DCC July Select Series by Bhupinder Sharma

S E L ECT

VOL 02 | ISSUE 17 JULY 2010 | RS. 50 A 9.9 MEDIA PUBLICATION

S E R IES

N E R X U T O Y M

D L O G

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ativ CRM, BI, SCM or Collaboration. D are â&#x20AC;&#x201C; r c u l ig into it ERP, pecial and d S s Software s e n i s u our B

Growing Again

Cloud and niche applications will drive demand for ERP PAGE 12

iscover it fo r yours elf

Interact to Succeed

Why a CRM solution makes sense more than ever PAGE 26

Smarten IT Up

How business intelliegence can make an enterprise smart PAGE 16

The Soft Side T sanjay.gupta@9dot9.in

More and more companies must use multiple software tools for the next level of growth

he picture of the Indian IT channel industry is incomplete without the story on the other side of hardware – software. Yet, when we hear the term ‘channels’, the image that invariably comes to our mind is one involving systems, components, motherboards and other ‘hard’ stuff. Why should that be so? Habit, I think. Excessive and continuous consumption – even if it is the consumption of a concept or idea – is habit-forming. And we have virtually grown up on the idea that the channel guys are those who push boxes rather than pull code. While this is largely true, it’s not the whole truth. For there are hundreds, if not thousands, of vendorcertified software channel partners all over India doing brisk business. I say brisk because, increasingly, businesses large and small need a huge amount of help in preparing themselves for the next phase of growth. Whether it is their own enterprise-wide operations, relationships with customers and suppliers or e-mailing and collaboration requirements, they must implement and use multiple software tools. Tools that can transform them from clunky companies to energetic enterprises – and thus enable them to not only scale their business faster but also compete with the best better. And if you think that this market is already dominated by the SAPs and Oracles of the world and their few premium partners, that’s no longer true.

Beyond large enterprises (whom they serve), there are millions of micro, small and medium organisations that are set to spend big time on software and services. As per research firm AMI-Partners, only 1.46 million of India’s 4.03 million SMBs (companies with up to 999 employees) use computers. While the hardware opportunity is immediately appreciated, one often overlooks the more ‘profitable’ prospect of selling and implementing a plethora of software – from ERP and SCM to BI and CRM. At present, the 1.46 million SMBs that do have PCs spend only 8% of their total IT expenditure on software and 12% on IT services. However, as all these SMBs go beyond the basic functions of invoicing and accounting, both these spends will grow significantly in proportion. How significantly will depend entirely on the opportunity mapping, concept selling and implementation skills of channel partners. We do hope our special editorial package this fortnight helps you identify and tap into the soft money spinners.

SANJAY GUPTA Editor Digit Channel Connect

sounding board sounding board S E L ECT

VOL 02 | ISSUE 17 AUGUST 2010 | RS. 50 A 9.9 MEDIA PUBLICATION

Ranjan Chopra, CEO, Team Computers: “One factor driving the growth of CRM in India is the need for organisations to optimise marketing spend and deliver offerings in a more defined manner.”

Kamal Vohra, Lead Analyst, Software and Services Research, IDC India: “The introduction of cloud-based ERM applications is expected to see good traction with the India SMB enterprise segment in the years ahead.”

Sanjay Mehta, CEO, MAIA Intelligence: “Presently, the demand for business intelligence solutions is largely being driven by MNCs and large enterprises. BI solutions seem to have gained more acceptance and significance in retail where customers play a pivotal role in the future of the company.”

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EXT YOUR N M

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C e business opportunities in softw are M or Colla ativ lucr it ERP, CRM, BI, SCpecial and d boration. Dig into – be iness Software us our B

Growing Again

Cloud and niche applications will drive demand for ERP PAGE 12

iscover it fo r yours elf

Interact to Succeed

Why a CRM solution makes sense more than ever PAGE 26

Smarten IT Up

A business intelliegence solution can help enterprises simplify data PAGE 16

Write to the Editor E-mail: editor@digitchannelconnect.com Snail Mail: The Editor, Digit Channel Connect, B-118, Sector 2, Noida 201301

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

contents

S ELECT

VOL 02 | ISSUE 17 AUGUST 2010 | RS. 50 A 9.9 MEDIA PUBLICATION

SERIES VOL 02 ISSUE 17 | JULY 2010 Managing Director: Dr Pramath Raj Sinha Printer & Publisher: Kanak Ghosh EDITORIAL Editor: Sanjay Gupta Copy Editor: Akshay Kapoor Sr. Correspondents: Charu Khera (Delhi), Payal Pruthi (Bengaluru) DESIGN Sr. Creative Director: Jayan K Narayanan Art Director: Binesh Sreedharan Associate Art Director: Anil VK Manager Design: Chander Shekhar Sr. Visualisers: PC Anoop, Santosh Kushwaha Sr. Designers: Prasanth TR & Anil T Photographer: Jiten Gandhi

N E R X U T O Y M

D L O G

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BRAND COMMUNICATION Product Manager: Ankur Agarwal SALES & MARKETING VP Sales & Marketing: Navin Chand Singh National Manager - Events and Special Projects: Mahantesh Godi (09880436623) Business Manager (Engagement Platforms) Arvind Ambo (09819904050) National Manager - Channels: Krishnadas Kurup (09322971866) Asst. Brand Manager: Arpita Ganguli Asst. Manager - Scheduling: Kishan Singh Bangalore & Chennai: Vinodh K (09740714817) Delhi: Pranav Saran (09312685289) Kolkata: Jayanta Bhattacharya (09331829284) Mumbai: Sachin Mhashilkar (09920348755)

ry to populoarrtubelief, there are a r t n nities in so Co business opp ft

ware M or Colla ative lucr it ERP, CRM, BI, SCpecial and d boration. Dig into â&#x20AC;&#x201C; iscover it fo r yours elf

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PRODUCTION & LOGISTICS Sr. GM Operations: Shivshankar M Hiremath Production Executive: Vilas Mhatre Logistics: MP Singh, Mohd. Ansari, Shashi Shekhar Singh

THE PROCESS-ORIENTED ORGANISATION

A business intelligence solution can help enterprises simplify data and make better Interact to Succeed decisions Smarten IT Up

The process oriented Growing Again organisation fully recognizCloud and niche applications will es business and IT potendrive demand for ERP PAGE 12 tial and leverages them for economic success

Why a CRM solution makes sense more than ever PAGE 26

With a bad year behind it, the industry is hopeful of cloud-based solutions and niche applications driving demand among SMBs

UP THE 14 MOVING SUPPLY CHAIN

A business intelliegence solution can help enterprises simplify data PAGE 16

EDITORIAL.......................................................... 02 TRENDS.............................................................. 07 COLLABORATION............................................... 18 CHANNEL CHAMPS............................................ 20 SCM................................................................... 22 RETHINKING RELATIONS.................................... 24 CRM................................................................... 26 VENDOR SPEAK................................................. 28

advertisers index Udyog Software.................................... Inside Front Cover K7 Computing........................................Inside Back Cover Iomega............................................................Back Cover Stellar.............................................................................1

As companies look at cutting costs and optimizing efficiency, supply chain management solutions are poised to play a strategic role and witness an increased adoption in the future

CHANNEL CHAMPS Sr Co-ordinator - Events: Rakesh Sequeira Events Executives: Pramod Jadhav, Johnson Noronha Audience Dev. Executive: Aparna Bobhate, Shilpa Surve OFFICE ADDRESS

OTHERS

GROWING AGAIN

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

SMARTEN IT UP

Supertron...................................................................3,25

Nine Dot Nine Interactive Pvt Ltd., KPT House, Plot 41/13, Sector 30, Vashi, Navi Mumbai - 400 703 Phone: 40789666 Fax: 022-40789540, 022-40789640 Printed and published by Kanak Ghosh for Nine Dot Nine Interactive Pvt Ltd. C/O KPT House, Plot 41/13, Sector 30, Vashi (Near Sanpada Railway Station), Navi Mumbai 400703 Editor: Anuradha Das Mathur C/O KPT House, Plot 41/13, Sector 30, Vashi (Near Sanpada Railway Station), Navi Mumbai 400703 Printed at Silverpoint Press Pvt. Ltd, TTC Ind. Area, Plot No. : A - 403, MIDC, Mahape, Navi Mumbai - 400709

Vizeum...........................................................................5 Emerson..................................................................7,9,11 Busy Infotech................................................................21 AIESEC..........................................................................23

JULY 2010

COVER DESIGN: ANOOP P C

BUSINESS SOFTWARE business process management SPECIAL

The

PROCESS ORIENTED

Organisation The process oriented organisation fully recognizes business and IT potential and leverages them for economic success IVO TOTEV

ompanies in dynamic markets are increasingly faced with the question of whether to implement IT applications once and run them for many years, or to adapt processes to respond to constantly changing conditions. This dilemma gets to the heart of the current lack of collaboration between IT and business strategies. But, current trends indicate that collaboration is near, as process innovations are set to become the strategic driver of IT transformation. At first glance, many industries seem stable with respect to their particular business models and IT-based implementations. This stability legitimizes a relatively static interpretation of IT’s role in business development. Achieving greater flexibility (and thus market success) is often not considered high priority. But an industry cannot truly remain stable and non-dynamic for the long term. Utility companies are an excellent example. With stable business models and no real competition, they were previously not driven by the market. Nevertheless, they assumed that IT should be designed based on standards and system neutrality. This sector’s IT may have been highly complex and heterogeneous in the beginning, but it was soon transformed into a uniform,

