YOU VOTED - IT Managers Identify Ten Hot Technology by Manan Mushtaq

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SECURITY: Is your enterprise ready for mobile devices?

GREEN IT: Can you cut the power cost in the data centre?

STRATEGY: How do you define IT project requirements?

52 THE BIG Q

How to ensure adequate bandwidth? Page 55

TEN HOT TECHNOLOGIES

YOU

VOTED! IT MANAGERS IDENTIFY

TEN HOT TECHNOLOGIES

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EDITORIAL

Driving business value To be the last to produce a technology

trend list is a difficult decision to make.

But, at IT Next we consciously choose to do this, to avoid bombarding you with another me-too

PHOTO GRAPHY: D R LOHIA

prediction for the year. Instead, we decided to conduct a reality-check of the “commonly announced predictions” by asking your peers— the IT managers—to vote and rank the technologies that will matter during the year. The parameters were simple—ability of the technologies to leverage existing IT infrastructure of an enterprise, its level of maturity, utility, and the cost of implementation. But the outcomes were startling. Several of the technologies that ranked high on low implementation cost, faltered on either the ability to leverage the existing infrastructure or the maturity and utility front. The real surprises in the pack were the much touted XaaS (everything as a service), business-grade social networking and green IT. Sure, they made it to the top list, but scored relatively low on the utility front. The message is clear: businesses and IT managers are looking at technologies that can help them squeeze more from the existing infrastructure, and provide clear, measurable cost savings—both in terms of improved productivity and efficiency. The top three in the list, security, BI and BA, and data center transformation, clearly indicate that enterprise IT spending will continue to be driven by the business value of technology. It looks like IT managers will adjust their operational spending levels in direct proportion to corporate revenue, rather than developing or implementing new systems or going for technology upgrades. Virtualisation, which scored marginally lower than the top three technologies in the list, reinforces the fact that the prevailing economic scenario is compelling IT managers to leverage their existing IT assets to the hilt, helping organisations keep their capex low. The one exception, however, is security. The fact that IT managers have rated it high on all parameters points to the fact that it continues to be a major concern area. But merely protecting devices will not serve any purpose. It needs to map the real business data. Watch out for the pitfalls though.

“IT managers are looking at technologies that can provide clear, measurable cost savings” S H U B H E N D U PA R T H

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TECHNOLOGIES

THAT MATTER INDIA’S IT MANAGERS REVIEW, ANALYSE AND REFLECT ON THE LATEST TECHNOLOGY TRENDS—AND VOTE ON THE ONES THAT WILL MAKE THE CUT THIS YEAR.

Page

INSIGHTS

BOSS TALK

INTERVIEW

27 Defending new boundaries How to secure your mobile enterprise environment

34 Getting ’em work from home Telecommuting employees can deliver big gains

While cloud computing offer some great benefits, the transition may not be easy for an enterprise

42 Playing the storage nutritionist Data tiering, virtualisation and green-orientation are among the vital nutrients that will help you arrive at the right mix

46 Making the right connections The right cabling solution must be standards-compliant and appropriate for both existing and future application needs

05 Take more on your plate | The much vaunted right time, right place adage is no longer relevant. What really works is all time, all place

24 “We have an edge over Google Apps” | Ponani Gopalakrishnan, VP at IBM India Software Lab talks about the benefits of LotusLive

C OV ER DES IGN/ILLUSTRATIO N: ANIL T

38 Moving away from terra firma

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ITNEXT.IN

MANAGEMENT Managing Director: Dr Pramath Raj Sinha Printer & Publisher: Vikas Gupta

EDITORIAL

Page

Group Editor: R Giridhar Editor: Shubhendu Parth Consulting Editor: Pravin Prashant Associate Editor: Shashwat DC Sr Correspondent: Jatinder Singh

PUTTING THE SQUEEZE ON ENERGY CONSUMPTION | Rationalising power cost at data centers can help build a greener enterprise

OPINION

OFF THE SHELF

06 Money Wise: Costliest not always the best | by Alok

64 Wipro launches green PC | A sneak preview of enterprise

Kumar, CEO, Sears IT & Management Services

products, solutions and services

DESIGN Sr Creative Director: Jayan K Narayanan Art Director: Binesh Sreedharan Associate Art Director: Anil VK Manager Design: Chander Shekhar Sr Visualisers: Anoop PC, Santosh Kushwaha Sr Designers: Prasanth TR & Anil T

59 Tech Talk: Resolving the ‘Open’ dilemma | by Jaideep

SALES & MARKETING

Billa, Advisor to Chief Architect & CEO, Polaris Software Lab

15-MINUTE MANAGER 49 From Fat to fit | How to manage the IT operating budget 50 Office Yoga | Asanas for

stress relief

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CUBE CHAT 60 Aspire to inspire | “A leader

52 Healing Achilles’ heel | Managing project requirements, budget and timelines 54 Power Dressing | 5 simple steps to buying the right suit

should not shy away from taking new responsibilities,” says Ranganathan N N, Joint Manager, Business IT Solutions at Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services

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BOSS TALK | NILESH SANGOI

MANAGING IT

Take more on your plate

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“The much vaunted right time, right place adage is no longer relevant. What really works is all time, all place”

It talks about the Google founders, and describes how technology has changed the way we live and work

critical to thoroughly understand fundamental theories and principles before learning through hands-on practical work. This foundation helps tremendously. And even while you do that, do not forget that in today’s environment a good CIO is one who comprehends technology and business equally well. So, take keen interest in the business your organisation is in, the market scenario, competition, business processes and the ways the business and the end consumer can be served better with the help of technology. In some organisations, there is a clear line drawn between IT and users. It should be ‘we’ rather than ‘us versus them’. Work very closely with other departments to see how you can help them make IT a business enabler. In the end, let me repeat that the much vaunted ‘right time, right place’ adage is no longer relevant. What really works is ‘all time, all place’. So never flinch from taking new and higher responsibilities. What you take on today without asking, might be yours for the taking tomorrow.

WRITERS: DAVID A VISE & MARK MALSEED PUBLISHER: PALGRAVE MACMILL AN PRICE: INR 295.00

The author is CTO of Meru Cabs and an open-source enthusiast who believes in being hands-on whenever possible. He has also served as AVP-IT at Star India

SUGGESTION BOX

PHOTO GRAPHY: MEXI XAV IER

ave you noticed something strange about human nature? While we acutely aspire for power and authority, we want to lay hands on them with minimum accountability and effort. I have often come across managers aspiring for higher positions, waiting for what they call the right time to show their skills and talent, little realising that they should be doing it all the time. The idea that one needs to wait for a particular opportunity to display one’s skills is grossly erroneous. Gone are the days when indulgent bosses used to mentor their juniors in the ‘guru-shishya parampara’. With competition becoming intense and time getting compressed, the current crop of juniors are expected to excel by the dint of their abilities and commitment if they really want to be noticed and mentored by their seniors for fast-track growth. So what should an IT manager, who desires to become the CIO some day, do to impress his bosses and score over his peers? He should proactively take more on his plate. Never evade assuming higher responsibilities just because they are not part of your job description. But how should you go about it? Typically, a CIO likes subordinates to whom he can assign a task and forget about it. Therefore, ensure that your boss does not have to continuously remind you about the task assigned. Keep communicating to him the developments, both good and bad. Also, remember that when you are escalating a problem to your boss, you present a few possible solutions, and your recommendation. This will make decision-making relatively easy for the boss and earn you higher responsibilities. To be able to do that, ensure that you build a very strong foundation of technology knowhow during the initial years of your career. It is

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INBOX

JANUARY 2010 IT NEXT THANKS ITS READERS FOR THE WARM RESPONSE http://www. scribd.com/ doc/25549135/ITNext-Vol-1-Issue-1 IT NEXT VALUES YOUR FEEDBACK

We want to know what you think about the magazine, and how we can make it a better read. Your comments will go a long way in making IT NEXT the preferred publication for the community. Send your comments, compliments, complaints or questions about the magazine to editor@itnext.in.

“It was nice to go through the first issue of IT Next, which focuses on the significant contribution made by IT managers in the growth of an organisation. This is the only magazine that provides IT mangers with ample guidance on how to become the next generation of CIOs. The magazine does well by focusing on upcoming issues and recent trends in technology both from infrastructure as well as applications side.”

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SUBHASIS NAYAK Manager (IT) | Bata India Ltd

The magazine looks good in content and on the gloss scale. The article on GST is good. Other articles in Insight section are also good. However, the magazine can do with lesser and smaller photographs. The cover story is good, but has missed out on the opportunity to highlight that today’s CIOs also help in the strategy process and are not limited to merely executing what someone else determines. This, of course, requires experience, competence and “industry-specific” perspectives. Going ahead the magazine should include a feature on “Musings” or “Higher Plane”, “Weekend Byte” or something else which will get the CIO talking of other interests or different perspectives than just about IT. An in-depth case study will add value to the readers and will be in keeping with your overall look, theme and feel. The magazine should also take up unusual issues or topics and get to depth and bring a refreshing perspective. It would also help to get a few international quality bloggers to write and contribute. I can see that you are structuring to be different. I feel you can work to become the Forbes India of the IT magazine world. Some additions, some de-emphasis, some emphasis will help. NAGARAJ BHARGAVA COO | Synaptris

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Brilliant IT magazine! I am sure it’s going to be read by every CIO in the country very soon. Very well laid out, fantastic design, coverage from logistics to Cloud… superb advertisements backed by all market leaders. Way to go! SHIVA SHANKAR SHIVA Vice-President & Head—IT Infrastructure & Security (Operations & Engineering) | Reliance Communications

It was a nice feeling to realise that I am actually reading something which has been exclusively designed for my community of IT managers. As you have pointed out in your editorial, the IT managers’ community often goes unnoticed in the entire gamut of IT and IT delivery. Thanks for bringing out a magazine for us. While the first edition is spot on in the content and presentation, I would like to know more about the best practices in IT strategy as this will help growing organisations to rise up to meet the growth challenges. But it is definitely a Maybach :). PRASAD REDDY Manager-IT & Administration | Prelude Systems

Excellent work! Hope you can keep up the quality. L C SINGH Founder CEO | Nihilent Technologies

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I read through the magazine and found it excellent. Despite there being other similar sources of information in the market, IT Next stands out on many counts— while the content is surely fabulous, I am impressed with the look and feel factor as well. Overall, I think it’s a great effort from your end and kudos to the entire team! SANCHIT VIR GOGIA Senior Analyst-IT Services | Springboard Research

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OPINION

MONEY WISE ALOK KUMAR CEO, Sears IT & Management Services

Costliest is not always the best

PHOTO GRAPHY: MEXI XAV IER

e all have learned the hard way that cost cutting and cost reduction need not wait for a recession to strike. However, recession has certainly taught all of us the lesson that high budget necessarily does not convert itself into high business benefits. It is only validation and participation from all levels that an organisation can achieve the right balance between what it spends and the benefit from IT investments. In the current day corporate scenario, most of the companies do not have any formal or detailed IT budget. IT is always considered as an expense, despite the fact that without it the business cannot operate anymore. I have mostly seen planning for IT happening on an ad hoc basis, and requirements reaching the CIO’s desk as if they have dropped suddenly from the sky. What this means is that the IT department has little room to plan. Most of the time and energy goes in managing what is at hand, and very little focus is accorded to integrating business and IT, or planning how business can better leverage ICT. It is very apparent that organisations that have understood the power of IT have benefited immensely from the same. Remember the days, when visiting a hotel for our dinner, our first glance used to be on the right hand side of the menu. Our taste buds were guided by the cost–the lower the better. This mindset is all pervasive in every walk of today’s corporate life. A budget is based on what the company can afford, and there is

