what activity is taking place within a BU? Trending features help track supplier risk and spend over time and can pinpoint specific areas of focus.
Companies wishing to dive deeper into historical analysis and those that require additional sophisticated analysis should evaluate SAP Spend Performance Management; this solution enables true part / line-item level analysis tied to a variety of risk elements (e.g., inventory information, historic performance, supplier financial viability, etc.). The D&B solution does not go this far. Yet, as an extension of the alerting and supplier management capabilities of the rest of the suite, D&B’s Supplier Risk Manager Supply Base Analysis module compares favorably to other capabilities in the market outside of SAP, many of which also lack line-item level visibility tied to various risk elements for query and analysis.
Overall, D&B Supplier Risk Manager provides one of the more flexible and robust supply risk management solutions in the market when it comes to monitoring supplier financial and operational risk. While not a killer application in the broader supplier information management sector, nor a replacement for other spend analysis and analytical tools, for companies looking to gain a handle on supply risk, it should appear on the shortlist of solutions. And for some, it may suffice from a broader capability standpoint as well. Moreover, based on D&B’s agnostic approach that lets companies decide whether or not they want a buyer-funded or supplier-funded model for supply risk management and supplier monitoring, it should provide a level of flexibility that focused, software-only solutions in the sector often fail to achieve.
Posted on April 21, 2010 by Atul
Costa Rica Is an Attractive Destination for Multi-Functional OperationsPLEASANTON, Calif., April 20 /PRNewswire/ — IBM, HP, P&G, Amazon, Sykes, Emerson, Amway, Schematic and many others have decided on Costa Rica as the near-shore location for their successful Shared Services, Back-office, Engineering, Media & Entertainment, Software Development, Architecture & Design, and Contact Center operations to serve North and South America as well as the rest of the world.Bilingual labor pool. World-class education system. Cost savings. Safety. Political and economic stability. Cultural affinity. Real time collaboration… Costa Ricas comprehensive value proposition has attracted companies globally for the establishment of their strategic services centers.Join us in this webinar on May 4th, 2010, at 2 p.m. ET / 11:00 a.m. PT to obtain firsthand insights of the opportunities Costa Rica offers, from experts who have evaluated and experienced its potential.We will feature Align Technologies case study as an example of the countrys proven track record, through this industry leaders direct experience with their right-shore, multidisciplinary captive operation in Costa Rica. Ted Callaghan, Vice President & General Manager – Customer Facing Operations, will share his experiences and answer questions. Ted joined Align Technology in July 2003. He is responsible for ensuring operational excellence and continuous improvement at the Customer Facing Operations Facility in Costa Rica. Over the past 7 years Ted has built a solid operational team and has led the organization to consistently exceed the performance goals. In 2009, Ted led the successful effort to expand the operation in Costa Rica to include several customer-facing functions.We will also feature the globally renowned author, speaker and consultant, Atul Vashistha. Consulting Magazine named Atul as one of the “Top 25 Most Influential Consultants” in 2006 and “Top 6 IT Powerbrokers” in 2004. HRO Today named him a HR Outsourcing Superstar five years in a row from 2004 through 2010, and FAO Today named him a Superstar from 2007 through 2009. Atul is the Founder & CEO of Neo Advisory Formerly neoIT and Neo Group. He is also the author of the bestsellers, Outsourcing Wisdom, Globalization Wisdom and The Offshore Nation.”Despite the ongoing economic crisis, the outlook for outsourcing remains optimistic. Organizations continue to adopt outsourcing as a business strategy and an effective optimization and transformation lever to help them mitigate the current financial and competitive challenges. As a consequence of increased adoption of outsourcing, the global sourcing landscape has been undergoing changes and many global locations are evolving to serve specific needs of organizations that embark on their globalization journey or evolve as mature globalizers. Costa Rica is in an envious position and its rich talent and proven infrastructure make it an attractive destination for services operations,” says Atul Vashistha, Founder and CEO at Neo Advisory, Best Outsourcing Jobs and Neo Group.This webinar is sponsored by CINDE, the Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency.About CINDEThe Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency CINDE is a private, non-profit and apolitical organization. During its 25 years, CINDE has attracted more than 200 companies to Costa Rica, including worldwide leaders such as Intel, Western Union and many others.To register for the webinar, please go to: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/700815224″Near Shore Location: Costa Rica”Attractive Destination for Multifunctional OperationsMay 4th at 2pm ET/11am PTMedia ContactsClaudia Trujillo, +506 2201.2851, ctrujillo@cinde.orgAtul Vashistha, 415.462.0569, atul@neoadvisory.com
via CINDE & Neo Advisory to Hold a Webinar on Near Shore Destination: Costa Rica May… — PLEASANTON, Calif., April 20 /PRNewswire/ –.