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

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homogenous IT landscape. Spurred by government deregulation, utility companies have increasingly begun implementing more flexible business models driven by innovation and competition. In addition to pure product innovations, such as green electricity, an increasing number of process innovations, like smart metering, are dotting the radar screen that allow utilities to respond to new regulatory requirements. We see this at the business, organisational and, above all, IT-implementation level. A number of utility companies do not even produce electricity, operate power grids or run distribution boxes themselves. This type of energy provider would rather concentrate on offering customers individualised product packages that are highly customized per usage patterns. But, usage patterns, particularly in commercial settings, have short lifecycles due to their very dynamic nature. Therefore, establishing innovative and flexible processes is vital. Business processes are not just the documentation of transactions in an organisation or of activities which are reflected in applications. Modern-day process automation and monitoring methods offer more. They support a transformation strategy that begins by describing processes consistently and comprehensively. Understanding processes and their interplay through-

IVO TOTEV

UNDERSTANDING PROCESSES AND THEIR INTERPLAY THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE ORGANISATION PAVES THE WAY FROM PROCESS INNOVATION TO DYNAMIC IT TRANSFORMATION Spurred by government deregulation, utility companies have increasingly begun implementing more flexible business models driven by innovation and competition.

out the entire organisation paves the way from process innovation to dynamic IT transformation. Processes are nowadays assessed according to criteria such as flexibility and agility. The important thing here is to keep costs in proportion to benefits. An awareness of the extent of process automation on the part of IT staff and specialist departments is necessary for successfully executing this type of transformation. When IT is considered an instrument for automating functions, it is difficult to establish an understanding of the relationship between enterprise processes and IT processes. The best way to approach this is by starting off on a small scale. Start with one minor process to illustrate how rapidly IT systems can respond to new process requirements and how this opens up new possibilities. Then, define a new joint strategy that addresses and achieves cost control and flexibility at the same time. If IT strategies are designed as an afterthought to the needs of the overall corporate strategy, the entire enterprise will suffer. End-to-end business processes are addressing this lack of collaboration and becoming an integral part of successful corporate cultures. Organisations need approaches which address problems and embrace opportunities while they are emerging. The process oriented organisation fully recognizes business and IT potential and leverages them for economic success. n Ivo Totev is a member of Software AG’s Executive Board with responsibility for Global Consulting Services.

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CIOs should be ready for second global recession: Gartner

ccording to a new report by Gartner, in 2008, most CIOs were forgiven for being unprepared to deal with the global recession, but if another recession unfolds in the next 12 to 18 months, no CIO will be forgiven for being unprepared a second time. In May 2010, investor doubts about the health of the global economy returned to the world’s capital markets with a vengeance. The possibility of nations defaulting on repaying massive loans, high unemployment rates, depressed housing prices, limited access to consumer and business credit, a growing belief that a sustained economic recovery may not be possible this year, and an array of other factors have all combined to shake investor confidence to its core. As these and other factors were unfolding, many economists were still maintaining that 2010 and beyond would be a period of modest recovery and growth. Because so much uncertainty exists about the sustainability of the current recovery, CIOs should confront such uncertainty with clear and decisive action. They should augment

current near-term plans by preparing for a second recession. “Just the potential for a second business downturn should be sufficient to compel CIOs to plan for another business downturn,” said Ken McGee, Vice President and Gartner fellow. “However, most CIOs will not have a response strategy prepared if a second business downturn occurs,” he added. McGee said that CIOs today are uniquely placed to tackle a second economic downturn, if they plan accordingly. “As questions, or even doubts, grow about the ability for economies to recover, CIOs in 2010 have one advantage over their predecessors. For the first time in the history of the IT industry, more than 90% of CIOs today possess extremely recent and practical experience dealing with a recession,” McGee said. “In light of this fact, we strongly urge these recession-hardened CIOs to leverage their recently acquired and economic battle-scarred experiences by proactively preparing their entire enterprises should another economic downturn occur within the next 12 to 18 months,” he added. n

Logitech announces its Laptop Speaker Z205

ogitech has announced its Laptop Speaker Z205 — a lightweight speaker with an easy-to-attach clip-on design. According to Subrotah Biswas, Country Manager- India & South West Asia, “When designing the Logitech Laptop Speaker Z205, we wanted to help people get better audio while enjoying their favorite shows or music without sacrificing portability. The Laptop Speaker Z205 is tiny enough to toss in your bag, but delivers big sound.” The Laptop Speaker Z205 is small — approximately 1.35 inches thick and 2.5 inches tall — which makes it quite portable. The included carrying case protects the speaker while inside the user’s briefcase or backpack. The speaker features two high-performance drivers, a built-in amplifier and an acoustically tuned enclosure. The user can easily adjust the volume as well as turn the speaker on and off using the buttons located on the top of the speaker. The Logitech Laptop Speaker Z205 is expected to be available in India from July 2010 onwards for a suggested retail price of Rs 2195. n

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Channel upbeat about Dell moving to top slot

he channel community has hailed Dell India’s move to the leadership position, beating HP, which was at the top slot in the laptop and PC market in India since the last five years. According to recent figures from Gartner, Dell India sold 2.35 lakh notebooks and around 1.18 lakh desktops to add up to a total number of 3.53 lakh PCs in the June quarter as compared to 3.31 lakh PCs by HP, comprising of 1.79 lakh notebook units and 1.52 lakh desktops during the same period. Recently, research firm IDC had also noted that HP fell behind Dell in the notebook sales department. Meanwhile, the channel community has welcomed the news, citing various reasons for HP’s slip from the top slot. According to Amit Saraf, Proprietor - Wian Solutions , HP is slowly

ZyXEL unveils new NBG 460N wireless Gigabit router

yXEL Communications has unveiled a new NBG 460N wireless Gigabit router in India. It delivers a solution for speed and coverage which is compliant with the latest 802.11n technology. This wireless N Gigabit router is inbuilt with features which enable the device to save power and reduce wireless radiation by configuring to fit in the needs. It also supports IPSec VPN (Virtual Private Network) which ensures secure transmission between two sites, eliminating the necessity for expensive leased lines enabling global interconnectivity at minimal expense. According to Pinaki Chatterjee, Executive Director-Technical, ZyXEL Technologies India, “This router not only delivers high speed connection, but also consumes less power due to its energy saving features,” said. Priced at Rs. 13500, the product will be available at all its authorized distributors. n

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

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losing its touch when it comes to quality products and the channel partners. “Till last year, I was recommending HP to all my customers. It was the first choice, but now, it’s not the same. HP stopped giving extension on warranty, and every week, we have two laptops coming back to us with some chip defect. Both on the quality front and with its relations with partners, HP seems to have failed,” says Saraf. Chetan Kumar, Proprietor, Digitech Electro World, blames the change of policies at HP’s end for the downturn. “The new management at HP tried to ape Dell’s model of appointing regional distributors for its personal systems group and did away with their national distributors. In doing so, they have appointed a lot of mobility distributors for selling notebooks who have no

special expertise as IT partners. The telecom distribution model has not worked for HP,” says Kumar. Chidananda D, General Manager, Marketing, Sogo Computers, views Dell as a promising brand. “We are considering reviving our relationship with the company in the laptop segment,” says Chidananda. Meanwhile, Dell authorities refused to comment on the development. “We haven’t received the official report and the figures, and will therefore not comment on anything speculative,” says Minari Shah, Head, Dell Corporate Communications APJ. In India, Dell now has a market share of 14.3% in the overall PC market last quarter. n Payal Pruthi

CMDA Pune to promote Octroi paid material

he IT dealers association in Pune - Computer and Media Dealers Association (CMDA) have been protesting against the proposed move by Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to privatise Octroi collection in the city. Octroi is a local tax collected on various articles brought into a district for consumption. Apart from CMDA Pune, the Poona Merchants Chamber has also opposed the move by PMC. Sharing details about the plan of action by CMDA Pune, Yogesh Godbole, Secretary, CMDA Pune said, “A few computer dealers in Pune were questioned by the Octroi department recently. CMDA Pune has initiated a multi-level strong action plan to sort out the matter. After the incidence, CMDA called an urgent meeting of all members and laid down the action plan. A sub-committee has been appointed to address the issue on top priority. Even though majority of vendors are giving Octroi paid material, as per the Octroi department, there is big Octroi evasion in computer goods. CMDA Pune, on its own, is collecting Octroi data from the vendors as well as distributors to make strong representation to Pune Municipal Corporation.” Recently, CMDA Pune also passed a resolution that all its members will only bill Octroi-paid products from distributors and vendors. The association has also initiated a communication process with the vendors as well as the distributors and all are ready to co-operate to support the cause. CMDA Pune has been making constant efforts to make companies like HP, Lenovo, Sony, Canon, Samsung, etc to deliver Octroi paid material in Pune, which has in turn increased the Octroi collection of the PMC. “All members have pledged to do business in Octroi paid material only. Also, many distributors agreed that they will bill Octroi paid material only,” said Godbole. As per the sources in the Pune Municipal Corporation, the corporation needs money for infrastructure development and Octroi could be a major source of revenue for them and its privatisation will further boost its collection. As per sources, CMDA Pune also plans to take strong action against vendors who are not giving Octroi paid material in Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad corporation area. “CMDA Pune has always promoted fair trade practices and supported ethical business practice and the association will take strong action against dealers who are evading Octroi,” shared Godbole. CMDA Pune has also recently concluded its Annual General Meeting (AGM) and has elected a new committee for the year 2010-2011. Shashikant Satbhai has been elected as the President, Hemant Naik as the Vice-President, Yogesh Godbole is the new Secretary, Sanjay Adhav as the Treasurer, Jayant Shete and Bharat Gopujkar as the Joint Secretary and Joint Treasurer respectively, Ratnesh Rathi, Deepak Agarwal, Rahul Meher, Rajendra Pawar, Aniruddha Menavlikar, Mayuresh Sovani and Chintamani Lele as the committee members. n Charu Khera