“Always plan technology for your needs, not on the basis of what you can afford” always a gap between the needs and the capacity. Therefore, it is obvious that with limited budget, the business benefits can never reach anywhere close to the business needs. Unfortunately, most organisations give low priority to IT planning. Technology, now being the backbone of almost every organisation, is akin to the nervous system of the company. Its breakdown will mean direct loss of business and, therefore, must be accorded a priority similar to sales, manufacturing or other core functions. When Deming and JM Juran started their quality campaign in the 1980’s, the mantra was “Quality is everyone’s

job”. Consequently, the quality of manufacturing, has undergone a sea change. Similarly, IT is so embedded in almost every organisation that it has to be everyone’s concern, and not that of the CIO alone. The day, this understanding is embedded in the mind of all CXOs, they will witness a sea change in the benefit technology can bring to their business. Here are a few tips that can help IT managers reap rich benefits even with low IT budgets. Always plan technology for your needs, not on the basis of what you can afford. One should look for solutions that fit the budget without compromising needs. For everything there is a solution. You have to put in extra effort to look around, or strike a balance where necessary. Don’t forget to review the actual benefits achieved after the project. As an IT manager, you should never ignore the fact that gaps will continue to exist between the plan and the actual expenditure. But the key to success lies in reviewing and reducing the gaps in the future. You can achieve that by making your IT an internal business. Effective programme management and control within IT and user departments will deliver far more benefits without spending anything extra. To do that you need to have the benchmarks to compare performance. But do not stop there; try to create your own benchmarks for others to follow. In the end, remember that your wants may always not be the needs of the organisation. Think, involve others and evolve a consensus on requirements. By doing this and more, you can achieve the same result or even better ones by spending less. So the next time, you are asked to make an assessment, remember the thumb rule, costliest is not always the best. The author has been a tech leader for more than a decade, and has been associated with companies like Hutchinson and the Reliance Group. Currently, he is heading Sears IT & Management Services India

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UPDATE

HP, Microsoft to simplify solution TECH ALLIANCE | Understanding the rising complexities of IT

environment across the globe, tech giants HP and Microsoft have entered into a partnership to jointly invest US $250 million in developing solutions aimed at simplifying the technology environment for enterprises. The partnership will enable the two companies build and integrate technologies like Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft SQL Server applications, and Microsoft Hyper-V Server with HP’s hardware,

E MOSBTIL ORE APP

The joint solutions are designed to simplify technology environments for businesses of all sizes

Advertisement support for mobile applications will generate almost 25% of all mobile app store revenues by 2013

(REVENUE PROJECTIONS IN US $ MILLION)

Application stores to be a core focus area for the mobile industry in 2010

30000

29,479

25000 20000 15000

4,237

6,770

2013

2010

5000

2009

10000

TRENDS DEALS PRODUCTS SERVICES PEOPLE

storage and networking gear. This will help HP prepackage “machines” for particular applications. The two companies are also looking at eliminating complexities of IT management and automate existing manual processes through the cloud environment to lower overall costs. Taking the partnership further, the two have also decided to increase their global investment by 10 times, to drive new opportunities for the 32,000 HP and Microsoft Frontline channel partners. The companies will also work towards developing solutions that can respond to changing business requirements by seamlessly converging server, storage, network and application resources in a self-managed environment. The deal is expected to impact earlier alliances made by IBM and Oracle to save enterprise costs and Cisco, VMware and EMC on private clouds. According to Microsoft, the integrated portfolio would be complemented by new design, implementation and support services for the joint solutions. Both companies will also work towards modernisation of application services for large Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) implementations and business intelligence (BI) solutions. This integration also intends to deliver power and performance optimisation, while ensuring interoperability in a heterogeneous data center environment, the two companies claim.

PHOTO GRAPHY: PHOTOS .CO M

UPDATE I N D U S T R Y

SOURCE: GARTNER, DECEMBER 2009

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SECURE YOUR IDENTITY

AUTOMATE YOUR PC BACKUP

SPEED UP YOUR CONNECTIVITY

Trend Micro’s 2010 edition of Internet Security Pro claims to secure online identities of users in an advanced way. The product is priced at Rs 1,890 for a single PC and Rs 2,890 for a three-PC licence.

Seagate Replica, the new PC backup device, can eliminate manual need for the PC backup process and can store up-to-date copies of everything at a single click.

Netgear RangeMax Dual Band Wireless-N Gigabit Router WNDR3700 has been designed to fulfill the high broadband connectivity needs of enterprises. It is priced at Rs 9,900.

Google introduces storage on tap TECH TIDINGS | Google docu-

ment users can now create and share all kinds of online documents. While the company will still limit users to 500KB for Microsoft Word documents, and 10MB for PowerPoint presentations and PDFs, the new limit for all other files that cannot be converted into a Google Docs format is 250MB. The company has, however, put a cap of 1GB on the amount of space for non-Google Docs files that are stored within Docs. Users can upgrade though, by buying additional storage for 25 cents per GB per year.

The new cloud storage capability will help enterprise

The new cloud storage capability will help enterprise users collaborate on various kinds of large format documents, as also enable them to make

AROUND THE WORLD

changes without having to worry about saving it in different storage devices. Those using premium versions of Google Docs can also use their accounts for remote backup. The move is not surprising, considering that Google has been trying to push its own cloud-based operating system. It is expected that Google will try to offer as many essential cloud services as possible before it launches the Chrome OS netbooks. The company further states that the Premier Edition Google Apps customer will be able to seamlessly upload many files at once and sync them with their desktop in real-time using third-party applications. With the battle of cloud heating up, the announcement is expected to stir the soup for many biggies, including Microsoft.

QUICK BYTE

Wireless backhaul:

30 lakh base stations by 2012 IDC predicts that the APAC carrier network equipment market will have 30 lakh base stations and over 18 lakh cell sites by 2012—a growth of 24.3% and 10.7% respectively from 2008-09. Half of these sites will be connected to fibre through Carrier Ethernet. Urban 3G/HSPA base stations will be linked to fibre by 2011 in most markets. The main driver of this transformation is the need for mobile operators to provide high bandwidth services with incremental capex outlays.

CISCO CEO JOHN CHAMBERS ON THE COMPANY’S GROWTH FORECAST

“THE COMPUTER SWITCHING COLOSSUS IS CHANGING FROM THE INTERNET’S ‘PLUMBER’ TO A PLATFORM AND PROVIDER OF PRODUCTS FOR ONLINE WORK AND LEISURE”

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UPDATE

Global IT spending to touch $3.4 trillion in 2010 of 9.3%. While Gartner expects the Middle East and African market to the global economy may be headed grow by 7.7%, it predicts 7% increase in for a recovery, international research Asia Pacific IT spending. firm Gartner has predicted that the However, the report cautions that world will spend US $3.4 trillion on IT the recovery in Western Europe, in 2010. The projection exemplifies a United States and Japan will continue significant improvement from 2009, to register slower growth. While when worldwide IT spending regisIT spending in Western Europe is tered a negative growth of 4.6%. expected to grow by 5.2%, Gartner The report further predicts that all predicts that the US and Japan market major segments, including computing spending would grow by 2.5% and hardware, software, IT services, 1.8%, respectively. telecom, and telecom services, will The report, however, grow in 2010. points out that it is important According to the research SPENDING IN ASIA PACIFIC to understand the impact firm, IT spending growth in TO GROW BY of exchange rates on the emerging markets—except markets as well. The growth, central and eastern Europe, it says, is largely attributed and some of the Gulf states— to a projected decline in will lead the way, with Latin the value of the US dollar America registering the Source: Gartner compared to 2009. highest spending growth

TECH TRENDS | Giving indications that

Oracle completes Sun takeover

Update.indd 10

NEERAJ GILL Managing Director – India & SAARC, Polycom

IT NEXT: How useful are the presentday conferencing solutions? GILL: Present-day conferencing solutions are well equipped to bring in operational efficiency, business continuity, and help in reducing travel cost, giving competitive advantage for swift business decisions. How are you addressing the needs of IT managers? At Polycom, we value the contribution of IT managers and continue to develop a variety of resources that are useful for them. While we support our users by providing adequate training, our technical support team is equipped to help them design the right tele-presence and video conferencing solution. So, what is your recommendation for a IT manager planning to implement a high definition conferencing solution?

The company is eying to leverage two key Sun software assets— Java and Solaris for longterm strategic customer advantages

long-term strategic customer advantages. With the completion of the acquisition, Oracle will now be able to fully utilise the potential of its solution by adding the high-end features of Solaris.

An IT manager should always consider factors like target users and existing conferencing environment while planning for a high definition conferencing solution. One should also consider what types of content would be shared—spreadsheets, detailed schematics, and whether the proposed solution is interoperable and future-proof and uses industry standards. Most importantly, IT managers should take measures to ensure that today’s investment should be of value tomorrow. By Jatinder Singh

PHOTO GRAPHY: JAYAN K NARAYANAN

M&A | Oracle has announced that it has completed the takeover of Sun Microsystems. The US $7.4 billion deal was pending approval for the last nine months. While the US Department of Justice approved the acquisition last year, the European Commission gave its go ahead only last month. The acquisition will enable Oracle to add servers, storage, SPARC processors, Solaris operating system, Java, and the MySQL database to its portfolio of database, middleware, and business applications. The company is eying to leverage two key Sun software assets—Java and Solaris, for

INTERVIEW

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UPDATE

Verizon offers full SAP suite on the cloud The service is targeted at medium to large organisations looking to use SAP at a lower cost

TECH TIDINGS | Taking a step forward

to realise its cloud ambition, Verizon has introduced a new cloud-based SAP service. According to the company, the service enables enterprises to more effectively deploy and manage essential SAP applications such as financial analysis and logistics management, while reducing complexity and controlling costs. The company claims to support the entire SAP portfolio, including software for customer relationship management, enterprise resource planning, product lifecycle, supply chain and corporate services. The service is targeted at medium

NEWS @ BLOG

to large enterprises that are looking to adopt cloud-based applications. The company says that it will offer custom service-level guarantees that extend beyond server and application availability to include transaction and business process metrics. While Verizon will provide service support using its dedicated help desk in India, San Francisco and UK, customers will also have visibility into their SAP environment through a Web interface. The offering has been certified by SAP, and the platform already supports 100,000 customers globally.