Posted on April 20, 2010 by Atul
They’re back. The growth for offshore players is coming back.
We have been advising a number of firms and see growth definitely coming back for the offshore leaders. Think it’ll still be a little bumpy for the Tier 2 players but it’s back.
TCS earnings jump 47% – The Telegraph – Calcutta
Chandrasekaran in Mumbai on Monday. AFPMumbai, April 19: Tata Consultancy Services TCS — the country’s largest software exporter — today beat analyst estimates by posting a 47 per cent growth in net profits for the fourth quarter ended March 31, 2010.Net profits of the country’s largest IT service provider rose to Rs 1,931 crore compared with Rs 1,314 crore in the corresponding period in the previous year.Analysts had forecast that the company would report net profits in the region of Rs 1,800 crore.In US GAAP terms, TCS reported revenues of Rs 7,736.5 crore, higher than Rs 7,171.8 crore in the corresponding period last year.In 2009-10, net profits were placed at Rs 6,872.9 crore Rs 5,171.8 crore even as it achieved a major milestone when revenues peaked at Rs 30,028.9 crore.The sparkling results came in the face of margin pressures on account of currency movements. During the period, the rupee gained against the US dollar and other currencies. Analysts say a 1 per cent appreciation in the rupee’s value can hit margins of IT companies by 50 basis points.Addressing a press conference soon after unveiling the results, S. Mahalingam, chief financial officer and executive director of TCS, admitted that the exchange rate had a negative impact on the company’s margins.However, on a sequential basis, the company was successful in improving its margins by 51 basis points as it focused on productivity improvement even as it pared costs.N. Chandrasekaran, chief executive officer and managing director, explained that there were various reasons behind the good performance. He said all verticals and all geographies contributed to the robust performance.The company was also successful in winning large deals. For instance, a European government agency awarded it a $500-million contract and the company won another multi-year contract worth $100 million. Among the verticals, financial services, retail and life sciences led from the front, while sectors such as telecom and manufacturing lagged.Chandrasekaran, however, had a positive outlook for the months ahead. “Traction is happening across the board. Emerging markets are picking up, there is a broad-based growth across verticals. We see growth being led by the US and emerging markets, followed by the UK and Europe,” he added.Ajoy Mukherjee, vice-president and head of global human resources, said the company was raising salaries for its employees both here and overseas. The salaries of its Indian workforce had been raised by 13 per cent. He added that TCS has made 20,000 campus offers in the current fiscal.
via The Telegraph – Calcutta Kolkata | Business | TCS earnings jump 47%.
Posted on April 8, 2010 by Atul
The “A” word attrition is back | Outsource Portfolio.
The “A” word (attrition) is back in outsourcing companies
With uncertainty easing, attrition, the biggest nightmare for HR managers in IT services and outsourcing companies, is on the horizon while for some firms, it is already here. So just how are the big 3 IT services firms faring on the attrition and hiring front? Consider the following attrition rates (as of January):
- Infosys. Attrition at Infosys rose from 10.9% the last quarter to 11.6%. However, a March Wall Street Journal article quoted a CLSA Asia-Pacific report as saying that there are unconfirmed rumors that 4,000-4,200 employees have resigned at Infosys for the month of February alone – well beyond the 1,200 employees who should be resigning each month (as of December 31, Infosys had about 109,882 employees). Nevertheless, it was also noted that Infosys had the largest bench strength in the industry at almost 20,000 free resources.
- Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). Attrition at TCS has been stable at around 11.5% – although company officials expect this rate to rise. However, the Wall Street Journal noted in February that TCS will go on a hiring spree and hire up to 30,000 new employees after the next fiscal year begins on April 1. This is on top of the 11,500 planned hires for the first quarter of 2010. It was also noted that 70% of new hires for the new fiscal year will be fresh graduates and more than 2,000 employees will be recruited from outside India.