S E L E C T

Pawan Khurana appointed CEO of QuantM Net Technologies

uantM Net Technologies has announced that it has appointed Pawan Khurana as its Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Pawan succeeds current CEO and QuantM’s founder Sanjay Bakshi, who will continue to drive the company’s leadership as Managing Director. Khurana will also join QuantM’s Board of Directors. “As the global economy recovers, organizations face new growth opportunities and many will need to make strategic investments in their IT to help them bring new products and services to the market,” said Sanjay Bakshi, MD QuantM. “We decided it needed greater focus on effective execution, Pawan Khurana revenue growth, and improved profitability, and felt it was the right time to have a new leader,” he added. During his 15 years of experience, Khurana held a number of leadership roles including General Manager - Services at IBM, where he was responsible for services channel business in India and South Asia. Prior to IBM, Pawan served Trend Micro as Regional Manager – India North & East. n

Gigabyte to revamp its channel structure

trends

S E R I E S

igabyte Technologies has announced that it will soon be launching a 2 teir channel structure for its partners in the country. This will be announced with the ‘Q3 Chanel Incentive Programme’. The structure will be launched for partners in Maharashtra, Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Bihar, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. By making this move, Gigabyte wants to expand the channel network in these regions and establish a wider customer base in the upcountry market. As per the company, the 2 tier structure will be introduced mainly to encourage value partners who have been reaching targets to be promoted as premium partners. According to Rajan Sharma, GM, Gigabyte India, “Many of our value partners who have doing well over last 3-4 years will be promoted as ‘Premium Partner’; this will help increase sales of our premium partners and help increase business volume. We will be initiating a string of interesting schemes for our channel to encourage them and engage with them on a continuous basis”. “We will focus on expanding the market by expanding our channel network by recruiting more partners in unrepresented areas”, he added. n

Indians demand seamless and personalised experience: Survey

CR Corporation has revealed the results of a new survey which shows that 91% of Indian consumers are more likely to opt for retail, financial services or travel companies which offer them greater control over where, when and how they interact across a range of channels — including social media and smart phones. The findings show that Indian consumers today are demanding more seamless and personalized experience across multiple self-service technologies. An overwhelming 88% of Indians surveyed said they are more likely to choose retailers that enable them to interact via their preferred combination of online, mobile and in-store self-service channels. Beyond this, 94% of those surveyed said organisations need to do more to ensure their social media activities are properly integrated with these channels. 64% of Indian respondents strongly believe it’s important to be able to access consistent information on product and services through their preferred combination of online, mobile or in-store self-service channels. Moreover, 45% of Indian respondents research financial products online while 40% access social networking sites such as Facebook or Twitter to seek financial product recommendations or peer opinions. Around 66% of respondents believe they would like to be able to personalize the way they access online, ATM, call center channels and improve the speed and efficiency of the service. When travelling, 78% of Indians want airlines & airports to offer kiosks, web or mobile technology to enable them to review and select flight options in the event of a delay. hotel reservations. n

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trends

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S E R I E S

Worldwide PC shipments increased 21% in Q2 2010

orldwide PC shipments reached 82.9 million units in the second quarter of 2010, a 20.7 percent increase from the second quarter of 2009, according to preliminary results by Gartner. These second quarter results were slightly above Gartner’s earlier market outlook. Gartner had expected second quarter PC shipments to grow 19.3 percent. “The preliminary second quarter results indicate ongoing improvement of the PC market, and it marks the third consecutive quarter of double-digit growth on a year-overyear basis,” said Mikako Kitagawa, Principal Analyst at Gartner. “End-user spending grew approximately 13 percent in the second quarter. Average selling prices (ASPs) continue to decline, but at a much slower rate compared with the last two years,” she added. “Mini-notebook shipment growth slowed significantly in the second quarter of 2010,” Kitagawa said. “Mini-notebook shipment growth still exceeded growth rates of the overall mobile PC market, but mini-notebook

growth slowed to the low 20 percent range compared with more than 70 percent in the last two quarters. This slowdown indicates that mini-notebooks are entering a mature growth stage,” she added. HP maintained its worldwide lead in PC shipments, but its growth rate was below the industry average as the company tried to protect margins in key regions. Acer continued to record strong shipment growth worldwide, fueled by solid PC sales in EMEA and Asia/ Pacific. Dell registered its second consecutive quarter of double-digit growth. Lenovo’s PC shipments increased 47.2 percent in the second quarter of 2010. Asus had the strongest growth rate among the top five vendors worldwide in the second quarter, as its shipments increased 78.5 percent. In the U.S., PC shipments surpassed 17.9 million units in the second quarter of 2010, a 16 percent increase from the same period last year. The professional PC market received a boost from the PC refresh cycle. The professional PC market growth was driven by

healthy seasonal demand from the public sector despite the budget deficit issues. Small and midsize businesses (SMBs), as well as large enterprises, are expected to ramp up in the second half of 2010. In the second quarter of 2010, PC shipments in EMEA totaled 24 million units, an increase of 21.6 percent, signaling continued strength of the EMEA PC market despite uncertain economic conditions. Central Europe was the fastest-growing segment, driven by strong demand from Russia as the country recovers after the dramatic downturn in 2009, followed by Western Europe and the Middle East and Africa. In Asia/Pacific, PC shipments surpassed 27.8 million units, up 25.4 percent from the second quarter of 2009. Markets in the region were off to a slow start in the quarter with news of economic uncertainties in Europe due to the credit crisis. However, the impact was limited, and market sentiment improved, releasing pent-up demand for PCs from late May onward. n

HP unveils redesigned portfolio of notebook PCs

Inspan announces tie-up with Quick Heal

nspan Infotech has announced its tie up with Quick Heal, as part of which Inspan will distribute the entire range of products from Quick Heal. Inspan plans to focus on south India to start with and concentrate on the entire range of products from Quick Heal that addresses the single to multiple user licenses for PC security. Inspan plans to increase the geographical reach over next two quarters. According to Sudhir S, Managing Director of Inspan Infotech, “We had made a promise to our partners in the previous quarter that we would be enabling them beyond the hardware components. This partnership with Quick Heal is the right choice for expansion of the product portfolio without losing the focus on the customer segment that Inspan and their partners cater to.” n

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ewlett-Packard (HP) India has unveiled a redesigned portfolio of HP Pavilion notebook PCs. As per the company, the new range has distinctive design elements, new materials, improved performance and enhanced experiences. The new portfolio includes thin and light HP Pavilion dm4 and HP Pavilion dv6 PC created by HP’s design team. The new range is equipped with easy-to-use

features for improved usability that enables users to see, hear, and touch the latest in computing experiences, according to the company. The portfolio features Dolby advanced audio and SRS audio, High Definition (HD) LED BrightView Screen, HP TrueVision HD Webcam, ATI Radeon Discrete Graphics with DirectX 11 capabilities, an intuitive touchscreen, and an aluminium chassis. n

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Global SCM software market contracted by 0.7% in 2009

orldwide Supply Chain Management (SCM) software revenue totaled $6.2 billion in 2009, a 0.7 percent decline from 2008 revenue, according to Gartner. New license revenue was down 7.4 percent in 2009, while recurring revenue associated with subscriptions and maintenance were the “life vest” of the market, growing 10.8 percent and 0.2 percent, respectively. “Despite the slight dip in overall revenue, the market for supply chain applications seems to have largely weathered the recent financial storms,” said Chad Eschinger, Research Director at Gartner. “Although the first

nine months of 2009 contracted, the fourth quarter sustained 6 percent annual growth, driven by some pent-up demand, but more so from growth in subscriptions and the many maintenance renewals that were due in the fourth quarter,” he added. N e w s o f t wa r e s a l e s we r e difficult to obtain in 2009, and vendors that have succeeded have transitioned part or all of their business toward subscription delivery of their solutions. This was evident within the top six vendors, where Ariba generated positive growth, but also where Oracle, with more of a best-of-breed approach, also generated slight growth. The

remaining four market share leaders all experienced a decline in SCM software revenue in 2009. “Competition between enterprise suite and specialist, bestof-breed vendors has heightened. Although suite vendors are typically well-positioned within organisations to stall emergingapplication purchases, there are significant opportunities for specialized vendors that offer differentiating domain and vertical solutions that are ‘blind spots’ in a suite provider’s offering,” said Eschinger. The specialized segment of SCM software revenue totaled $3.5 billion in 2009, a 1.6