TECH TIDINGS

HP expands security portfolio Betting big on rising security threats and growing business complexities, HP has introduced new security solutions and services in key areas of technology infrastructure, consulting and training, for both conventional and managed business environments. According to the company, the new services and solutions will be part of the HP secure Advantage portfolio. It will include applications, business continuity, content, data integrity, data center, end points, networks, identity and access management, risk management, and security operations. The company claims that each category of offering is supported by many individual services and capabilities for various types of information security needs. With this announcement, HP aspires to become a single-point source for addressing diverse security needs of an enterprise. The new security solution is also expected to help HP improve its Enterprise Services division offering. The company has previously acquired IT outsourcing firm Electronic Data System (EDS) for $13.9 billion in 2008, which is now called HP Enterprise Services.

OPEN IS GOOD FOR IPAD, SAYS ADOBE CTO FLASH WAS ORIGINALLY DESIGNED for pen computing tablets, about 15 years before that market was ready to take off | Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch in his blog < http://tinyurl.com/ITNext-Kevin-Lynch-on-iPad>

There has been much hue and cry over the non-inclusion of Flash on the latest gadget, with Apple CEO Steve Jobs calling Adobe “lazy” and Flash “too buggy” for its devices. Lynch subtly debunked Apple’s “walled approach” stating that, “the Web should remain an open environment with consistent access to content and applications regardless of your viewing device”. F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0 | IT NEXT

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COVER STORY | TECH TRENDS

10 TECHNOLOGIES THAT MATTER

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TECH TRENDS | COVER STORY

The robust performance of the Indian economy over the past few months has reinforced the belief that downturn, at least in India, is well and truly behind us. IT budgets that were hurriedly slashed a few quarters ago are being slowly reinstated. Shelved project plans are being revived, and IT managers are once again being tasked to identify and evaluate technologies that can help their organisations capture and monetise new opportunities, and improve operational efficiencies. The beginning of a new year is also the time when industry experts and vendors

of IT managers evaluate and rank them on four dimensions:. 1. Leverage of existing IT assets: With increased organisational emphasis on cost control, the ability to reuse and leverage existing technology and infrastructure is a huge plus since it not only helps optimise capital expenditure but also reduces the difficulty of transitioning to a new paradigm. 2. Maturity of technology: Technology maturity often has a direct correlation to ease of installation, deployment and management. IT managers responsible for ensuring application and infrastructure reliability tend to

INDIA’S IT MANAGERS REVIEW, ANALYSE AND REFLECT ON THE LATEST TECHNOLOGY TRENDS—AND VOTE ON THE ONES THAT WILL MAKE THE CUT THIS YEAR. BY DEEPAK KUMAR ILLUSTRATION: ANIL T

identify the latest technology trends and make predictions for the year. This is also the time when IT managers responsible for creating, maintaining and operating corporate infrastructure and services recommend and select the technologies and solutions for their organisations. A big challenge for IT managers making these decisions is to cut through the hype and hyperbole—and identify the ideas that will matter. The IT Next team identified a range of technologies that have the potential to make a mark in 2010—and asked the community

value technology maturity over novelty. 3. Potential benefits and utility: Evaluating a trend or technology on this parameter helps organisations sift hype from reality. Issues like return-on-investment and time-tomarket are important considerations here. 4. Cost of implementation: Superior or new technologies often come at a significant cost, or can become expensive to deploy. A discrete assessment (of the technology) on cost considerations ensures its relevance. We now present the Top 10 Technologies that will matter this year.

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COVER STORY | TECH TRENDS

CONCEPT & METHODOLOGY

SECURITY 2.0

The perennial concern with security has not reduced

WHY THIS SURVEY IT Next asked IT managers to rate the top technology predictions and trends for 2010 on a 5-point scale.

OVERALL SCORE

3.41/5

THE PARAMETERS The technologies were evaluated on a set of four parameters:

3.26

1. Leverage of existing IT 2. Maturity of the given technology

OVERALL SCORE

4. Low cost of implementation (of the technology) EXPERT EDITORIAL PANEL R Giridhar, Group Editor, 9.9 Media Dr Neena Pahuja, CIO, MAX Healthcare Institute Basant Kr Chaturvedi, Head ITPerfetti Van Melle India Shiva Shankar, Vice President & Head - IT Infrastructure & Security Operations & Engineering, Reliance Communications Shubhendu Parth, Editor, IT Next Deepak Kumar, ICT/Media Market Researcher and Consultant RESPONDENTS/SAMPLING IT Next conducted a survey amongst 41 IT managers in various verticals across the country. While a majority of respondents were from Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore, cities like Hyderabad, Pune, Nasik, Ludhiana, Vadodara and Bhilai were also represented. THE METHODOLOGY Each respondent rated the identified technologies on four selected parameters. The averages of these scores were then taken to arrive at the final scoresâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and the Top 10 Rankings. We also pulled out a few additional technologies to include in the Following Five list. The reason to have this separate list is that while the benefits of these five technologies may not be realised during 2010, these would still be the ones to watch for. Also, for specific industries or companies, their relevance could grow more rapidly over the following months.

2.79

GREEN IT

3.26

2.96/5

3. Potential benefits and utility for the organisation

3.64

Controling spiraling power costs and contributing to CSR go hand-inhand

2.87 3.26

3.21 2.87

OVERALL SCORE

2.97

3.17/5

3.56

2.87

2.54 VIRTUALISATION

3.08

The focus remains on leveraging existing IT assets and capex in control

2.54 2.87

2.79 2.44

OVERALL SCORE

2.75/5

PRIVATE CLOUD Marrying the benefits of a cloud model to the security of traditional set up appeals to many

2.44

3.03 XAAS Despite its advantages over box-based pricing models, interoperability issues are a concern

OVERALL SCORE

2.73/5

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TECH TRENDS | COVER STORY

LOW COST OF IMP

LEVERAGE OF EX

LEME

ISTI

BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE & BUSINESS ANALYTICS

NTA TI O

3.27/5

2.67

U T IL I T Y

Rapidly changing business environment drives the need for greater data savvy amongst users

OVERALL SCORE

3.33

3.23/5

3.67

MATURIT Y

Ease of management and greater efficiency are driving this trend

3.26

3.33

TOP 10

DATA CENTER TRANSFORMATION

2.90

3.69 2.90

TECHNOLOGIES FOR 2010

SCORED

1-5

SCALE

2.62

2.54

2.62

2.79

OVERALL SCORE

2.62/5

3.03

BUSINESS-GRADE SOCIAL NETWORKING

3.28

3.00

While managers recognise the power of the tools, changing corporate culture to use them efficiently will be a challenge

3.03 3.33

2.72 3.00

OVERALL SCORE

3.04/5

ENTERPRISE MOBILITY

2.67

OVERALL SCORE

3.00/5

Note: Dus ea vellessunt vel is endis dolupta ssuntemquist qui sundipsapis et porioremque nus a inihil id magnam, atquas

UNIFIED COMMUNICATION

Convenience and ubiquitous connectivity drives greater interest in the technology

The twin benefits— intra-organisation coordination and one-session query resolution—propel this to the fore

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COVER STORY | TECH TRENDS

Security 2.0 Just protecting devices in the network will not suffice—the focus of security needs to be the data

3.41

OVERALL SCORE

PITFALLS Putting more emphasis on security solutions and somewhat less on the security policy could lead to a breach of data.

speedier damage control in the aftermath of the crisis. Market intelligence teams in enterprises are now placing greater emphasis on such tools to help their organisations captivate on new opportunities as the economy recovers. While business intelligence focuses on monitoring operational information for understanding the gaps and taking corrective measures, business analytics aims to perform a predictive analysis of the market and the business. In today’s globalised and highly competitive marketplace, BI and BA tools can help your organisation compete better. Line managers increasingly rely on their IT counterparts for improved performance management. IT Next urges you to evaluate and recommend BI/BA tools that can be neatly integrated with your enterprise IT systems, and help market intelligence and marketing teams in your organisation use the data to formulate smart growth strategies.

As 2010 sees uptake of several community-based technology and communication paradigms like UC, TP and Social Media, the traditional perimeter security models will need to change and give way to a paradigm that is more user-driven and user-propagated. Information dissemination and user awareness will play a more important role, and IT managers will need to pay more attention to implementing security policies in a relatively open and dynamic IT framework. Now that the boundaries of enterprise networks are no longer rigid, with partner and client networks meeting in fuzzy zones, protecting devices in the network is not enough. Even protecting the servers and storage devices that contain data will not suffice—the focus of security has to be on data. IT Next is of the view that it would be meaningful to develop security policies that lay greater emphasis on data and information protection, followed by endpoint protection and network protection. Essentially, it is about having data at the center of the security policy. It would be advantageous for IT managers to use the social media and integrated communication tools to sensitise users about security policies, and develop security champions for addressing security-related concerns in the dynamic enterprise.

Business Intelligence and Analytics 3.27

OVERALL SCORE

While BI can help analyse business information better, the value is in performing a predictive analysis

PITFALLS The biggest showstopper could be the quality and format of underlying data that can mar effectiveness of a good BI/BA solution.

The economic crisis that caught many enterprises and governments unprepared, also spawned the realisation that a greater use of BI and BA tools could have facilitated a

HOW THEY RANK

SECURITY 2.0 BI & BA DATA CENTER VERTULISATION Rank

= Low Cost of Implementation

= Level of Maturity

5 = Utility

= Leverage of Existing IT

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TECH TRENDS | COVER STORY

Data Center Transformation Virtualisation, server rationalisation, site consolidation, and energy management are ideal ingredients of a data center transformation recipe

3.23

OVERALL SCORE

PITFALLS

The wide variety of solution perspectives on data center transformation carries the real risk of adopting a solution or architecture that may not be the right fit for your organisation.

While ‘measured green’ alone would be a good enough reason to initiate a data center transformation, there are other equally strong reasons to do it.

These include measurable cost savings, improved productivity and efficiency across the organisation. The ideal ingredients for a data center transformation would include virtualisation, server rationalisation, site consolidation, and energy management. IT Next advises IT managers to develop a data center transformation roadmap that will distribute the capital expenditure (capex) over a period of years while ensuring return on investments for each year or a periodic interval. For example, you could identify inefficient and energy

hogging servers and chart a phased plan to replace these by smart form factor servers that are more efficient. Data centers often operate with more-than-surplus cooling equipment, to fight off ‘hot spots’ that get built up in certain zones due to air-flow deficiencies. Experts have pointed out that most data centers suffer from the problem of over-loading and that the solution lies in identifying the hot spots and creating airflow in those zones. You colud draw measurable benefits by installing energy monitoring and management software in the data center.