- Wipro. Wipro had an attrition rate of about 13.4% – up from an average of 8.9% over the past three quarters. Hence, the Hindu Business Line noted that they were planning a salary hike for February along with promotions to help prevent attrition from rising further while recruitment initiatives would happen on a demand basis and include a mix of campus hires and science graduates along with experienced talent. Meanwhile, the Hindu Business Line quoted Girish Paranjpe, the Joint-CEO of Wipro’s IT Services group, as saying that the company’s bench strength was around 7,500 to 8,000 on an employee base of about 103,000 while the industry bench strength standard is usually twice that.
However, another Hindu Business Line article noted that the brunt of any rise in attrition rates will likely be borne by mid-size software outsourcers who could see attrition rates reach the 15% level. Moreover and since the big players have mostly not been hiring for some time, employees with midsize firms are more likely to consider jumping to larger companies if they are offered the right opportunity.
Meanwhile, utilization rates (that is, the number of employees billed per hundred verses those who are on the bench) are also increasing at the big 3 IT services firms. According to the Hindu Business Line, utilization rates rose from 67.3% to 68.8% at Infosys, 73.6% to 77.2% at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and 70.8% to 73.2% at Wipro.
Nevertheless, as both utilization and attrition rates rise, its time for companies to once again think about long-term strategies for retaining employees. As Raman Roy, the chairman and managing director of BPO firm Quattro, noted in the Financial Express, meddling with salary and benefits is a short-term strategy (he chooses to focus on in-house training to create an efficient group of high achievers) while attrition is merely a symptom and not a disease. In other words, its the symptom of an increasingly healthier job market and economy for outsourcing.
Posted on April 2, 2010 by Atul
Is Supply Chain Mangement Emerging from the Clouds? – Feature Article – World Trade. By Mary Shacklett
By 2012, research firm IDC estimates that $7.7 billion will be spent worldwide on cloud services, but the lion’s share of it will go to ERP (enterprise resource planning) and CRM (customer relationship management) cloud services providers, not to supply chain management. Supply chain cloud solutions lag the marketplace, but there are signs now that initial enterprise trepidation about outsourcing supply chains is starting to fade.
“There are two aspects to the benefits of cloud computing models for manufacturing and logistics organizations,” says John Brand, Research Director at Hydrasight, an IT research and analysis firm. “One is to remove the internal costs associated with running your own IT infrastructure. The second is the benefit of increased visibility across organizational boundaries, particularly if a third party is involved. A decade ago, we were talking about electronic marketplaces as the future of supply chain systems (e.g., for catalogues, ordering and trading). Now, the reality is that organizations are often better served by data intermediaries who aggregate and value-add to the data that passes through the supply chain. Most often this data is anonymized or heavily obscured to ensure privacy and integrity, while giving organizations greater insight and intelligence into data, which can be reasonably shared between parties, with the right security policies and protocols in place. These ‘data hubs’ can provide very rich services beyond simple data aggregation, reporting, and analytics. In fact, when you consider what cloud-based email services can do for the control and removal of spam and viruses, cloud-based supply systems can similarly reduce the ‘noise’ within the supply chain to simplify and speed up data exchange.”
The follow-up question is, can these cloud-based supply chain management solutions address the most pressing issues that manufacturing and logistics companies are facing today?
Strategies for managing the supply chain
The recent recession saw many companies outsourcing manufacturing. This resulted in supply chains that became complexes of thousands of different suppliers around the world. With manufacturing taking place in China, Korea, and other overseas locales, supply chains began to flow not only through manufacturers and suppliers, but through customs brokers and freight forwarders as well. Simply put, more could now go wrong—given the systems and processes that track manufacturing and delivery to ensure that orders are filled “just in time” with quality goods in a period when you don’t want to overstock.
“Traditionally, there have been three paths to supply chain management and inspection,” explains Josh Green, CEO of Panjiva. “The first was not to worry about it, and to simply judge the suppliers by the results. This resulted in occasional high risks, but also in lowest prices, and was a bit of an ‘ostrich’ approach. The second approach was to have an army of people at the facilities checking every move, which is what many of the larger companies chose to do. This was a good way to keep tabs on processes and quality, but was very expensive. The third method was to outsource the process by working with a local inspection firm, which essentially was an ‘army for hire.’ The middlemen would assure that the necessary steps and procedures for manufacturing were being followed.”
Green says that if you step back and look at all three approaches, the underlying issue is really an information collaboration process. Like Hydrasight’s John Brand, Green believes that critical information can be analyzed by using cloud-based supply chains to see if cost efficiencies are being realized—instead of having to deploy local inspectors for suppliers. “Let’s take the example of shipping data,” says Green. “If you look at each of your suppliers and see what is going on with their customer relations, or if there have been sudden drops in shipments, it might be that something is going on. While this kind of data is never really a substitute for actually visiting a supplier, it can be a useful indicator.”