Transcend launches new keychain USB flash drive

ranscend has announced the 16 GB JetFlash V90C classic keychain USB flash drive, which has abundant storage space and a geometric pattern. As per the company, the 4.8 mm-thick 16GB JetFlash V90C USB flash drive’s storage capacity is large enough to hold up to 6552 pictures (based on 5 megapixel JPEG compression format) or 240 minutes of 1080p video, enabling business travelers and ordinary users to easily carry enormous amounts of data while on the move. According to Gordon Wu, Regional Head – SARRC, Transcend, “The front of the 16GB JetFlash V90C is laser-etched with distinctive geometric shapes that create a striking colorful 3D illusion when light catches it at different angles. The drive features a cap-less design with a hidden USB connector, and also comes with a fashionable metal keychain.” The JetFlash V90C offers up to 15MB/s transfer speeds and is now available in four capacities: 2GB, 4GB, 8GB and 16GB. n

percent increase from 2008. The suites segment of SCM software revenue totaled $2.7 billion in 2009, a 3.7 percent decline from 2008 revenue. “Given the market’s vendor fragmentation and the continued expansion of suite vendors, we expect market consolidation and share in the SCM market to eventually mimic that of the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) market,” Eschinger said. “ H owe ve r, u n l i ke t h e E R P market, we expect the process to take longer, with less ‘lockout’ and more activity with new entrants, given the breadth of needs across supply chains and functional domains,” he added.n

Digilink rolls out Network 160 seminar series

igilink has rolled out the Network 160 seminar series for its dealers and reseller community. This seminar series will cover 160 cities across the country. As per the company, Network 160 is aimed to promote Digilink and Digisol range of products in Class A, B, C & D market, Pan-India and will also create awareness on latest trends and technologies existing in the market. According to Prabodh Vyas, Director, Sales and Marketing, Digilink, “The idea of having road shows is to take Digilink and Digisol brand of products to our channel community and give them an experience of both these brands in a very refreshing manner. These road shows will help us in networking with our partners, understanding their issues and resolving them.” n

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erp

GROWING

AGAIN

With a bad year behind it, the industry is hopeful of cloud-based solutions and niche applications driving demand among SMBs PRATEEK MALHOTRA AND SUMA E P

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

hen a business is small, it focuses on its growth. And when it gets big, the focus continues to be further growth. But the real challenge then starts rearing its head — how does the top management get an integrated view of the business? From teams being set up to count the key parameters and draw up frequent reports for the top brass to see, companies have come a long way. Today, a company in Ahmedabad can run its business using software installed in a data center in Mumbai, and get automated reports on each detail of the business, or a quick dashboard view of what the day was like — Were the daily targets met, is there an area where we are losing money, why isn’t a specific department keeping pace…and so on. Welcome to ERP or Enterprise Resource Planning. In fact, today, the term has evolved into enterprise resource management building in governance and analytics into the task handling. In its evolution process, it has gone through many forms such as Management Information Systems (MIS), Integrated Information Systems (IIS), Executive Information Systems (EIS) among others. As a business grew, its functions became complex, resources kept getting added in an adhoc fashion and one fine day, it woke up to the reality of revenue leakages, duplication of effort, one department being oblivious what another was doing…in short, a very ineffective way of running the show. Companies would implement one application, say accounting first. Then, they would bring in an application to handle procurement, then payroll, and so on. With applications being deployed in this manner, the information within the company started residing in silos, and it became a bigger task to take out information that was current and that enabled correct decision making. ERP came in as the company wide application to integrate operations and, bring in efficient processes, accountability and transparency. It was, of course, the large organisations that took to it at first. But today, even SMBs are on the ERP path, exploring customized, yet world-class solutions to help them enter the big league and the international scene.

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL The Evolution During the 1960s, most businesses relied on customized inventory control based on traditional inventory concepts. This was limited to handling inventory and related tasks. The 1970s saw the emergence of Material Requirement Planning (MRP) that worked on scheduling production processes by utilizing software applications. MRP, on the basis of end product demand, generated detailed schedules for operations, raw material purchases, and the production order. The concept of MRP evolved in the eighties and began to coordinate manufacturing processes ranging from production planning, parts purchasing, inventory control to product distribution. It was in the nineties that the transition to ERP happened, which brought in multi-module application software with modules to integrate business activities of various departments and their functions. At the time, the top ERP players were Baan and SAP. An ERP system unifies all business operations, functions and departments into a centralised database to enhance workflow, bring transparency in working, and avoid role and work duplication. Different departments and their functions such as manufacturing, sales, inventory, marketing, accounts, human resources, customer relationship, and administration are integrated. Departments get access to the information they need from other departments, and work is performed as per the processes laid down and the responsibility assigned. In the absence of ERP software that was perfect for a specific business in a particular domain, many companies went ahead and developed their own ERP systems. As they knew their own business better than anyone else, they were the best people to develop it as well. However, the ERP software market has evolved over the years, and now customized ERP solutions for various

verticals are easily accessible. They just need to be customized to suit the processes in a company implementing it. There are a number of ERP vendors in the market. Among the top ERP suppliers are SAP, Oracle and Microsoft. Other players include Sage, QAD, Infor, Ramco and Tally. Many of these vendors are increasingly focussing on small and medium size companies, as the market for serving large enterprises is getting saturated. ERP applications for sectors like automobile, construction, education, healthcare, hospitality, manufacturing, pharmaceutical, retail, software, insurance, media etc, are now available. The modules for each of these sectors differ as their needs and processes are different.

Reaching Places The ERP market is back to its growth track after a lacklustre year in 2009. In Asia Pacific, excluding Japan, IDC expects 15.4% growth in the enterprise applications software market in 2010. Of this, the major chunk is attributed to ERM software. India too echoes the spirit. “Although the India ERM market registered a negative Year-On-Year (Y-O-Y) growth in 2009 over 2008, it is poised for a recovery and is expected to register a healthy growth in the forthcoming 3-5 year time-frame (2010 to 2012/2014). ERM solutions saw major traction from the manufacturing sector, followed by the communications and media sector in 2009,” says Kamal Vohra, Lead Analyst, Software and Services Research, IDC India.

Trends As the market emerges from the recession, things have gone a bit slow on the ERP adoption front. There is pressure on CIOs to prove that every bit of money spent on ERP systems

ERP BENEFITS • Efficiency in the overall functioning of the business. • Better control over business processes overcoming the limitation of functional boundaries. • The information can be easily accessed by anyone at any time. • Paper work reduces, timeliness increases. • Customer accessibility to information becomes easier. • Improved cost control • Better monitoring of activities of various departments and thus better utilisation of business resources • Smooth flow of accurate and detailed information. • Quick and effective decision-making.

erp

ERP CAME IN AS THE COMPANY WIDE APPLICATION TO INTEGRATE OPERATIONS AND, BRING IN EFFICIENT PROCESSES, ACCOUNTABILITY AND TRANSPARENCY.

should give big returns. So, companies are closely analysing every aspect of ERP, right from choosing the appropriate vendor, the scale of customisation needed, the time and cost involved for implementation and maintenance, and the benefits derived. Small and medium size businesses are taking the ERP steps warily. Vohra says, “The focus (in 2009) was to capture and utilise data effectively for the enhancement of operational efficiency. The need to develop An ERP specific and aligned solutions for niche system unifies segments within the manufacturing all business vertical was increasingly felt, and has operations, pushed vendors to work at developing functions and domain specific solutions.” departments It’s now the age of the cloud and into a delivering ERP as SaaS (Software as a centralised Service). ERP implementation has huge database cost implications, and that has been a to enhance dampener for the uptake among SMBs. workflow, bring That’s where the option of SaaS comes transparency into the scene. SaaS ERP systems are in working, cost effective with less up front investand avoid ment, and they demand fewer complexrole and work ities on the part of a company. duplication. “Large enterprises contributed to the bulk of spending in the India ERM space in 2009, and are expected to continue to do so in the coming years. However, PLANNING a certain level of interest in ERM appliGIVES WAY TO cations amongst SMB enterprises has MANAGEMENT, been generated over the past few years. AND FULL BLOWN Historically, SMB enterprises have used APPLICATIONS different solutions for different funcGIVE WAY TO tions that were built in-house, resulting CLOUD SOLUTIONS in a siloed applications environment. As THAT ENABLE the SMB enterprises seek to simplify this A MODULAR legacy, they are in search of a compreBUILDUP. THIS IS hensive solutions suite that matches THE ROAD THAT their business needs, and that is also affordable. With this background, the ERP IS NOW introduction of cloud-based ERM appliTAKING. cations is expected to see good traction with the India SMB enterprise segment in the years ahead”, Vohra says. ERP vendors are also looking beyond big businesses for ERP implementations. They are focusing on enhancing their products to suit different verticals. Small vendors have been hit by recession and have had to go slow on their research and development efforts. Most organisations in the market for ERP adoption would go with established names with proven credentials. Planning gives way to management, and full blown applications give way to cloud solutions that enable a modular buildup. This is the road that ERP is now taking. n editor@digitchannelconnect.com

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL

scm

Moving

UP the

SUPPLY CHAIN

As companies look at cutting costs and optimising efficiency, supply chain management solutions are poised to play a strategic role PAYAL PRUTHI

upply Chain Management (SCM) solutions empower organisations to streamline and enhance their operations and gain an edge over competitors. A well-integrated SCM solution can fully automate and support the supply chain processes of an organisation from endto-end. More and more companies in India are realising this and engaging vendors and partners to get better grips on their supply chains. According to Kamal Vohra, Lead Analyst, Software and Ser vices Research, IDC India, the total Indian SCM solutions market is growing at a CAGR of 7.6% and is expected to touch US$ 132.6 million by 2011. “The India SCM solutions market in 2009 was US$ 91.8 million, with the major players being SAP, Oracle and Aspen Technology and other players being Microsoft, Invensys, Lawson and Infor.