Virtualisation

could reduce the need for additional licensed software— A virtualisation strategy will help you get the best out and reduce the need to virtualise of your IT infrastructure. Evaluate and perform a mid- applications. Overall, the larger your term adjustment, if necessary organisation, the more visible would be returns Given that the most pronounced goal of virtualisation is to leveron a virtualisation age existing IT infrastructure and reduce buying, its relevance OVERALL investment, especially for for you as an IT manager will continue to be very high in the SCORE large and larger-amongprevailing economic situation. So, stick to your virtualisation the-medium enterprises. roadmap, and do the necessary adjustments and refinements, if you are already working on one. If not, put your virtualisation act However, vendors are also offering virtualisation solutions for smaller together, especially if you have a data center to manage. In general, server and storage virtualisation will make immediate businesses. ITNext believes that in a sense because redundancy of these resources is usually high in many dynamically evolving market organisations in India. Adoption of desktop virtualisation and application virtualisation and technology scenario, a twowould work on a small scale, at least through 2010. One, because phased approach to virtualisation for virtualised desktop environments to be cost competitive, the is the way to go: while need-based implementations need to be fairly large-scale, something that one may part-virtualisation projects not be inclined to consider, particularly when transitioning through a should be rolled out for quick benefits, end-to-end, full-blown recovery phase. Investments in application virtualisation could be worth postponing virtualisation projects may be while the SaaS paradigm gains momentum. That is because SaaS evaluated from a long-term

3.17

PITFALLS Security issues get amplified in a virtualised environment because a large number of virtual machines could be exposed. Virtualisation can also cause managementrelated issues, due to increased complexities.

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COVER STORY | TECH TRENDS

3.04

OVERALL SCORE

PITFALLS

UC works in an IP environment with a large number of components. Making them work seamlessly and reliably could be a big challenge.

There is always the risk of user acceptance (of a EM solution) being compromised by management issues or security concerns.

Unified Communication

Enterprise Mobility

The key advantage of UC lies in its ability to resolve a query in a given session. This increases productivity, and reduces resource and time costs

Enterprise mobility solutions will give businesses much-needed dynamic flexibility in competitive market places

costs. This is radically The commonly accepted different from traditional key components of a UC OVERALL communication which SCORE solution are: e-mail, relies on a single medium, instant messaging, IP say email or telephony, telephony, and presence, with video conferencing and would typically involve multiple sessions spread over getting added to the suite. The benefit is the integrated many days, even weeks, to connectivity among different close a query, business deal or communication media and customer complaint. IT Next recommends UC, platforms like texting, voice and video. It allows the user especially because the cost of to switch from one medium to implementation is not high, another, literally at the click of and given that UC leverages and integrates existing a button. You can use UC in your communication platforms like organisation for, say, a customer IP, hybrid PBX, e-mail and IM query resolution, within the in the enterprise. span of a given session, to increase productivity and reduce resource and time

The scope of enterprise mobility ranges from intrapremise to inter-premise, and from intra-city to inter-city connectivity, and seamless access to enterprise applications. As enterprises strive to better compete in the marketplace, enterprise mobility is becoming a key differentiator. Enterprise mobility is expected to register higher adoption levels across a wide range of verticals in 2010. The fact that laptop shipments will continue to grow at much higher rates than desktops, and smart phone shipments are already higher than PC sales, is a testimony to the ground being ready for enterprise mobility. IT Next believes that enterprise mobility solutions will give businesses the much-needed dynamic flexibility in competitive market places. In particular, if you manage IT in businesses such as insurance, retail, logistics, transportation, manufacturing and healthcare, adoption of EM could bring in substantial business benefits, and also simplify concerns such as location tracking and integrated view of inventory.

HOW THEY RANK

ENTERPRISE MOBILITY UC GREEN TECHNOLOGIES PRIVATE CLOUDS Rank

= Low Cost of Implementation

3.00

= Level of Maturity

5 = Utility

= Leverage of Existing IT

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TECH TRENDS | COVER STORY

Green Technologies

centers, we could be heading to a serious situation. Besides addressing the concern of rising enYou as an IT manager have a pivotal role to play here: you can ergy costs, the focus on ‘green’ can contribuse ‘green’ to effectively address the ute to CSR and sustainability initiatives concern, while also contributing to your organisation’s CSR and As an IT manager, you may have been witness to sustainability initiatives. power and cooling requirements associated with IT risA good market development ing to alarming proportions. You may even be is that the cost of deploying directly affected if this expense now goes from green IT has come down the IT budget, as is the case for an increasing significantly with IT OVERALL SCORE number of organisations. vendors now shipping green A couple of years ago, a report by the IT as a mainstream rather Environmental Protection Agency of the US than in a niche product. estimated that data center energy usage would nearly IT Next is of the view that double by 2011 over 2006 levels if the then prevailing you are ideally positioned to operating practices continued. While there is no similar be a green agent, and bring study for India, the rate at which data center adoption about the change in your has grown over the past couple of years leads to the organisation. Make the most of conclusion that the situation could be much worse. this opportunity to contribute, If we take into account the fact that power supply and save the environment. situation in India is not dependable and that gensets have become a way of second life for most data

2.96

PITFALLS A ‘green rush or overdrive’ could lead to IT spending that is disproportionate to savings derived from the implementation. It could also lead to higher overall carbon footprint due to speedier replacement of equipment in a shortened timeframe.

Private Clouds

PITFALLS Cloud management technologies are beginning to mature, and are expected to undergo more evolution going forward. Currently, they may not be able to accommodate all virtualisation and infrastructure technologies in their current forms.

economic sense if the vendor is able to package infrastructure, Get your vendor to package infrastructure, platforms, and applications platforms, and applications together for together in a seamless fashion as a robust solution. And, contrary greater economic benefit to perceptions, private cloud offerings in 2010 will be useful A private cloud is an emulation of the public cloud in a and economically viable even for controlled enterprise environment. Given the perceived smaller businesses. IT Next suggests that as advantages of (public) cloud computing, and the secuyou take calculated steps rity and availability concerns surrounding it, a towards private cloud private or internal cloud holds the promise of computing for your offering the best of both worlds. OVERALL organisation, look for A private cloud, however, is not likely to SCORE good ‘appliance’ versions be as cheap as a public cloud equivalent. Yet, of such offerings. These if offered by your long-standing and trusted appliances are likely to be vendor or solution provider, IT Next suggests that you go for it. While virtualisation provides relatively cheaper, have better significant improvement in infrastructure utilisation plug-and-play characteristics, rates, a good cloud management solution can drive and would typically be a fusion of proven discrete products, say a utilisation even more. A private cloud offering would make even more platform and an application.

2.75

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COVER STORY | TECH TRENDS

XaaS Since any thing as a service reduces the risk of failure, it is a good bet when experimenting with new software and solutions

PITFALLS SaaS applications may pose integration and interoperability issues with existing enterprise applications. There can be unplanned and unexpected downtime, due to reasons beyond the control of the enterprise IT team.

HOW THEY RANK

fueled buyer interest and adoption. However, it can be correctly argued that an enterprise-wide usage would demand contract pricing to come into play, and perhaps render the cost advantage of XaaS less obvious. Yet, XaaS will have a clear overall advantage While software-as-a-service (SaaS) is the better known and talked about category, but there are over box-based pricing models, despite the leasing and financing options promoted by box others too—infrastructure-as-a-service, vendors. platform-as-a-service, and so on. All these IT Next’s opinion is that XaaS services are delivered over the cloud. OVERALL would be a particularly good bet when In India, as elsewhere, telecom service SCORE experimenting with new software and providers are emerging as mainstream solutions for non-core functions, as it XaaS channels and providers, as part of their attempt to offset falling average revenue per lowers risks associated with failure. You may user in their regular voice and data service offerings. consider XaaS alternatives for proven solutions XaaS has largely been marketed as a pay- deployed in the core, only after being convinced as-you-use or utility pricing model, which has by success studies and robust proofs of concept.

2.73

XAAS SOCIAL SOFTWARE Rank

= Low Cost of Implementation

= Level of Maturity

5 = Utility

= Leverage of Existing IT

The Following Five…

…And why they were not part of the Top 10 list

MANAGED SERVICES

WAN OPTIMISATION

WIRELESS BROADBAND

The importance and relevance of managed services hasn’t reduced so significantly as to take it out of the Top 10 list; it’s just that more avid and pronounced interest in other technologies has pushed managed services out of the tensquad. Managed services will continue to be as relevant for IT managers as in 2009, but more and more as a matter of IT routine.

IT managers have accorded very high importance to various WAN optimisation tools and technologies. Yet, WAN optimisation is increasingly being demanded as a part of the overall offering from a managed network service provider and not as a standalone genre.

The potential benefits of a wide-scale 3G/ WiMAX takeoff in India would be huge for enterprises, as they promise to make enterprise mobility, unified communication, collaboration and others more seamless, meaningful and powerful. Judging by the interest levels expressed by IT managers, 3G/WiMAX could have well featured in the Top 10 list. However, the spectrum delays will effectively make it a non-starter for most of 2010, and we expect it to have greater relevance in 2011.

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TECH TRENDS | COVER STORY

Enterprise-grade Social Software By plugging social media tools into an enterprise application or process, organisations can achieve ‘contextual collaboration’

PITFALLS The biggest pitfall would lie in the contradiction that a social media platform essentially suited for a flat world has with the hierarchal structure still so typical of enterprises.

Have you fought against the invasion that will help enterprises compete better of various social media platforms into the in the marketplace. A salient feature of enterprise social enterprise, haunted by security concerns? networking is “collaboration in It’s time to realise that the use context”. This can be achieved of social media is a cultural-cumby plugging in social media generational shift in human-toOVERALL collaboration features into an human communication. The best SCORE enterprise application or process way to defend against its perils is to enable information sharing to embrace it, with security filters built in. That’s what enterprise-grade between users right when the need for sharing is felt. social software is all about! IT Next suggests that IT managers Deployment of social media in the enterprise will earn IT managers spend time in evaluating various accolades, not just for providing the enterprise-grade social media solutions communication environment that and looking for success studies. Carry employees are already used to, but more out the deployment only after you are importantly for initiating a cultural shift convinced of the benefits.

2.62

COLLABORATION

SOLID STATE COMPUTING

In the long run, collaboration is positioned to be a superset that would encompass other genres like unified communications, enterprise mobility, tele-presence and business-grade social networking. However, the magic fabric that can seamlessly make this happen is only available now. The IT Next panel feels that collaboration as a technology still needs to mature before it can gain wider acceptance.

Solid state computing has indeed seen a highly accelerated uptake and adoption across various computing platforms. We are of the opinion that solid-state computing could surprise by beating growth expectations and be among the most significant trends to watch for in 2010. However, while the cost of solidstate storage remains 20-25 times more than that of the rotating hard drive-based storage, wide-scale adoption in India’s cost-conscious enterprises will be a non starter.

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INTERVIEW | PONANI GOPALAKRISHNAN

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PONANI GOPALAKRISHNAN | INTERVIEW

“WE HAVE AN

EDGE OVER GOOGLE APPS”

PHOTO GRAPHY: RAHUL KN

Ponani Gopalakrishnan, Vice-President for IBM’s India Software Lab, in a conversation with Shashwat DC, dwells on the benefits that enterprises can draw from LotusLive offerings, and how they compare with Google Apps What are the compelling business reasons for LotusLive? Ponani: If you really look at enterprise computing today, you will discover that the primary requirement of CIOs is a lot more flexibility in their infrastructure as business requirements are changing rapidly. This puts a lot of pressure on the CIO as the infrastructure needs to be ready to take loads during an sudden upsurge or spike in business requirements. According to our estimates, even today, huge amounts of IT infrastructure remain unutilised. According to one assessment, servers are usually utilised at close to 20% to 25%. That is a huge waste of computing power. This is what compelled people to look at other services and models, and why cloud computing came to the fore. The fact that IT budgets are flat or shrinking due to the current economic scenario has only made the

need to shift to the cloud model more urgent. So, the draw is not only lower costs, but also the ability to avoid purchase, deployment, management of hardware and software stacks, and also to ensure a lower IT administrative headcount. LotusLive is the perfect match for all these requirements. It is a suite of business networking and collaboration cloud-based services. The integrated services include email, social networking for businesses, online meetings, file sharing and instant messaging.