Cloud-based supply chain management is not going to sweep everyone in overnight, but there are some fast-moving industries moving toward adoption, like high-tech manufacturing, which operates in an extremely competitive and volatile market. In these cases, managers want as much supply chain visibility as they can get for purposes of risk management, especially after the recent economic downturn, which created more outsourcing to where fewer companies are doing their own manufacturing anymore. Cloud-based supply chain solutions give these organizations the ability to quickly scale and compete as the global economy bounces back—as well as a means to automate many standard processes while managing the exceptions more effectively.
Here are some of the current supply chain “brush fires” that companies are fighting:
Support of community collaboration. With the growth of manufacturing outsourcing, companies now have thousands of suppliers that are difficult to qualify and onboard to their internal management systems for purposes of supply chain communications and collaboration. Sometimes, Excel spreadsheets are the only immediate collaboration tools available, which leaves much of the day-to-day collaboration story untold.
Re-projecting forecast. Changes to production forecasts practically occur overnight now—especially as we are emerging from a recession where nobody knew for sure what consumers would continue to buy as they tightened their belts. Managing these fluctuating forecasts impacts everyone, because no one wants to be caught short of goods or long on inventory. This means that forecast revisions have to be shared in real-time or in near real-time with stakeholders throughout the supply chain. This is impossible to do unless you have tightly integrated systems, beginning with CRM and Demand Management and extending to ERP and supply chain management.
Workflow visibility without boundaries. Somehow, companies and their suppliers need real-time visibility and workflow automation for purchasing and inventory management, as well as for automation of order fulfillment and logistics execution. They can no longer wait for computer “batch processes” to run overnight and generate reports that they read in the morning.
What the cloud provides
There is widespread agreement that the single, most pressing issue for companies today with supply chain responsibilities is to get their arms around their burgeoning supplier networks. This is an area particularly well matched to current cloud provider strengths.
“A typical cloud supply chain solution already has all of the infrastructure in place,” says Mark Woodward, CEO of supply chain solutions provider E2open. “In our case, we have 50,000 suppliers and trading partners already in our network, so when a client comes to us, we are able to connect them to a rich community of partners almost instantaneously. This not only means that our customers are up and running more quickly, it also means they are significantly cutting down on onboarding and associated costs for both themselves and their partners.” Other supply chain cloud solution providers have similar supplier repositories, which means that company processes for supplier qualification and setup for supply chain communications and collaboration are dramatically reduced in both time and expense.
Perhaps the most pivotal question for companies seeking the cloud, however, is the degree of integration they and their systems require with their supplier bases. There are two fundamental cloud computing approaches to be considered: either a Web portal that provides real-time communications and collaboration capability between companies and their suppliers, or a fully integrated business-to-business (B2B) solution that not only provides real-time communications and collaborations between all parties, but that also performs transaction processing and data base updates in real-time.
For example, if you use a cloud-based supply chain solution as a kind of Web portal that allows you to readily exchange information and to collaborate with your supplier bases on day-to-day issues, all you might need is deployment (which the vendor provides, coordinating with your IT department), training and optimization—again provided by the vendor, who presents best usage practices. “Our goal is to build tools so simple that training isn’t really required,” says Panjiva’s Green. “For example, you don’t talk about needing to get trained in order to use Google. The key is building tools that are flexible enough to bend to how people are doing the business, and not the other way around. Complication has been a major reason why technologies have failed in the past.”
On the other hand, there are also organizations with heavy B2B integration needs for their supply chains. Building integration on this level takes time, whether you are approaching the project internally or with a cloud-based supply chain provider.
“Enterprises with large supplier communities require a robust B2B integration platform that accounts for the wide variety of operating environments and technical sophistication of their suppliers,” says Peter Scott, Vice President of Supply Chain Solutions for Exostar, which provides cloud-based supply chain services. “Implementing and maintaining such a platform, however, can be a cost and resource challenge….Over time, this is why we are seeing more companies opt for this integrated, business-to-business cloud-based framework.”
John Brand of Hydrasight says he has witnessed a range of supply chain deployment styles and timeframes, depending on the solution deployed, the expectations from business users, and the depth of integration required by clients. Brand’s research shows that for discrete applications like portalized supply chain management, organizations can be up and running in weeks, if not days. But for more complex, large scale and highly integrated projects, this timeline can grow from several months to years.