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

The year-on-year growth for the India SCM market took a hit during the global economic slowdown, but is expected to recover in 2010 and beyond,” says Vohra. “Supply chain management is becoming an increasingly dominant subject on the boardroom agenda and so, we expect SCM technology deployments to grow in line with analyst forecasts for the coming years,” says Ushasri TS, Vice President & Managing Director, Manhattan Associates India. According to her, the SCM market has taken off on a much more positive start in the year 2010, with Manhattan reporting record first quarter earnings and a 22% increase in revenue over the same period last year.

Key Drivers According to Vohra, increasing logistics costs, increasing complexity and

uncertainty of supply networks, globalization of businesses, and shortening of product lifecycles are some of the key drivers for the popularity of SCM solutions. “Businesses are looking beyond their internal organisation structures to engage better with their supply chain KAMAL VOHRA, partners and build robust inventory, LEAD ANALYST, logistics and distribution models and SOFTWARE AND SERVICES RESEARCH, that is where SCM plays an important IDC INDIA role,” says Vohra. Ravindra Sharma, General Manager, “BUSINESSES ARE Ariba India, a prominent provider of LOOKING BEYOND software solutions feels that the recent THEIR INTERNAL financial crisis has made cost manageORGANISATION ment a focus area. “With India poised STRUCTURES TO for decent growth, many of the firms ENGAGE BETTER are proactively setting up supply chain WITH THEIR infrastructure which can help them SUPPLY CHAIN grow rapidly and profitably. Many of these firms have global business PARTNERS AND aspirations and are benchmarking BUILD ROBUST themselves with global organisations INVENTORY, in various aspects including business LOGISTICS AND processes, practices and technology,” DISTRIBUTION he says. MODELS AND Anil Menon, VP - Software Group THAT IS WHERE Channels - IBM India/South Asia says, SCM PLAYS AN “These applications help companies IMPORTANT ROLE.” make better decisions faster, addressing global supply chain design and sourcing strategies, transportation planning, and the optimal flow and placement of inventory across the end-to-end supply chain - encouraging companies to adopt SCM solutions.”

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL

scm

Worldwide SCM Vendor Software Revenue (Millions of Dollars) Vendor

2009 2009 Market 2008 2008 Market 2008-2009 Revenue Share (%) Revenue Share (%) Growth (%)

SAP

1,223.3

19.8

1,341.3

21.5

-8.8

Oracle

1,038.6

16.8

1,036.4

16.6

0.2

JDA Software

258.1

4.2

264.7

4.2

-2.5

Ariba

228.7

3.7

210.3

3.4

8.8

i2 Technologies

114.0

1.8

116.4

1.9

-2.0

Manhattan Associates

111.8

1.8

142.3

2.3

-21.4

3,215.4

51.9

3,123.3

50.1

3.0

6,190.0

100.0

6,234.7

100.0

-0.7

Other Vendors Total

ANIL MENON, VP - SOFTWARE GROUP CHANNELS - IBM INDIA/SOUTH ASIA

“With India poised for decent growth, many of the firms are proactively setting up supply chain infrastructure which can help them grow rapidly and profitably.”

Note: Gartner defines total software revenue as revenue that is generated from appliances, new licenses, updates, subscriptions and hosting, technical support, and maintenance. Professional services revenue and hardware revenue are not included in total software revenue. Source: Gartner (June 2010)

Mapping New Trends Partha Patnaik, GM-HR & Admin of the Hyderabad based company Four Soft feels that offering solutions that make the supply chain more green and efficient is one of the latest trends in the SCM market. “Four Soft has taken a global initiative to address the same with (FFIFA) - Freight Forwarding Industry and Four Soft Alliance. The objective of FFIFA is to provide a forum for the exchange of ideas where the resultant “Industry Best Practices” will save the industry time, energy and money in providing better services to its custom-

Key Sectors Deploying SCM Solutions • FMCG • Automotive • Infrastructure • Pharma • Manufacturing • Finance • Retail • Healthcare

ers,” says Partha. According to an Oracle spokesperson, as per analyst reports, 2010 would be the year beyond ERP and SCM. Enterprises will increasingly turn to IT investments as part of their growth and competitiveness strategies. Additionally, other major trends will include BI and risk management increasingly becoming a part of SCM with companies adopting green supply chain processes. “We’re seeing companies returning to investment mode and they’re doing this with a focus on cost reduction and improved collaboration across the supply chain. We see leading supply chains using electronic collaboration as a competitive advantage,” says Ushasri.

On a Fast Track “Deployment of SCM solutions is definitely increasing. These solutions can enable companies to predict market requirements and risks, help adapt and innovate in response to volatile market conditions and hence help in improving the supply chain processes. In addition, vendors are increasingly coming

RAVINDRA SHARMA, GENERAL MANAGER, ARIBA

“THESE APPLICATIONS HELP COMPANIES MAKE BETTER DECISIONS FASTER, ADDRESSING GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAIN DESIGN AND SOURCING STRATEGIES, TRANSPORTATION PLANNING, AND THE OPTIMAL FLOW AND PLACEMENT OF INVENTORY ACROSS THE END-TO-END SUPPLY CHAIN ENCOURAGING COMPANIES TO ADOPT SCM SOLUTIONS.”

out with integrated solutions that can enable companies to maximize productivity and reduce costs,” says the spokesperson for Oracle. According to Sharma, “Collaborative commerce among the business partners (customers, suppliers, others) is at a nascent stage, leaving huge business potential untapped leading to more opportunities in the SCM space.” Meanwhile, Ushasri believes that SCM has various levels of sophistication depending on the market demands and sophistication of the sector you are serving. “Whether a market is emerging or mature, SCM is required because it consists of planning, sourcing, manufacturing, delivery to your customers and even returns,” says Ushasri. The adoption of SCM solutions and judicious optimization of the entire supply and distribution chain delivers good results to the manufacturing, retail & wholesale and FMCG organisations. “Indian corporates have ‘tasted’ the efficiency of SCM solutions and now believe it to be a vital component of their business readiness plans,” says Vohra. According to Menon, IBM, along with Websphere and ILOG has been focusing on verticals like energy and utilities, government, SCM and manufacturing, travel and transportation, healthcare, logistics, retail, banking, telecommunications, insurance, and, financial markets - all of which are heavy users of SCM. Pharmaceuticals, oil & gas, and, FMCG are some of the other key and growing users of SCM software, according to Partha.

Need to overcome While the whole notion of SCM is all about breaking barriers and silos, SCM still needs to be treated as a core pillar of business strategy. According to Vohra, lack of standardization, heavy customization and long turnaround time from concept to implementation are major inhibitors for the industry. “Domain experience and skill shortage to guide organisations through successful supply chain improvement projects are also deterrents,” he says. According to Sharma, while there is an escalating acknowledgement and appreciation for the role of supply chain management, many would argue that the job itself has never been more difficult. “In addition to the skill gaps at the operating level, to remain at the forefront of supply chain innovation and enablement is a challenge in itself,” he says. n payal.pruthi@9dot9.in

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

business intelligence

Smarten IT Up A business intelligence solution can help enterprises simplify data and make better decisions

ued to grow in 2009, but at a rapidly diminished pace from the previous year. As per the firm, SAP was the market leader in the BI space, with a 22% share in 2009, followed by Oracle at 14.5%, SAS Institute at 14.2%, IBM at 12.2%, and Microsoft at 7.9%. Combined, the five vendors controlled more than 70% of the total market for BI in India. Gartner further said that the demand for self-service BI tools is likely to drive continued market growth in 2010.

CHARU KHERA

Why BI? One of the biggest benefits of BI is that it helps enterprises with better business decision-making and simplified data. “The best part about BI is that it gives you the information when you need it, in the format you need. Most often, people print reports without

oday’s businesses rely heavily on data and information. But a growing amount of data and its existence on multiple platforms and in several locations poses the challenge of gathering useful business insights for organisations. And that’s where a Business Intelligence (BI) solution comes in. From a functional point of view, BI covers querying, reporting, Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) and Business Analytics (BA). In other words, a BI solution not only helps enterprises with a unified view of data that is extracted from multiple systems such as ERP, SCM, CRM, etc, but also helps them analyse their business performance. Furthermore, BI solutions provide enterprises with improved productivity and quality, increased customer service levels and also profitability. The key adopters of BI include organisations who have to manage a vast amount of information, those who deal extensively with numbers, and those

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

who have to face mounting pressure to make accurate decisions more quickly. For example, for telecom companies to succeed in the cut-throat competition, it is business intelligence (and not pricing) that can give them an edge. Segments such as retail, BFSI, telecommunication, pharmaceutical, government and defence are some of the other key adopters of BI in India. “Presently, the demand for BI solutions is largely being driven by MNCs and large enterprises. BI solutions seem to have gained more acceptance and significance in retail where customers play a pivotal role in the future of the company,” says Sanjay Mehta, CEO, MAIA Intelligence. As per Gartner, the BI market contin-

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL business intelligence checking their accuracy. By using BI, companies can simplify their data, and also save on printing cost and reduce paper consumption,” shares Ranjan Chopra of Team Computers. Some important characteristics of a BI solution are integrated data from multiple sources, consistent data across organisational systems, and most importantly, fast delivery of analysis. BI is also essential for efficient corporate performance management. Other key benefits of BI are time savings and operational efficiencies for an organisation, lower cost of operations, improved customer service and satisfaction, operational and strategic decision making, enhanced employee communications & satisfaction, and also improved knowledge sharing.