How does LotusLive compare to other enterprise services like Google Apps? LotusLive has built in a rich set of features that are designed to handle this range of requirements. The reason why Google Apps is not the best fit for enterprise users is because it is not designed to be one. It is essentially a conglomeration of several popular com-

ponents such as Gmail, Google Docs and Google Sites. LotusLive, on the other hand, is designed to complement the existing collaboration infrastructure. It takes collaboration to the next level by making it effortless to work with both co-workers as well as external stakeholders such as customers or partners.

Can you explain some of these features in LotusLive? Being able to collaborate seamlessly is one of the biggest features of LotusLive. A lot of applications have been designed around it. There are plenty of tools and applications that an enterprise can make use of. For instance, we support a web meeting... so if you have a small work group spread around different cities, then you can bring them around to a common meeting platform. It integrates audio, video and presentation. We also have the ability to pull

F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0 | IT NEXT

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INTERVIEW | PONANI GOPALAKRISHNAN together web conferencing. You can stream lectures to a large audience live on the web using LotusLive. Besides that, thanks to a recent acquisition (Outblaze), LotusLive provides enterprise class email with a high level of security, privacy, backup and reliability. We also have a feature that allows the organisation to host communities through Lotus Connections. Then we have a special feature for those who are transitioning to the cloud-based environment called ‘click to cloud’.

You mentioned enterprise class email. How is that better than the one offered by Gmail? Over the past many years, lot of sensitive information is being exchanged over emails, be it approval for projects, budget sanctions and strategic blueprints. All this information travelling over unencrypted public network poses a big risk. What if tomorrow someone hacks into your email account and deletes your inbox? What happens if your address book is compromised? What happens if a sensitive document is sent to someone by mistake? The current email services like those offered by Google are not designed to cope with such issues. They are great tools from a consumer perspective, not from a business-user perspective. At IBM, not only do we ensure that our products are robust and secure, but we also back them up with strong service. That is the edge we have over all Google Apps. Many enterprises already own collaboration tools. How do they integrate with the LotusLive platform? We have a dedicated team of professionals that helps com-

panies integrate their applications. Sometimes, it happens that enterprises want to integrate their internal systems. So they might want to pull some information from their ERP and be able to populate the same on the collaboration platform. We have the ability to do that. Some of that is already pre-integrated into the system, while for specific requirements we work with the clients.

What is the pricing model for the LotusLive service? It is a very compelling price. You have both group pricing andindividual pricing options, and it compares very well with what you can get from Google Apps. If you do not have a collaboration

“LOTUSLIVE IS DESIGNED TO COMPLEMENT THE EXISTING COLLABORATION INFRASTRUCTURE... IT TAKES COLLABORATION TO THE NEXT LEVEL”

Tune in to www. itnext.in/podcast to listen Dr Ponani Gopalakrishnan talk about LotusLive, evolution of cloud computing and more

platform internally, you have a choice of putting in a lot of capital investment now and doing an installation that is going to take several months. And then you have to train your users. By the time the project actually ends, it will be several months. But with LotusLive, it is instant. So the cost is not just in terms of capital or money, but also in terms of time and effort. You do not have to wait for months for a project to be completed.

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SECURITY | INSIGHT

DEFENDING NEW BOUNDARIES Growing adoption of mobile enterprise devices is compelling IT managers to bring in best security practices at their end instead of putting the onus on the end user BY JATIN D E R S I N G H

Barely had Manish Jain, senior IT manager of a mid-size packaging firm, settled down for a late dinner, that he got a call from his boss, the CIO. Apparently, the boss, who was travelling abroad, had misplaced his Blackberry and was sweating with worry. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Manish, disable the darn thing and erase the data immediately.â&#x20AC;? The instructions were prompt and precise. Manish punched in a few messages that carried a secret code and replied to a few automated responses. The CIOs device was disabled and wiped clean.

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INSIGHT | SECURITY

“FORANYITMANAGER IT IS ESSENTIAL TO DESIGN BEST BUSINESS PRACTICES TO SECURE VALUABLE INFORMATION IRRESPECTIVE OF THE LOCATION OR THE DEVICE” — Prakash Pradhan, Head IT, Jagsanpal Pharmaceuticals, India

“IT IS VITAL TO EVALUATE THE SECURITY FRAMEWORK FOR MOBILE DEVICES AS LOST OR STOLEN DEVICES CAN ENDANGER CONFIDENTIAL DATA AND COMPLIANCE EFFORTS” —Shankarnarayan Dharmarajan, Marketing Manager, Wireless, Seurity and Routing Technology Group, Cisco India & SAARC

The good thing about this incident was that Jain was aware of the remote-wiping capabilities in the device and was prepared to handle the eventuality. But that is not the case with hundreds of other IT managers. While mobile enterprise usage has grown manifold, the threats have increased in tandem. Mobile enterprise devices are not just portable but also allow users to send and receive updates in real time across branches. However, the device has also brought with it a confusing tangle of mobile platforms, with endless number of technology challenges, revolving around device provisioning, compliance, security, performance management support, and decommissioning. “It is vital to evaluate the security framework for mobile devices as lost or stolen devices can endanger confidential data and compliance efforts, causing terrible pain in the long run,” says

7 STEPS

TO SECURE MOBILE ENTERPRISE DEVICES 1

nsure that the password E protection is attuned to be ‘on’ in the mobile devices.

Install the firewall and update it regularly.

Frame policies to restrict unauthorised access and downloading of files.

I nstall a mobile management system to keep a regular check on data security policies for remote devices.

ake sure to deploy efficient M encryption policies.

uarantee your transmission G safety through enforcement of security/VPN security standards.

ring in permanent lockdown/ B automatic data rub-off feature to tackle issues such as device lost or missing for a certain period.

Shankarnarayan Dharmarajan, Marketing Manager, Wireless, Security and Routing Technology Group, Cisco India & SAARC.

Back to basics Organisations often fail to lay appropriate emphasis on cannons that are indispensable for IT security of an enterprise. For instance, have you given a serious thought to the number of times your employees expose company data, deliberately or inadvertently, through their USB and removable storage devices? And more importantly, are you constantly evaluating which data needs to be protected, at which level, and for what period? If not, then you too, might end up in a predicament similar to Jain’s. “Designing best business practices to secure valuable information, irrespective of the location or the device, is a critical job for any organisation. We constantly attempt to improve our policies as per the necessity of our operations,” says Prakash Pradhan, Head IT at Jagsanpal Pharmaceuticals. For an IT manager, managing devices, applications, data and communications proactively is critical to the success of mobile workers. While strong encryption and inbuilt password protection is critical, the devices should be managed from a central console, wirelessly, so that repair and maintenance can be done without physically bringing the devices back for service. In addition, an effective endpoint protection solution can be very effective. It not only allows analysis of application behaviour over the network, but also helps administrators restrict usage of high-risk devices and applications. The infected endpoint can be repaired by disinfecting or quarantining the system. The remedial process is then completed by deploying the necessary patch. Efficient monitoring is another vital step towards protecting confidential information. While data must be made available to mobile workers, as per the requirements, adequate steps should be taken to ensure that data is not being smuggled by any outsider. To this end, data loss prevention (DLP) solutions can be of immense help to IT managers. “With DLP solution, organisations can be sure that customer lists are not copied to USB flash drives or other removable media, source

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SECURITY | INSIGHT

WIPING THE DEVICE CLEAN BLACKBERRY Blackberry phones have this security feature inbuilt. Thus, any Blackberry Enterprise Server (BES) handset can be erased remotely via the Erase Data and Disable Handheld IT administration command over the wireless network. IT administrators can also specify if the handset should revert to factory default settings or retain the IT policy it had before. Individual users with BES can install Roblock for Blackberry 2.0, an application that remotelocks or wipes devices. The tool offers GPS tracking and also helps recover lost contacts. Users can also install the GadgetTrak app that enables remote wiping through SMS.

APPLE IPHONE Unil the recent launch of iPhone OS 3.0, remote-wiping meant much trouble. Now Apple offers a MobileMe service that lets users perform a remote-wipe on a lost or stolen iPhone. Besides, the application also allows Mac users the ability to push e-mail, contacts and calendar entries to the iPhone.

ANDROID PHONE The good thing about Android Phone is that being an open platform it offers a handful of remote security options. One such application is remote-wipe for Root users. The other application is SMobile Anti-Theft for Android.

SYMBIAN/WINDOWS MOBILE There are scores of applications that are available for Symbian (Nokia) and Windows Mobile phone. Kaspersky Lab has a product Windows Mobile and Symbian that will send SMS with a Google maps location, lock or wipe the phone, and can also send back the new number, if any other SIM is inserted. It also has anti-virus and firewall, as well as tools that can help block SMS spam.

code is not copied or pasted to a new file, design documents are not burnt to CDs or DVDs, price lists are not printed out or faxed to competitors and much more,” elucidates Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director-India & SAARC, Symantec. Automatic kill and permanent lockdown are some of the other measures that can help IT managers wipe all the data automatically in case the device fails to connect with the central console within a stipulated period of time. “Also, policies can be put in place so that not all data is displayed in all geographies. For example, certain e-mail data could be restricted to specific locations. Once outside the defined area, the data would not get transmitted,” suggests Franck Rougier, President of Blue Helios, a New Yorkbased consulting firm. “It’s indispensable to get employees trained in the basics of security. There are several minor things like regularly

changing the pasword or not auto saving them, which can strengthen or weaken the entire data security plan,” says N Rangnathan, Project Manager at Mahindra & Mahindra.