“The biggest obstacles are usually inflated expectations for business users, obstructionary IT departments, and poor alignment in IT infrastructure,” said Brand. “Getting the balance right between the level of investment required to onboard into cloud-based services and the execution of a migration and management plan is still a significant challenge.”
Cloud-based supply chains and enterprise IT
How equipped are enterprise IT departments to work with cloud-based supply chain management?
There are industry experts who view IT as a “sticking point” for cloud services in general, and for cloud-based supply chain management in particular—but there are reasons.
First, nearly all cloud-based services are introduced into companies by end business groups, but it is ultimately IT that is charged with the risk management for the business relationships; the setup, monitoring and execution of SLAs (service level agreements) with the cloud services providers to ensure that corporate business interests are met; and the responsibility of meeting security and compliance standards that are demanded by outside auditors and regulatory agencies. It is understandable that IT becomes naturally nervous when faced with the prospect of outsourcing operations, and losing control for what it remains responsible for. “There is always an impact when you bring in a new system,” says e2open’s Mark Woodward. “People have processes that they want to keep. The challenge is to be flexible enough to support those processes, while providing them with the ability to scale effectively.”
In some cases, enterprises opt to keep those processes. They do this by running their supply chain management systems internally, and by chartering IT with the task of testing new suppliers and maintaining both the supplier data base and the system. “These companies put up their own supply chain portals for vendors and business partners and use their IT departments to implement the portals and support them,” explains Exostar’s Scott.
Scott says that there are advantages in skills and expertise that cloud-based providers can offer IT. “Let’s say IT can create a portal,” says Scott. “Now, how do you get 500 to 5,000 business partners to connect? A cloud-based supply chain solution brings instant connectivity to a common body of suppliers and partners, which is why you find many cloud-based providers coalescing around certain industry groups like aerospace, finance, or retail. When we talk to a new customer that wants supply chain collaboration, we’ll already have 50 to 75 percent of the suppliers the customer uses enabled on our network. This takes the risks, costs, and time to implement way down so that it’s not just adding technology anymore.”
A second aspect to any portal is support—an area for which supply chain cloud providers have professionally trained call centers and subject matter experts on staff. With a supply chain cloud services partner, IT can leverage this knowledge when suppliers come calling with questions, since the customer service demands of outside customers are considerably greater than the demands IT technicians typically experience while dealing with business users within the enterprise.
“Overall, we see the market starting to change,” notes Woodward. “More and more, CIOs and their teams are beginning to think about cloud-based supply chain management as a competitive requirement. It’s simply no longer possible to run a globally integrated supply chain with traditional ERP and internal systems alone, and leading companies are starting to realize that.”
The next steps
Although companies have not moved as aggressively into cloud-based supply chain management as they have into other cloud solutions, they are nonetheless moving forward because cloud-based supply chain solutions can improve their competitive advantage. In particular, supply chain in the cloud is being adopted in industries like financial services, retail, high technology, groceries, and pharmaceuticals—with enterprises in North America and Europe making aggressive entries into cloud and spreading adoption into Asia as a result, since 75 percent of the supplier connections are there.
As this shift occurs, emphasis is turning to SLAs for cloud-based vendors that address enterprise concerns, like 99.5 percent minimum uptime, pre-scheduled times for system maintenance and installations of new software releases, warranties on data protection and security, and in some cases, caged servers in data centers that are only used for a specific enterprise client, with admission to those cages granted only to cloud provider technicians who have been authorized to work on those servers by the enterprise client.
Understanding that the key to the cloud is a large base of qualified suppliers, cloud supply chain management providers have also made it easy for suppliers to join their networks. It doesn’t cost 70 to 80 percent of suppliers anything to be implemented today on a cloud-based supply system. Those who actively engage in collaboration might see a fee of $2,000 per year, and those who are active B2B partners might see a $10,000 annual cost, but relatively speaking, it is inexpensive for suppliers to take part in cloud-based supply chains. wt
Mary Shacklett is founder and president of Transworld Data based in Olympia, Washington.
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Posted on April 2, 2010 by Atul
Source: Huffington Post
Eric Ehrmann: Big Broadband Brazil.
With election season underway president Lula’s program expanding Brazil’s Internet infrastructure has gained credibility across the political spectrum. Regardless of who wins the presidency in October the program helps government and the private sector work faster and smarter. Grabbing first mover advantage among G-20 nations, Big Broadband Brazil is providing high speed backbone for all types of business processes, creating jobs, and securing Brazil’s future as an economic and agricultural power.