Success Story:

Third Eye Analytics It is possible for solution providers to carve a niche for themselves in the space of business intelligence and PV Ravindran create a successful business – something PV Ravindran of Third Eye Analytics is doing currently. Prior to setting up Third Eye, Ravindran was working with Tally Solutions as Vice President of R&D. He realised that there was a great need in the market for a complementary solution to ERP that could provide a unified view of sales so that a company could compare those figures from multiple dealer locations. So, he began working on developing what he calls “an extended enterprise solution”. It took Ravindran and his team about two years to develop the tool, christened Thirdeye-BI. Ravindran says that Thirdeye-BI is a preconfigured solution that focusses on specific needs such as those of retail organisations. The solution can be implemented across a national-level retailer in three to six months. What’s more, to tap into his Tally experience, Ravindran has roped in many of Tally’s existing partners to sell and implement Thirdeye-BI as an add-on to their existing portfolio of accounting and ERP solutions. With two clients already under its kitty – Brand House Retail and Madura Garments – Third Eye Analytics looks set for an accelerated growth path ahead.

Key Trends BI, as a technology has been evolving constantly; the BI arena is changing and its reach is growing fast. One of the most popular trends in the BI space is its integration with Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). While ERP is deployed for standardisation of processes and integrity of data, a BI solution helps with standardisation of information and a unified view of the same data. Sharing the benefits of integration of BI and ERP, Durai Rajasekar, Senior Vice President, Ramco Systems said, “BI is a highly customisable platform and its integration with ERP can provide tremendous value to organisations in various areas such as inventory holding analysis, inventory movement analysis, cash requirement analysis, price variance analysis, production optimisation analysis, and cost analysis for products, operations, purchases and so on.” As per Gartner’s findings in the 2010 Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligent Platforms, the market for BI platforms would stay among the fastest growing software markets. Gartner highlights that the key trends in the BI space in 2010 would be the availability of open source BI software for enterprises. “Open source BI tool production deployments will grow five-fold through 2012,” the research firm says. Furthermore, research by HP and Forrester Research shows that organisations are increasingly interested in cloud computing for BI. “With BI running in the cloud, organisations can pay just for the capacity they need, when they need it. Also, it gives companies access to complex, sophisticated BI technologies without having to pay for in-house BI expertise,” as per Gartner 2010 report on BI. Other key trends in the BI space are convergence of BI and Corporate Performance Management (CPM), in-memory analytics, on-demand BI and many more. BI on mobile is another growing trend. With the increasing mobile platform maturity, one can access easily through smartphones online data stores, analytical applications and many other BI tools.

Key Growth Drivers and Roadblocks Industry watchers believe that BI is becoming increasingly important as enterprises try to turn their data into information. “Most organisations today feel and understand the complex and growing nature of the data; they

BI SOLUTIONS PROVIDE ENTERPRISES WITH IMPROVED PRODUCTIVITY AND QUALITY, INCREASED CUSTOMER SERVICE LEVELS AND ALSO PROFITABILITY. A business intelligence solution not only helps enterprises with a unified view of data, but also helps them analyse their business performance. A BI SOLUTION HELPS WITH STANDARDISATION OF INFORMATION AND A UNIFIED VIEW OF THE SAME DATA. As per Gartner, BI would continue to remain a mission-critical application for businesses, as it turns information into an asset for deriving insight and making decisions.

understand that the data is there, but it is trapped in different silos and its accuracy cannot be trusted. To manage this ever-growing data, BI is a great tool,” said Chopra. Some of the other important drivers of BI among Indian enterprises are the company’s increasing need to leverage existing data and information, their demand for increased revenues and reduced costs, constantly changing competitive landscape, increasing organisational complexity, and constant reduction in IT budgets of most organisations. In spite of all the benefits of BI, many businesses in India still view BI as an overpriced luxury IT tool. In spite of the fact that BI is amongst the most highly desired business technology, there are a number of adoption barriers and BI is still largely the domain of a select group of large enterprises. One of the biggest challenges is that BI does not work when it comes to unstructured data, which is a common phenomenon across organisations today.

Opportunity for partners The fact that the interest of organisations in BI is increasing comes as no surprise. “Awareness for BI is very high, but the level of deployment is comparatively low, and thus, India is a large untapped market that SIs should focus on,” shares Mehta. Furthermore, the explosion in digital data would give enormous opportunities to SIs – the so called BI professionals who can then aggregate, correlate and help turn BI into intelligence for organisations. “Many organisations complain that they spend more time in finding, extracting, cleaning and integrating data - instead of analysing and reporting it, and it is to these organisations that we offer BI solutions,” says Chopra. As per Gartner, BI would continue to remain a mission-critical application for businesses, as it turns information into an asset for deriving insight and making decisions. No doubt, majority of Indian enterprises are recognising the importance of BI; also, the trends in the BI space look promising. In short, BI is expected to be more valuable for enterprises and would help them make strategic decisions. Innovations in the space will make the technology more affordable for small businesses. With respect to SIs, they should get aggressive and capture the huge untapped potential that the BI market holds. n charu.khera@9dot9.in

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

collaboration

A BETTER WAY TO

This arrangement was good for the experts, but not necessarily for the related community and society at large. It created a sort of information or expertise imbalance – of information richness and poverty – across a few elite members and the rest of the community, respectively. Secondly, businesses would operate locally and in isolation without any location diversification and limited mutual exchange. In most cases, even the consumption was co-located with manufacturing. Thirdly, there was no concept of customer privileges, empowerment or influence. The customer also had less buying power; so, the market size was limited. Businesses were the key, drivers determined what will sell, in what form and at what price. Businesses enjoyed this influence and did not bother about improving any aspects of their manufacturing and selling; winning and retention of customers were unknown terms.

Defining enterprise collaboration Move to the current information age and the rules of businesses changed immediately. The scenarios are much more competitive, influencers are distributed, and businesses have a lot of factors, such as customer satisfaction & retention, social influences, competition, regulatory compliances, etc to deal with. In today’s age of networking, sharing and working together, you immediately realize that every member of the community has something to consume or contribute - an experience to share, an expert comment to offer, an opinion to express, a

COMMUNICATE From one-way communication, organisations are moving towards a more comprehensive, integrated approach to collaboration – and reaping real business benefits SWAPNIL PARANJPE

The need for enterprise collaboration

arlier, the value of an information worker was judged by his subject matter expertise and how quickly he adopted to the change in technology. In turn, any organisation would rely heavily on its ability to attract, hire and retain the best of the talent and skill available. This led to a trend for individuals to enhance and deepen their expertise, but not share it as such. This led to intellect getting locked inside selected brains, thus becoming premium and scarce, which could not be leveraged by the community-at-large. Matters of important decisions were being discussed, deliberated and taken within core groups and the affected community was left to consume what was being delivered to them in a limited and censored manner.

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

resource to recommend, deliberation on solution approaches, etc – on a query or a problem. And on the other end, there are business users who consume relevant news, techniques, recommendations, opinions and expertise from this social network. Enterprise Collaboration is the term that captures this newage world order, where people network with each other, join groups, form communities and members share their problems, observations, seek opinions and solutions, and community experts and peers help out.

JULY 2010

Individuals thrive on networking and collaboration across platforms like forums, blogs, micro-blogs, social profiles, online chat, portals, surveys, polls, etc using supporting features such as user rating, content ranking, comments, notifications, presence, social tagging, bookmarking and search. For business reasons, individuals collaborate inside enterprises, over formal platforms as well as informal communities. And it is not only individuals, but organisations also that collaborate with each other. Examples of organisational collaboration engagements include: Collaboration across distributed delivery teams: This cuts down product launch times and optimizes on resource requirements. Collaboration across supply chains: For reduced inventory levels and the ability to service on-demand manufacturing and retail

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL supplies. Collaboration for transparent and effective e-governance: Citizen awareness is increased through search, social networks and subscription to relevant government content. Collaboration across franchisee network: Alliance partners are empowered by providing discovery and access over business relevant information. Partners are also included in the decision-making process in real time.

Evolution of Collaboration Collaboration has evolved from its 1.0 days of being a point of one-way conversation and communication to 2.0, which is a more comprehensive, integrated and multi-way approach to community collaboration in providing real business benefits for organisations and communities. The difficulty with 1.0 is that it has limited visibility or empowerment for general users, is hardly discoverable, and provides no means to extend the functionality. On the other hand, 2.0 tools and techniques have emerged as platforms of the people, for the people, and by the people.

Opportunities and Challenges The advent of the enterprise collaboration tools and techniques has opened up new opportunities for businesses to deploy them and reap the resulting tangible and intangible benefits. While enterprise collaboration offers

several business benefits, there are enough challenges involved across the lifecycle of choosing, deploying and adopting a tool or a platform. Below are mentioned some of the identified technical and business challenges that need to be addressed before finalizing the plan to procure and deploy a tool: Executive support: For rollout of any enterprise-wide system and to sustain it for the long term, especially that are disruptive in nature (such as search and collaboration), it is very important that executive buy-in is obtained well in advance and executive goals feature amongst the top level objectives of the rollout 1. RoI and priorities – For sustained budgetary support, stakeholder blessing and user satisfaction, it is essential that realistic goals with quick, short wins are planned with priorities signed-off from stakeholder, design & deployment and user groups. Ensuring that this initiative is appropriately programme managed and directly influences the key result areas of one of the executives (e.g. CIO office) is important to keep it on track. 2. Security and compliance – Ensuring that enterprise security and compliance requirements are met by the chosen tool is critical. It is necessary that any deployed collaboration tool honours the enterprise access rights, policies and roles. 3. Enterprise integration – To reap appropriate benefits from the deploy-

Where collaboration benefits the most

Distributed Teams across Geographies

Large organisations or Delivery Groups

Marketing and Brand Management

Top Beneficiaries

Customer Support, Customer Relationship Management and IT Service Desk

Franchisee Networks and Business Alliances

collaboration ment of any enterprise collaboration tool, it is important that it inter-operates with the existing enterprise ecosystem and infrastructure. 4. Usability – User adoption of newly deployed IT systems has been a continuous and common concern for organisations; hence it is essential that any chosen product earns high points on usability and mobility of the concerned applications. It is important that these tools or applications are self-discoverable and intuitive in use.