Multi-flavoured menu “Security labs see thousands of new malware samples every day and it is simply not possible to create detection signatures for each of them. So, different detection and protection techniques like whitelisting and blacklisting are being developed. These techniques designate specific programmes as ‘known good’ or ‘known bad’ and treat them as per behavioural analysis,” says Roger Thompson, Chief Research Officer at AVG Technologies. There are many security solutions in the market, claiming to provide highest level of security for mobile enterprise devices. Vendors such as Symantec, Trend Micro, AVG, McAfee

“WITH DLP SOLUTION, ORGANISATIONS CAN BE SURE THAT CUSTOMER LISTS ARE NOT COPIED TO USB FLASH DRIVES OR OTHER REMOVABLE MEDIA” —Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director-India & SAARC, Symantec

and F-Secure have specific tailored offerings for different levels. While Trend Micro’s Office Scan 10.0 claims to defend laptops and smart phones at all levels of network, companies like Sybase are offering Afaria, a mobile device management and mobile security solution from a single console, providing protection against security threats and compliance issues. However, at the end of the day, what matters most is the implementation of a solution that not only manages and secures mobile data and devices but also provides the best ROI along with improved efficiency, customer service and, ultimately, profitability. So be well advised like Mr Jain was, and prepare in advance so you do not end up losing your midnight sleep over a lost device. Find similar stories online on the website www.itnext.in/Insight

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INSIGHT | DATA CENTRE

PUTTINGTHE

SQUEEZE ON ENERGY CONSUMPTION Rationalising power and energy costs in data centers can help improve resource allocation and facilitate the move towards green enterprises BY MOHIT CHHABRA

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DATA CENTRE | INSIGHT

T managers are at the crossroads today with the economic scenario squeezing them from all sides. On one hand, the number of IT handson-deck are being rationalised. On the other, the team is under greater pressure to make ‘wise’ decisions about IT infrastructure planning to make the best use of their existing resources. Meanwhile, demands from the business and mission critical business applications are increasing. On the data centre front, the IT manager can control costs by juggling a range of variables. Some of these are delay in capital expenditure, reduction of total cost of ownership, reduction in risks associated with remote disaster recovery and lowering of maintenance expenditure. In addition, the IT team also has the option of cutting cost by reducing energy spend in many ways—from introducing efficient cooling systems to decreasing server and storage footprints, managing data growth efficiently to storing more data within the existing infrastructure. But adopting any of these options is riddled with huge challenges. Until about a few years ago, the key challenge faced by a data centre manager was that of space and availability. Today, with technology becoming robust and efficient, and mean-time-between-failures nose diving, availability is the least of an IT manager’s worries. Energy efficiency, power density and cooling density are the top issues facing today’s data centre manager. This is obvious, considering the fact that nearly 45% of the total cost of ownership for a typical rack in a high availability 2N data centre is accounted for by power and cooling equipment. “Going after cooling equipment can actually serve two purposes. It can create energy efficiency that directly translates into cost savings thus converging the objectives of green IT with that of business,” says Bhairav Kulshrestha, Manager (IT) at Atul Group of Companies. Planning, or sharpening the axe, is a great tool to generate cost efficiencies. Like all other asset classes, data and applications should be identified and accordingly classified into categories that then deliver

an associated level of service. For instance, not every type of data needs the same level of protection, replication, disaster management and recovery services. Hence, savings and efficiencies can be gained by identifying and classifying data sets into their associated levels of service. Certain technologies are helping IT organisations get there faster.

Understanding usage patterns Most data centers are sized for peak conditions that rarely exist. According to a study by Emerson, in a typical business data centre, daily demand progressively increases from about 5 a.m. to 11 a.m. and then begins to drop at 5 p.m. However, server power consumption remains relatively high even as server load decreases. In the idle mode, many servers consume between 70% and 85% of full operational power. This means that a facility operating at just 20% capacity may be consuming 80% of the energy as the similar facility operating at peak capacity. A vast majority of server processors have built-in power management features that can be used to dramatically reduce power consumption in idle mode. However, many times, for the fear of increasing response times, the features remain disabled. It would be prudent to analyse usage patterns and re-examine the disabling of the power savings feature in server processors. Another disadvantage of building and running data centers for peak loads, is the cost of cooling. “Computer Room Air Conditioners or CRACs are fitted with fans that run at constant speed to deliver a constant volume of air flow. Newer technologies can convert these fans to variable frequency drive fans. This controls and adjusts the fan speed according to the server load, thereby optimising and bringing efficiency to power consumption,” says Pratik Chube, Country General Manager (Product Management & Marketing) at Emerson Network Power India. And these savings are easily quantifiable. For instance, a 20% reduction in fan speed results in savings of nearly 50% on power consumed by fans. The advantage of this new technology is that these variable fan-

Blade servers consume about

10 45

less power than rack mount servers of equal performance

of the TCO for a typical rack in a high availability 2N data centre is contributed by power and cooling equipment

reduction in the fan speed of computer room ACs can help cut over 50% of power consumption by these fans

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INSIGHT | DATA CENTRE

THE POWER GUZZLER Energy usage in a data centre is more or less evenly split between computing (52%) and overheads (48%). While newer technology like blade servers reduce the computing load, they often tend to generate greater amount of heat resulting in more power consumption in the air conditioning. The issue exacerbates in a tropical country like India, as companies mainly rely on air conditioning to keep servers at the right temperature. The more powerful the machine, the more is the cool air needed to keep it from overheating. Experts predict that energy costs, now about 10% of the average IT budget, could rise to 50% in a matter of years unless urgent actions are taken. Technologies like virtualisation can help reduce both the computing load as well as the air-conditioning requirement thereby bringing down the power consumption drastically.

CATEGORY

BREAK-UP

Computing

588kW

Lighting

10kW

UPS and distribution losses

72kW

Cooling power draw for

429kW

computing and UPS losses Building switchgear/MV

28kW

Transformer/other losses Total

1,127 kW

“WHEN RACK MOUNT SERVERS ARE REPLACED WITH BLADE SERVERS, IT CAN RESULT IN HUGE ENERGY SAVING” —Pratik Chube, Country General Manager (Product Management & Marketing), Emerson Network Power India

“…GOING AFTER COOLING EQUIPMENT CAN CREATE ENERGY EFFICIENCY THAT DIRECTLY TRANSLATES INTO COST SAVINGS…” —Bhairav Kulshrestha, Manager (IT), Atul Group of Companies

speed drives can be retrofitted into the existing CRACs with minimal investment, one which pays back for itself within a year.

Shifting to save The whole drive within the IT community to shift to blade servers along with server virtualisation may not have been driven entirely by energy considerations but these shifts have certainly had a huge impact on energy consumption. Blade servers consume about 10% less power than equivalent rack mount servers because multiple servers share common power supplies, cooling fans and other components. “It is estimated that when 20% of rack mount servers are

replaced with blade servers, it results in a 1% saving on total energy consumption,” explains Chube. Similarly, a shift towards server virtualisation results in consolidation and savings. The consolidation of as many as 10 or more physical servers into one yields amazing efficiencies. It is estimated that virtualisation can provide an additional 8% reduction in total power consumption at a data centre. Indeed, something to aspire for and execute!

ITNEXT<space><your feedback> and send it to

567678

*Special rates apply

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INSIGHT | TELECOMMUTING

GETTING ’EM FROM

WORK HOME Telecommuting employees can deliver big gains only if enterprises adopt robust technologies and the right policy measures

BY P R AG YA S I N G H

ork is something we do, not something we travel to. While this is not yet a catch phrase in Indian organisations, but it seems well on its way getting there. With urban centres such as Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad getting more congested, the corporate sector is presenting its employees flexible work options that enable them to cut travel time and boost productivity. A recent survey conducted by IDC revealed that 81% of executives polled across the Asia-Pacific region strongly agree that telecommuting improves productivity. In 2005, only 61% thought so. For a growing number of businesses, telecommuting has

proved to be favourable for both employer and employee. If your company is in a business where employees do not need to be physically present to carry out work, or if your organisation is facing problem finding an adequate and suitable workspace, then telecommuting can be an answer. The concept has come of age, thanks to the availability of high-speed connectivity and handheld devices, at least in major Indian cities. According to Kalyan Banga, Research Analyst at AMI Partners, “Telecommuting penetration is on the rise across Indian enterprises, particularly amongst SMBs. While it has increased from 3% in 2006 to 11% in 2008 amongst smaller companies, it has jumped from 8% to 27% amongst medium level enterprises. These figures

point to the growing importance of telecommuting among Indian SMBs.” In small businesses, telecommuting penetration is highest among professional businesses followed by manufacturing units, that have remote production facilities and specific service needs. However, in the medium business segment, the penetration is highest in the banking and finance sector as they have agents and brokers working from remote locations. But, like in other technology deployment, the concept cannot be rolled out without a proper enterprise strategy for telecommuting. IT managers need to understand a host of issues—from security to performance management, policies for data classification and defining access rights—to prepare their organisations.

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PHOTO GRAPHY: PHOTOS .CO M

TELECOMMUTING | INSIGHT

Says Dr Deepak Shikarpur of Computer Society of India: “Telecommuting is possible wherever there is clarity in the role, and data security is in place.” In addition, telecommuting requires robust technological support to enable hassle-free communication between the organisation and the employee. According to Shikarpur, a PC with wide screen and high bandwidth Internet with adequate audio is the minimum setup needed for home operation. “Secured access to the corporate network is also a must,” he says, adding, “Privacy at home and a good telephone instrument with speakerphone facility would be ideal.”

Security and performance management Security becomes a major issue in telecommuting. Adopting measures such as secured access to business data, phone systems, applications

HOW TO MAKE IT WORK n Provide telecommuters with proper technical, technological and logistical support to ensure that they are able to do their job effectively n Put in place proper data security measure to avoid intrusion or cyber attacks triggered from a telecommuter’s system n Install a mobile management system to keep a regular check on data security policies for remote devices n Ensure adequate communication infrastructure is in place for real time interaction and collaboration from point-to-point, and point to multi-point n Frame policies to restrict unauthorised access and downloading of files n Help telecommuters understand the tools, and provide special handbooks or reference guides to help them use technologies, access information and expertise

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INSIGHT | TELECOMMUTING

TECHNOLOGY IS THE KEY A lowdown on technologies that you need to consider to enable telecommuting in your organisation.

Virtual Private Network (VPN): This is a private network that connects your offices and remote users via a virtual connection over the internet. Some of the major vendors that provide VPN solution include Avaya, AT&T Business Data Services, Axcelerant, Cisco, CheckPoint, NetSilica, Neoteris, Positive Networks, Plethora Technology, Fortinet and Sonic Wall. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP): VoIP involves the transmission of voice communications over IP networks such as the Internet. Services like Skype are extremely popular among small and medium businesses. It lets users make PC-to-PC phone calls for free. To make calls to landlines and mobiles, you have to pay. You can also ask your telecom service provider to provide VoIP connectivity or opt for fullfledged VoIP network and phones. Companies like Avaya, Cisco, Nortel and others offer these technologies. Instant Messaging (IM) software: IM is real-time communication via typed text and is a useful tool for keeping tele-workers in touch. Free IMs abound, with GTalk and MSN leading the pack. You can also opt for paid IM services for greater reliability and security, or explore IBM Lotus IM and Microsoft Office Live Communications Server technologies.

and other resources through secured, wireless and fast Internet connections can go a long way in making remote functioning possible (see box “How to make it work”). For long-term benefit, it is important for an organisation to put in place a clear-cut security policy as well as performance measurement tools. It also needs a way to handle softer issues by clearly articulating the total number of work-hours for such employees, and vaccation time. Amit Malik, Vice-President–East, Cisco India and SAARC, says, “Telecommuting is feasible only if the organisation has structured performance management approach in place.” According to him, organisations need to be very transparent about how to assess a telecommuting employee’s work and productivity. “We also have clear processes and advanced communication technology in place that allows employees to work efficiently, no matter where they are. As the employees’ bonus is mapped onto productivity, it also provides a clear reason to deliver on work assigned,” he explains.