Lula’s strategy, which has seen Brazil’s internet population increase from 8 million to 60 million since taking office in 2003, was designed to attract international capital to complement local business and state investments. But it isn’t linked to Davos-style globalism, which seeks to roll back the influence of the state and the social contracts between governments and people in the name of “free markets” and the US notion of “Internet democracy.” Regardless of how much good advocates say this model offers, it’s the same laissez-faire paradigm that caused the current economic crisis .
Lula’s plan is working because it features the nation-state as the dealmaker, not the lap dog the Davos crowd prefers. Brazil respects state and free market players, acknowledges their differences and creates space for them to co-exist and compete.
On the broadband front, the government of Brazil plans to generate public and private investments totaling $14.9 billion and add upwards of 30 million fixed lines to the national Internet infrastructure by 2014.
Carlos Slim of Mexico, who already controls Claro Telecom in Brazil, is considering a $10 billion investment in the mobile market that could help the government reach its goal of generating 60 million new connections in the next four years.
Brazil’s strategic ally in Europe, France, is rolling out a 4.5 billion Euro bond issue to finance the first big upgrade in its national broadband infrastructure. Private investors and broadband providers are expected to put up matching funds, with the goal of providing 70 percent of the French internet population with access to 100 mbps by 2019. Currently 94% are ADSL subscribers.
Lula’s vision is having a game-changing effect, with Brazil hosting conferences headlining major players who formerly preferred Northern Hemisphere venues to promote and discuss investing in the future of the Web.
The Financial Times of London and Valor Economica, a major Brazilian business newspaper, are hosting an infrastructure summit May 10-11 Rio. And US internet consulting firm Gartner Research is featuring Brasscom, the Brazilian Association of Internet and Communication Companies as part of its 2010 Summit in Sao Paulo and Rio June 8-10 that will discuss Brazil’s expanding role as a provider of Internet back office operations in the Americas.
Brasscom has also taken the lead reaching out to counterpart national information technology (IT) associations in Russia (Russoft) and China (CCIIP) and companies like Intel and SAP to coordinate planning and development of new infrastructure, software and education initiatives. The resulting baseline will provide a common focus for the BRIC nations in the new knowledge based economy, promote job creation and ramp up best approaches for servicing the projected billion users in the world’s largest mobile market.
In Washington meanwhile, cognitive dissonance between Team Obama, major internet industry players, financiers and K Street lobbyists makes crafting a national internet policy problematic.
A recently released 360 page FCC report on bandwidth to support the growing knowledge economy has less to do with projecting the US leadership than created the Internet than with supporting the online entertainment industry that helped put president Obama in office. Slate Magazine recently characterized the US broadband network as being “crummy.”
China is making tremendous investment in its broadband infrastructure. But the culture of complaint fostered by Google’s Cold War-style brinkmanship overlooks the fact that China needs to weave Chinese style “Internet democracy” into its social fabric at its its own pace in order to avoid domestic political developments that would not bode well for the United States.
This classic debate between state power and US-based globalism reveals that the speed at which China can monetize the potential of the world’s largest digital economy will never be fast enough for Google’s Eric Schmidt and others who want to convert their prospective China footprints into a bankable asset that could loosen up money in today’s tight credit market.
Government infrastructures historically have been tagged by international media for setting prices in telecom and internet markets. But Lula, who globalist pundits and NGOs chide for his Workers Party “leftist” orientation, went outside the box and brought competition into the mix. While Lula’s government hoped for the best, the result has been rate creep by private telecoms and internet service providers that has burned Brazilian consumers.
A study by Anatel, the national telecommunications oversight agency, has found that private broadband operators have been manipulating prices and not offering speeds as advertised. Brazil’s Supreme Court recently handed down a decision that in the end will likely penalize those companies. And Bloomberg is reporting that the Lula government is revitalizing state-controlled Telbras to organize an $11 billion public-private partnership and launch a broadband plan that will cost Brazilians between about $17 (30 Reals) per month, less than half of what most pay now.
On the eve of the dot com bubble the US represented 66 percent of the world internet population. Today, it represents just 15 percent and growth in North America is flat. In South America, internet growth is vibrant and Big Bandwidth Brazil is a reminder of why strong government oversight is necessary to mediate the interests of globalist telecoms and internet industries.