SWAPNIL PARANJPE

ENTERPRISE COLLABORATION IS A TERM THAT CAPTURES THE NEW-AGE WORLD ORDER, WHERE PEOPLE NETWORK WITH EACH OTHER, JOIN GROUPS, FORM COMMUNITIES AND MEMBERS SHARE THEIR PROBLEMS, OBSERVATIONS, SEEK OPINIONS AND SOLUTIONS, AND COMMUNITY EXPERTS AND PEERS HELP OUT. For business reasons, individuals collaborate inside enterprises, over formal platforms as well as informal communities. TO REAP APPROPRIATE BENEFITS FROM THE DEPLOYMENT OF ANY ENTERPRISE COLLABORATION TOOL, IT IS IMPORTANT THAT IT INTEROPERATES WITH THE EXISTING ENTERPRISE ECOSYSTEM AND INFRASTRUCTURE.

Future Trends The following are some key trends that the industry is likely to witness in the near future: 1. Enterprise business software will adopt possible relevant enterprise collaboration functionality and design and integrate it right into their platform. For e.g. a CRM solution will enable as many directly relevant collaboration features out-of-the-box. 2. Enterprise collaboration platform vendors will provide a cloud option for a small-to-medium business that is at par with its on-premise version, but providing a big cost and administration advantage. 3.Smart ‘enterprise collaboration’ vendors will provide following capabilities off their platforms: a. Ability to extend and consume functionality across different media, publishing and user interfaces. b. Ability to seamlessly integrate with enterprise infrastructure to enable organisations manage enterprise security, applications and administration. c. Reporting and analytics capabilities, which will enhance the value of the social actions, conversations, transactions, content and networks that gets generated out of the usage of the collaboration platform. 4. In the true sense of collaboration, many enterprise business software vendors are likely to partner with and acquire other relevant technology to leverage the complementing collaboration features and provide richer solution and business value to the businesses and end-users. n Swapnil Paranjpe is Sr. Project Manager in the Enterprise Collaboration Business Unit at Persistent Systems Ltd.

DIGIT CHANNEL CONNECT

JULY 2010

The initiative started by Digit Channel Connect in the form of the Channel Champs programme carried on the good work in five more cities. Here’s what the attendees have to say...

CITIES VIZAG, JAMSHEDPUR, ASANSOL, DHANBAD, VIJAYWADA

The main issues affecting our community are monopolistic principles of companies, changes in policies, and, no loyalty bonus.” AMITABH S. VIDYARTHI

President - Jamshedpur IT Association (JITA)

This event was really informative. I have been a regular reader of the DCC magazine and would like if you include visual product detail in a CD along with the issue. SHEKHAR KUMAR

Yonex Computer Centre

I have attended this event earlier and have always found it to be quite good. As for the DCC magazine, I have read it before and would like to subscribe to it in the future.” RAKESH KUMAR Rakesh Infotech

I have been a regular visitor at this event and would like to attend it in the future as well. I have read the DCC magazine and would like to subscribe to it.”

Asansol

Jamshedpur

JULY 2010

I haven’t attended the Channel Champs event earlier, nor have I read the DCC magazine. But I found the event very informative and would love to attend it in the future. Also, I would like to subscribe to your magazine.

Vizag

channel champs I have attended this event earlier also and have found it to be quite engaging this time as well. I would definitely be attending it in the future. As for the DCC magazine, I have already read it and am already a subscriber.” M.SURYA PRAKASH

Network Computer Services

This is my first Channel Champs event. It was really nice and I would like to attend it in the future. I find the DCC magazine to be quite informative and am already a subscriber.” SRINIVAS.M

CA&S Solutions (P) Limited

PRADEEP SINGHANIA Speaker Point

I have attended this channel meet before. Everything was well managed in this event and I hope to be a regular visitor to it in the future. As for your magazine, I haven’t read it till now, but would like to subscribe to it. BINAY KUMAR SINGH Khushi Infotech

Gigabyte-Area Manager-Sales

N. KUMAR

Arun Electronics

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I’ve attended many channel meets. This event went off very well and I would like to attend it in the future also. I haven’t read the DCC magazine, but would like to subscribe to it.” GIRIDHARI AGARWAL Agarwal Computers

I have attended the Channel Champs event before and found this one to be good as well. I have read the DCC magazine. It is good to read, but I feel that there should be more product detail in it.” ANUP KUMAR Prompt

The organisation of the event went off pretty well and I’m sure it will definitely boost the confidence level of the channel partners present here. I feel that the event should also be held in cities like Patna, Muzzafarpur, and, Ranchi.” AMIT RAJ

Gigabyte - Area Sales Manager

I found this event to be quite informative, as all the resellers were under one roof and got a chance to interact among themselves. Overall, it was a good experience.” SOURAV DAS

LG-Area Manager

Vijaywada

Dhanbad

channel champs I have attended this particular channel meet before and found this one to be really good. I would like to attend it in the future also. As for the DCC magazine, I haven’t read it and would like to subscribe to it as well.

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BHARAT

Raj Electronics

I have been a regular attendee at the Channel Champs event and have always found it quite interesting. I’ve read the DCC magazine and would like to subscribe to it in the future.

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this event.”

The event really proved to be useful for me, as I met all the channel partners under one roof. I would like to thanks 9dot9 for organising

D.VIVIKANANDAN LG- Area Manager-IT

The event was very well organised and managed. The POP display was very attractive. The number of attendees was also quite substantial. The event proved to be an interesting experience overall.”

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scm

MAKING THE CHAIN

mation than ever, supply chain executives still struggle to “see” and act on the right information and rank visibility as their greatest management challenge. Although more information is available, proportionally less is being effectively captured, managed, analyzed and made available to people who need it. Effective use of business analytics could help them share information and collaborate more effectively. Risk – CFOs are not the only senior executives urgently concerned about risk; risk management ranks remarkably high on the agenda of supply chain executives as well. More than two-thirds of supply chain executives have programmes in place to monitor compliance. But, top supply chains are taking risk management a step further by incorporating it into their plans and VIVEK S RAWAT using IT to monitor and act on disruptive events. Interaction with customers – Despite EVEN MINOR demand-driven mantras, companies are MISSTEPS AND MISCALCULATIONS better connected to their suppliers than CAN HAVE MAJOR their customers. Although technology CONSEQUENCES, has made it more feasible than ever to incorporate customer input, working AS THE IMPACT directly with customers remains the SPREADS least common supply-chain planning LIKE VIRUSES practice. As pressure to be more profTHROUGHOUT itable grows, supply chains won’t be COMPLEX SUPPLY- able to afford the excess inventory, lost CHAIN NETWORKS. sales and missed innovation opportunities caused by inadequate customer collaboration. Globalization – Contrary to initial As compliance rationale, globalization has proven to mandates, be more about revenue growth than suppliers and cost savings. Given the growing interinformation dependence among economies worldflows multiply, wide, it’s no surprise that globalization supply chains ranks as a top supply chain challenge. are becoming Many companies are encountering more complex, issues with global sourcing, including costly and unreliable delivery, longer lead times vulnerable. and poor quality. However, the financial advantages of globalization of their markets and operations outweigh these negatives. Overall, these findings suggest that it’s no longer enough to build supply chains that are efficient, demanddriven or even transparent. Companies will need to use machine-generated information, have connection between the entire supply chain and decisions made through use of advanced analytics, in other words, “smarter” supply chains. n Vivek S Rawat is Country Manager – WebSphere – Software Group – IBM India/South Asia

SMARTER Organisations in a fast-globalising world need to tackle five key challenges to get the most out of their supply chains VIVEK S RAWAT

usinesses and supply chains have become substantially more global and interconnected over the last decade, increasing their exposure to shocks and disruptions. In addition to spreading geographically, supply chains now involve more companies. Supply chains must also contend with rapidly expanding and contracting product portfolios. Together, these shifts are creating constant turmoil. Even minor missteps and miscalculations can have major consequences, as the impact spreads like viruses throughout complex supply-chain networks. But, how are supply chain executives coping? As part of a Global Chief Supply Chain Officer Study, IBM spoke with 400 senior executives from North America, Western Europe and the Asia Pacific region who are responsible for their organisations’ supply chain strategies and operations. IBM’s discussions revealed five

challenges to creating “smarter” supply chains of the future: Cost containment – When it comes to managing costs, companies with top supply chains take a longer-term view, according to AMR Research. Those supply chains are moving more quickly toward agile supply chains that allow rapid response to changing market conditions and variable cost structures that ramp up and down with revenues. Flexibility is their antidote for cost volatility. Visibility – Flooded with more infor-

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customer relationship management

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL

RETHINKING RELATIONS

In today’s challenging times for banks, technology that gets them closer to their customers makes business sense

confluence of industry developments, including consolidation, regulation, and new technologies are putting additional pressure on operating models of banks and raising questions about traditional strategies for growth and value creation. Customers will continue to depend on banks only as long as banks can provide service and value that cannot be found anywhere else. As a result, banks have begun to rethink what, where, and how they serve increasingly informed and demanding customers. The IBM Institute for Business Value in its report ‘The Paradox of Banking 2015’ has identified the following main trends in the banking industry: Customers redefine the rules of the

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game: Pronounced shifts in demographics, attitudes and behaviors, in addition to wide spread information, are giving customers the power to demand much greater responsiveness and transparency from their banks. Universal banks and ultra-focused niche players thrive: Large players will generate higher aggregate profits by reaping the benefits of super scale, while niche players will aggressively pursue the most desirable customers by addressing their needs in distinct ways – those in the middle will get squeezed. Reg u l a t o r y b u rd e n s i n t e n s i f y: Heightened needs around privacy, security, partnership and operational risks will require banks to take a proactive, enterprise-wide approach to managing compliance issues. Technology improves to enable breakaway value: Emerging technologies such as grid computing, serviceoriented architectures, virtualisation of data and storage, and predictive intelligence will cause entrenched in-sourcing philosophies to perish in favor of a partnership model where specialized enterprises thrive. We are already beginning to see banks moving toward exceptional customer experience. Banks are in the process of developing the ability to use customer information in real time to devise truly differentiating banking experiences and solutions. To provide a wholesome customer experience, banks need to have the following:

• Thorough understanding of the needs of segments they aspire to serve and delight. • Extraordinary service standards and follow through. • Emphasis on people empowerment. • Extensive client associate training.