Hurdles and benefits Despite the fact that the advantages of telecommuting, such as increase in number of productive hours, better professional and personal life

ON THE UPSWING 2008

Audio & video conferencing software: These are packages that allow an array of group and individual communications including VoIP, IM and video conferencing. Options range from audio-only to complete presentation support and webcasts. Citrix GoToMeeting, Cisco TelePresence, WebEx and Microsoft Office Live Meeting are some of the options available. Remote access technology: Using this technology, your team can access their computers stationed in the office. GoToMyPC is one of the leading service providers of this technology. For small businesses, they have a central admin center that lets you manage team collaboration. Collaboration systems: Collaboration software is a key need for effective group interaction particularly when the group members are in far-flung locations. You can start off with something inexpensive as Google Docs. Or try Office Live. There is also Zoho, a comprehensive set of web-based programmes targeted at small and medium sized businesses.

27%

2006

11%

3% Small enterprises

Medium enterprises

The SMB sector has been a big driver of telecommuting in India for two main reasons. One, as a tool to cut real estate cost; and second, to ensure employee stickiness by enabling better work-life balance. Source: AMI Partners

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TELECOMMUTING | INSIGHT

“TELECOMMUTING IS POSSIBLE WHEREVER THERE IS CLARITY IN THE ROLE, AND DATA SECURITY IS IN PLACE” —Dr Deepak Shikarpur, Computer Society of India

“IT CAN BRING IN POTENTIALLY LARGE GAINS IN PRODUCTIVITY AND SUBSTANTIAL SAVINGS IN BOTH TIME AND COST” “TELECOMMUTING IS FEASIBLE ONLY IF THE ORGANISATION HAS STRUCTURED PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT APPROACH IN PLACE”

—Rajesh A R, Vice-President, Temporary Staffing, TeamLease Services

—Amit Malik, Vice-President – East, Cisco India and SAARC

balance, less exhaustion due to reduced or no commutes and, more importantly, reduction in carbon footprint outweigh the negatives, the proportion of organisations adopting telecommuting is still small. Many employers have difficulty in breaking free from the ‘keeping an eye’ mindset, and evaluating the employees on the basis of their physical presence, rather than their performance. However, providing flexible working options does enable organisations to retain the best talent, even when they are facing personal problems. In the

case of women staff, this option works particularly well during times of family pressures or maternity leave. Says Rajesh A R, Vice-President (temporary staffing) at TeamLease Services, “The concept can bring in potentially large gains in productivity and substantial savings in time and cost. At the same time, it offers good work-life balance to the telecommuting workforce. However, for these benefits to come to fruition, it is extremely important for companies to have excellent performance management systems in place.”

Besides, telecommuting can also help enterprises in terms of talent retention and offering the staff flexibility on a regular basis, or when they are on long vacation or leave. However, to be the change agent driving the concept, IT managers need to carefully explore the options provided by various vendors. They also need to examine the various technology options (see box: Technology is the key) and weigh the pros and cons before offering a solution that can help the organisation extend this facility to employees.

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2/10/2010 5:05:35 PM

INSIGHT | CLOUD COMPUTING

MOVING TERRA FROM

AWAY FIRMA While cloud computing offer some great benefits, the transition may not be easy for an enterprise. But if you knowwhat to expect, you can prepare for it BY S H AS H WAT D C

“A hundred years ago, companies stopped generating their own power with steam engines and dynamos, and plugged into the newly-built electric grid. The cheap power pumped out by electric utilities didn’t just change how businesses operate. It set off a chain reaction of economic and social transformations that brought the modern world into existence. Today, a similar revolution is under way. Hooked up to the internet’s global computing grid, massive informationprocessing plants have begun pumping data and software code into our homes and businesses. This time, it’s computing that’s turning into a utility.” —Nicholas Carr in the Big Switch

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CLOUD COMPUTING | INSIGHT NO OTHER TECHNOLOGY has been so much in the news as cloud computing. The ability to provision hardware and software remotely seems to have taken enterprise computing by storm. Products and services built around this concept by companies like Salesforce.com, Amazon, IBM, Google, Microsoft, and others have proliferated in the market today. Much like the clouds that hover over us in real world, cloud computing has cast its spell on enterprise data centers, enticing IT decision-makers. In his book the ‘Big Switch’, Carr likens cloud computing to the all pervasive electricity grid network and postulates that we will be using computing resources in the service model. Thus, in a cloudy world if you require extra storage or processing power, there will be no need to buy a storage box or extra RAM. Just call in the cloud service provider (CSP) and get instantly. And yet, even as we are gung-ho about the cloud and the future, there seems to be some confusion about what exactly cloud computing is. First it was SaaS (Software as a Service), then PaaS (Platform as a Service). More recently we have IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service), CaaS (Communication as a Service) and even XaaS (Everything as a Service). What are these? Just like clouds which have many varieties like cirrus, cumulus, nimbostratus, there are many forms of cloud computing. All these acronyms represent different paths leading to one goal: Kingdom Cloud, where everything gets dynamically and remotely done in a cost effective manner. That’s as far as the concept goes. The real issue is in shifting to a cloud-based setup within an enterprise. And no matter how easy the vendors portray it to be, it is not a slam dunk. Many IT managers, who made the shift from a traditional on-the-premise infrastructure to a SaaS or an IaaS model, recall with horror the transition process. In fact, the more complex the current infrastructure, the more vexing the shift will be. Interestingly, most of the challenges that crop up are not technical ones, but process or people oriented.

So, if you are planning to climb on a cloud, here is what you need to guard against.

Do you really have to? Agreed, cloud is cheap, is easy to use and green too. But do you really need to be on the cloud? The decision to shift to a platform should not be dictated by technology, but by business concerns. Thus, the first thing to be assessed is whether or not the cloud suits the requirement, and the nature of your business. For instance, a retail chain with presence across the country is a good candidate for cloud, while a creative agency with a single office is certainly not. Even when there is a match, there may be functions that should not be sent to the cloud. Shiva Shankar, Vice-President and Head of IT Infrastructure and Security Operations at Reliance Communications warns, “I see very little understanding of cloud in the industry today. This technology will evolve and meet all the security issues, over time.” He advises organisations to stay away from the public cloud for CRM, ERP or any financial applications. “Within the organisation, one can create a private cloud for such apps so that the infrastructure and resources can be effectively utilised. There are several applications in each business that can go to cloud, and I would not hesitate to move them to the cloud to exploit the advantages,” he adds. Another factor to be borne in mind is the growth projection of the business in the near-term and long-term horizon. Ideally, a fast-paced growth can be easily supplemented by cloud computing. Though even in times of placid growth, cloud computing can come handy as a cost saving measure.

How secure is the cloud? Crooks and hackers are always on the lookout for vulnerabilities to exploit, and systems that can be compromised. In such a scenario, trusting a third party vendor with sensitive information can be fairly nerve-wracking. Even if the vendor has fortified its networks against attacks or intrusion, do not forget that the data will

“I DO NOT THINK IT IS PRUDENT TO JUMP INTO PUBLIC CLOUDS… PEOPLE NEED TO CONSIDER THESE NEW CONCEPTS WITH EXCELLENT PLANNING DURING IT REFRESHMENT, AND IN A PHASED MANNER” —Ratnakar Nemani, CIO & Head—IT Projects Wing, VST Industries

Overall awareness level of cloud computing in Asia Pacific (excluding Japan) SOURCE: SPRINGBOARD RESEARCH

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INSIGHT | CLOUD COMPUTING

1 SEVEN-STEP

CSP SELECTOR

BUSINESS VIABILITY Pedigree: Brand visibility of cloud service provider, entrepreneur track record, management, strategic investors or VCs Financials: Balance sheet, cash flows, VC funding rounds, equity structure

Collated by Sameer Kulkarni, Head—IT Automation Architecture (Data Center Business), Reliance Communications

Commitment level: Capex committed to cloud per-se, R&D or innovation budget Roadmap: Expansion plans announced publicly and commitment to growth Industry rankings: Assessments from third party analysts like Gartner, Yankee and IDC

“THERE ARE QUITE A FEW SECURITY CONCERNS, AS YOUR DATA IS TRAVELLING ON PUBLIC NETWORKS” —Vishwajeet Singh, National Manager – IT, FCm Travel Solutions be travelling up and down a network channel that could be compromised. Vishwajeet Singh, National Manager– IT, FCm Travel Solutions agrees that hosted models are becoming more popular because of instant availability

2 STRATEGIC CAPABILITIES Manpower: Quality of manpower, average industry experience, qualifications, certifications, attrition rate Partnerships and tie-ups: Published track record of partnerships (the more the better) Forums: Forums hosted, steered, sponsored Patents filed: (if any)

“THE MAJOR ISSUE WITH CLOUD COMPUTING IS THE ADOPTION, AND THE ROI FACTOR” —Ajay Kumar Meher, VP – IT, Sony Entertainment Television

of the desired platform or solution. However, he warns that enterprises need to consider various aspects while adopting for such a solution. “Most of the time it is not very easy to customise the solutions available on a

3 PORTFOLIO AND PRICING Portfolio: Breadth and depth of portfolio offerings, medium to long-term roadmap Pricing flexibility: Maturity and flexibility of the pricing model and up sell model

hosted model. Secondly, it is dependent on Internet and external networks. And most importantly, there are quite a few security concerns, as your data is travelling on public networks,” he says. An IT manager needs to not only review the security policy of the Cloud Service Provider (CSP) but also do a robust check on how the data will travel between the organisations and the service provider. The starting point would be to do a vulnerability analysis of the current infrastructure, and examine the security and privacy policy of the CSP. And don’t forget to examine the legal policy as well—namely if the network is compromised, who is liable for it. Always remember, for a CSP your data is merely a business. For you, it is a lifeline.

Is it really cost effective? ‘Save money, oodles and oodles of it’ is the pitch that all CSPs make. While there is some truth in what they say, it is not the complete story itself. “Though flexibility is guaranteed and upfront payments avoided, the issue of higher cost still bogs cloud users,” states Upal Chakraborty, CIO at DLF Limited.

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CLOUD COMPUTING | INSIGHT

OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE Portal experience: Portal of a company says a lot about it (how rich, contemporary and up to date?)

Customer empowerment: Extent of “self-care” automation of customer and service life cycle management Real time visibility: Real time reporting, application visibility, topology, dependency maps Notification & escalation process: Means, processes and sophistication Disaster recovery: Architecture, tools and readiness

Web enablement: Degree of sophistication in web enablement of customer operations

TECHNOLOGY ARCHITECTURE Choice of platforms: Choice of virtualisation platforms, servers, OS, ISVs Eco-system: Extent of vendor neutrality, migration, commitment to open source option

SLAS AND CONTRACTS Measurements: How transparent is the measurement and reporting, and is it automated Enforceability: Contractual terms and obligations to the SLAs

Extensibility: How seamlessly extensible (on-tap available) is the compute, storage and network

The confusion is further aggravated by the numerous CSPs and their varied offerings. Depending on the service provided, CSPs have a tiered pricing model. The best way would be to study the different pricing models in detail, and make a valued comparison. Also, remember that vendors yield to negotiation; so do not feel shy to bargain. “The major issue with cloud computing is the adoption, and the ROI factor,” says Ajay Kumar Meher, Vice-President– IT, Sony Entertainment Television. He further classifies the enterprise apps as commodity type (e-mail), and that of enterprise class (ERPs and SCM). “Taking the first one on the cloud may be feasible, but pay back will be more time consuming than creating one. For the second type, the apps are very customised and getting them migrated to cloud (third party) will be very difficult. Besides, getting the desired SLA may also be difficult at times,” he warns. Another factor, and often the most critical one in making the shift is the issue of legacy infrastructure. Do not forget to account for the migration time, and the costs of the legacy and in-house applications. The devil clearly lies in the details; do not forget

to examine them thoroughly before committing yourself. “Apart from these issues, some of the barriers are privacy, security and regulatory compliances in different countries. Unless these issues are addressed, I do not think it is prudent to jump into public clouds as of now. May be people need to consider these new concepts during IT refreshment in a phased manner,” advises Ratnakar Nemani, CIO & Head—IT Projects Wing at VST Industries.