Need for CRM in banking

QUESTIONS FOR BANKS TO CONSIDER: HOW WILL BANKS CONTINUE TO GROW REVENUES AND REMAIN PROFITABLE? WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO CREATE AND MAINTAIN ADVANTAGE IN THIS HIGHLY COMPETITIVE INDUSTRY? The future growth and profitability of the banking sector is now dependent on the ability to aggregate information across systems and reorient it by customer instead of product.

As competitive forces within the industry intensify, it is clear that banks will have to become far more responsive to changing market conditions and emerging competitive threats, not to mention a more empowered customer base. Hence, they will need to take dramatic steps to redefine their business models, to assemble the best capabilities in the market, and, to become specialized enterprises that focus on critical differentiating business components within the firm. The future growth and profitability of the banking sector is now dependent on the ability to aggregate information across systems and reorient it by customer instead of product. With advances in global connectivity and computing power, the quantity of available data will continue to increase rapidly. Increasing demand will drive information technology investment in customer analytics. CRM accelerates extraction of appropriate information from volumes of information that are scattered across multiple sources, both internal and external to the banks. This can provide the banks with opportunities to analyze and apply the information for decision making.

The multiple aspects of CRM • Quality of the service provided to customers when they interact with a bank. • Capability to provide front line employees and call center agents with real-time information about customer relationships. • Analytical software that can provide business intelligence on cross-sell and up-sell opportunities by modeling and predicting customer financial needs. • Sales force automation technology to improve the tracking and followthrough of customer leads. • Complex accounting applications to measure customer profitability. n This article has been adapted from a white paper. Courtesy: Talisma

crm

INTERACT to SUCCEED A customer relationship management solution can help a business serve its customers better and understand their ever changing needs CHARU KHERA

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JULY 2010

here is an age-old mantra of success: The customer is the soul of business. Over the years, organisations have realised that keeping customers happy and satisfied will help them gain more profits and market share. Customers today demand good quality products, efficient and 24x7 customer service. This is where CRM or Customer Relationship Management comes into the picture. CRM is what helps manage and nurture a companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s interactions with customers, its clients and sales prospects. As per Wikipedia, CRM helps companies find, attract, and win new clients, nurture and retain the existing ones, entice former clients back into the fold, and also reduce the costs of marketing and client service. In short, CRM denotes a company-wide business strategy embracing all client-facing departments and even beyond. The key adopters of CRM includes companies such as banks, insurance providers and telecom providers, who need to understand their clientsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; behaviour, spending patterns, needs, and causes of dissatisfaction. Also,

BUSINESS SOFTWARE SPECIAL sectors such as transportation, retail, government, health care and professional services often deploy CRM solutions. As per a Springboard Research report, titled “SaaS CRM in AsiaPacif ic: Strong Growth Despite Market Concerns”, the web-based or on-demand CRM software market was at $183 million for the year ended 2008 and estimates that the market will grow to $570 million by 2012. The research report also stated that on demand CRM software is the most frequently used hosted business software application. Also, as per Gartner, in 2009, the Indian CRM market accounted for $80.3 million and between 2008 and 2013, CRM in India is expected to grow at a CAGR of 12%. Ranjan Chopra, CEO, Team Computers says, “Customer satisfaction is of utmost importance for any organisation. A CRM solution is therefore necessary, as it adds to that experience and gives an accurate feedback to the vendor.”

Growth drivers of CRM Nowadays, customers have more choices than ever, and are more frugal and hence, enterprises feel the need to understand their customers better, more than ever, in order to survive in the marketplace and stay profitable. A key growth driver for CRM in India is that companies are ready to invest in understanding customer value and the goal is to have a 360-degree view of what the customer demands and needs. CRM as a model has its roots in three primary areas: Call center systems, help desk applications and sales force automation. As per Forrester, the key trends that

Key Benefits of CRM 1. Streamlined sales and marketing processes. 2. Elimination of time consuming tasks, effective utilization of resources, eradication of unproductive work. 3. Higher sales productivity. 4. Improved service, loyalty, and retention. 5. Higher close rates. 6. Better profiling and targeting. 7. Reduced expenses. 8. Increased market share. 9. Higher overall profitability. 10. Marginal costing. Source: Wikipedia

will drive CRM strategies and technology adoption is the necessity to adapt to the rapidly changing “social” consumer, the need for more robust CRM strategies, the need to reduce CRM project risks, and the imperative to unlock the value of customer data. Other key factors leading to continued growth of CRM are the quests for increased customer share, market share, retention and efficiencies. Sushant Dwivedy, Director-Microsoft Business Solutions says, “Getting new customers is a problem. Retaining them is even harder, which is in direct proportion to the growth factor of CRM.” Adding to his thoughts, Chopra says, “One factor driving the growth of CRM in India is the need for organisations to optimise marketing spend and deliver offerings in a more defined manner.”

Key trends in the CRM space The most notable trend that has been affecting the growth of CRM tools are cloud computing and Software as a Service (SaaS). As per experts, hosted/ On-Demand/SaaS paradigm for CRM is fast gaining ground as an implementation strategy. Under this model, customers can also adopt the pay-asper-usage model instead of investing, owning and managing the complete CRM infrastructure in-house. Also, analytical CRM is fast gaining ground as a hot trend in the CRM industry; most enterprises today believe in encouraging their analytical teams to work closely with their customers. Also, a key innovation with respect to CRM is that it has gone mobile and is easily accessible almost anywhere. In addition, vertical CRM solutions are also gaining momentum among enterprises. For example, there are CRM solutions available for verticals such as legal, financial, management as well as accounting sectors.

Roadblocks in the success of CRM Despite numerous benefits of CRM, many companies are still not fully leveraging the CRM tools and services to align their marketing, sales, and services. One of the biggest reasons for the same is that CRM implementations are quite fragmented and isolated (different initiatives are taken by individual departments to address their own needs), which in turn leads to issues like disunited decision processes, and dysfunctional processes. In addi-

crm

CRM IS WHAT HELPS MANAGE AND NURTURE A COMPANY’S INTERACTIONS WITH CUSTOMERS, ITS CLIENTS AND SALES PROSPECTS.

CRM helps companies find, attract, and win new clients, nurture and retain the existing ones, entice former clients back into the fold, and also reduce the costs of marketing and client service. A KEY GROWTH DRIVER FOR CRM IN INDIA IS THAT COMPANIES ARE READY TO INVEST IN UNDERSTANDING CUSTOMER VALUE AND THE GOAL IS TO HAVE A 360-DEGREE VIEW OF WHAT THE CUSTOMER DEMANDS AND NEEDS.

tion, in-house implementation of CRM requires huge investments, i.e., investment needed to maintain a huge customer database. Thus, the costs involved in CRM are enormous. One of the other reasons why CRM fails is that most often organisations fail to choose the right method of measurement and implementation. This problem can be addressed by choosing the right System Integrator (SI) or by outsourcing CRM tools, and also, companies should ensure that different metrics are employed for the calculation of different goals. CRM provides slow Returns on Investment (RoI) and thus, most organisations find it to be a long-term process to wait for years before they are able to see actual returns on their investments. Also, there are many enterprises who do not manage to fully explore the benefits of CRM as they fail to understand that CRM is about business and not just technology. Though technology plays a key role in making CRM an enabler, CRM is not about solving a technological problem; rather, it is a process that aligns business around customers’ needs. Then, there are barriers imposed by broadband penetration. In India, broadband penetration is not at an advanced stage and hence, CRM penetration too has not yet reached a very high level.

CRM future potential CRM is here to stay and will evolve. It can revolutionise the way a business is conducted and is also expected to become a business necessity in the near future. Industry watchers define CRM, in future, is a decision, which can make or break a business and it should be practised by all enterprises across all verticals. It will become deeply ingrained as a business strategy for most enterprises and the technology would evolve magnificently. However, effective implementation and application of a good CRM system is a must. This is where the System Integrators (SIs) come in. The future of CRM is bright indeed and the space can provide enormous benefits to SIs too. Many SIs have already gained expertise in areas within CRM such as contact management, lead management, investment management and wealth management. n charu.khera@9dot9.in

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JULY 2010