Are you ready for the after? Cloud computing should be viewed as a journey to the end and not an end in itself. There are numerous issues that could go wrong along the way, and it is always good to know where the parachute is. The important thing is to be clear and firm on the SLAs. Work with the CSP to define and detail what exactly the commitment of 99.9% uptime implies, and what happens if it is not. Well worked SLAs can save a lot of trouble in the long run. And then finally, what happens if you do not want to be in the cloud anymore? It is important to work that out before you join in, cautions

7 SECURITY AND LEGAL Privacy policy: Stated privacy policy and enforceability Jurisdiction: In which country is the CSP located and covered by what jurisdiction

Manjit Tomar, Business Development Manager at Wipro Infotech. “Plan ahead for the exit route, and have options for the time when you decide to move away from the cloud,” Tomar suggests adding that, organisations might need to move away from the cloud due to relationship or technology issues. “You need to have a standby plan for such situations. Provision the necessary conditions in the agreement with the cloud provider so that you are safe in case you need to move away from the cloud computing service. Outline clauses that will detail how you can get your data back. These clauses should outline the data formats and how you can handle migration of this data onto your future application,” he advises. In the end, remember that going on to the cloud or staying put should be based on well thought out plan and not merely because you should be on it. We all know that clouds can be very unpredictable in real life. They may not be different in the enterprise space too.

How did you like this story? Send your feedback at editor@itnext.in

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INSIGHT | STORAGE

PLAYING

STORAGE THE

Data tiering, virtualisation and green-orientation are among the vital nutrientsfor sustaining your storage infrastructure. A quick ground-check will help you arrive at the right mix BY D E E PA K K U M A R

PHOTO : PHOTO S.C OM

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STORAGE | INSIGHT As enterprise data volume continues to grow in a colossal fashion, an IT manager is challenged to keep the storage infrastructure responsive to information and compliance needs, both from within and outside the organisation. IT Next will help you find the way out. But first, you need to answer a few questions. Does all data in your organisation have equal storage importance and retrieval priority? Do you have no budget constraints when it comes to buying additional fibre channel (FC) disk arrays? Has the economic slowdown also slowed down your storage requirements? Of course, a common answer to the queries would be a clear no. Now that we have done that, let’s see how it can be of help.

Add, add, add…? Traditionally, that is what we have been doing. We have bulk-stored enterprise data on arrays of disks, and kept adding disks when the data inflow exceeds the installed capacity. After a while, the process starts appearing as mundane as adding chairs in the back of a conference room as new attendees keep pouring in. And you thought data storage was about information lifecycle management (ILM)? Yes, it is indeed about management! In fact, the task is getting more and more complex by the day, not to mention that adding disk arrays linearly is going to make this complexity even more baffling. So what is the solution? Before coming to that, let’s first visit the answer to question number 1: not all data are equal. Why do we then treat all data as almost equal? We store all enterprise data on the same storage media without discrimination. Agreed, the prevailing data storage practices are an outcome of tradition than of your conscious choice. But then, probably it is time for one to take more conscious decisions, proactively. We need to segregate data by its sensitivity, access

priority, compliance requirement, and other parameters. We need to be costconscious and prudent in choosing the storage media.

You will also be able forecast for cumulative storage needs—the trick is to keep adding each passing year’s data to cumulative storage.

Getting started

What storage management system is currently in use, and what are its advantages and disadvantages?

Running a detailed audit of the storage infrastructure and needs in your enterprise should get you started. The objective is to discover the following:

What is the total installed capacity and how much of that has been utilised? This is not just to estimate the capacity that will be available but to also gauge how much capacity is being utilised on a cumulative basis versus annually. In other words, this is to get a ratio of the archived data versus current data. This first level of data segregation gives you a simple, yet effective basis for determining how much of higherspeed storage media is necessary while the rest can reside on lowerspeed media.

Which kinds of storage media have been deployed, and what is the distribution? This will give you an estimate of how much storage media is available across high, medium and low-speed segments. This, along with data segmentation, should get you started with mapping the high-priority data to high-speed storage media, and help document the need for procuring any additional media. Along the way, you will also get to know if low-priority data is sitting on high-speed storage and take the necessary corrective measures. Essentially, high-speed storage could be freed up for use by high-priority data.

How many users are there in the enterprise and how much data do they generate annually? This will help you forecast the additional storage requirement for the coming year, and even for a three to five year period. It can also help you forecast storage requirements by speed segments.

Without the right management system in place, even cheap storage can lead to a higher overall spend in the long run. An ineffective management system would also result in more energy costs associated with higher runtimes.

What is the level of virtualisation, if any, that has been carried out? While cost saving by way of leveraging existing storage infrastructure is a major driver of virtualisation, another important benefit is that it enables easier handling of heterogeneous storage environments, something that is quite common due to the “add, add, add” strategy. The other management benefit of virtualisation is that it gives you an effective way to deal with file-based data in a secured manner. A point to remember here is that while virtualisation helps improve utilisation, it is not an alternative to the tiered approach. A right mix of the two should be considered. Subhasish Saha, Chief Technology Officer at Apeejay Surrendra Group says that his organisation found an audit to be extremely rewarding in highlighting core issues. “We had three striking observations. First, we did not have any policies of storage across the organisation. Second, storage provisioning was in silos without any optimisation thrown in, which resulted in utilisation levels varying from 10% to 95%. Third, demand for business critical application data was the lowest,” he elaborated. Appejay Surrendra implemented a virtualisation solution from a leading vendor, which has already resulted in consolidation of 15 out of 40 servers and improved utilisation by 35%.

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INSIGHT | STORAGE

How many tiers? So you may have guessed by now that it is about having a maximum of threetiered storage architecture… almost. Almost, because IT Next will also recommend ‘flashing’ it up with a thin fourth layer at the top to address ultra-fast access needs in certain situations. Shailesh Joshi, Head IT at Godrej Properties says that his organisation is in the process of developing a tiered storage system. “Our goal is to reduce backup cost while ensuring improved performance and better service levels. With increasing importance of compliance, digitisation of corporate assets has gained importance. Items like contracts, e-mails and transaction records need to be stored and retrieved on a regular basis. Also high availability of data is of prime importance nowadays,” Joshi points out. The standard prescription for tiering is: FC or equivalent in Tier 1 for the high-priority data, SATA or equivalent in Tier 2 for bulking it up, and tapes in Tier 3 for backing it up. In fact, tapes have demonstrated a proven advantage over disk drives, not only in terms of cost but also in terms of low power and cooling costs. To add to that, compliance guidelines for financial accountability of regulated companies will require more and more data to be retained for years to support any audit or investigation into company records. Compliance requirements would also warrant that data is not altered or tampered after being stored. Write Once Read Many (WORM) tape drives are an ideal cost-effective fit for such requirements. Great! But what was that fourth layer we recommended above? Flash!

Icing on the cake Given the technological advancements in flash drives, it makes good IT management sense to use a pinch of these solid state storage devices to add flavour to your storage recipe. True, the cost of flash is still prohibitive, perhaps 20 to 25 times the cost of disk-based storage. But then,

“OUR GOAL IS TO REDUCE BACKUP COST WHILE ENSURING IMPROVED PERFORMANCE AND BETTER SERVICE LEVELS” — Shailesh Joshi, Head IT, Godrej Properties

“AN INTELLIGENT AND TIERED APPROACH TO FLASH, FC AND SATA WOULD BE BENEFICIAL” —Sanjay Lulla, Director – Technology, EMC Corp

that is precisely the reason why we did not recommend using it even in Tier 1. Sanjay Lulla, Director–Technology at EMC Corp says, “An intelligent and tiered approach to flash, FC and SATA would be beneficial. It would be great if flash, FC and SATA drives are used as target for specific portions of an application workload. It would be even better if there is an intelligent application that could migrate content between these tiers seamlessly, based on business policies.” What we do believe is that flash can deliver more than the money spent on it if it is used to store just the metadata part. That is why we call it a storage layer and not a tier. Vendors have already come up with flash-embedded servers that help you achieve this objective. This also makes your storage greener as flash uses less energy than the rotating disk drives. Needless to say, flash boosts the performance of your storage system.

With high-speed metadata access becoming a reality, you will also see information lifecycle management (ILM) making more sense. Predicting the trend, Chuck Hollis, an industry veteran and blogger of many years’ standing, had in 2006 said: “Information is so important, it’s going to need an owner, the way a CFO owns money or HR owns personnel. I think IT will need to evolve to an ownership role regarding information policy and management… ILM is but one manifestation of these trends.” That holds even truer today. Storage is indeed about ownership of information, its management and accountability. Therefore, keeping the storage system dynamic, agile and fit is the key to successful IT management. Own the health of your storage systems. Play the nutritionist. The author is an independent ICT/Media market researcher and consultant

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INSIGHT | STRUCTURED CABLING

MAKING THE RIGHT

N N O C I C N E TO S The right cabling solution need not be bleeding-edge, but must be standards-compliant and suitable for existing and potential application requirements BY JATIN D E R S I N G H

A CABLING CALL THAT the IT team at Birla Tyres took almost a year ago is now serving the country’s fifth-largest tyre manufacturer well. The Cat 6-based solution provides uninterrupted bandwidth and availability to meet the company’s ever-growing applications requirements, ranging from data and voice to video. Looking back, Birla Tyres was determined to take a holistic view of the cabling infrastructure, as it also planned to integrate the networking infrastructure at their two Orissa-based production units. They believed that this approach would not only save on the overall capital expenditure but also lead to an improved ROI. The team evaluated a number of solutions from different vendors and even took inputs from external consultants to arrive at the best fit for the organisation’s strategic needs.

“

of network related problems occur because of a wrong decision in deploying efficient structured cabling solution

”

—Milind Tamhane, Vice President- ITS, Manufacturing, Digilink

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STRUCTURED CABLING | INSIGHT S Ojha, who is the IT Head at Birla Tyres’ Balasore unit says, “Appropriate planning for cabling is a prerequisite to avoid any issues in the performance.” Structured cabling indeed has come a long, long way from the times when it would attract only peripheral involvement of IT managers…

Planning matters

When Birla Tyres planned to augment their production capacity to 500 tonnes of tyres per day, the IT team decided to take a close and careful look at the structured cabling plan, as part of the bigger IT infrastructure plan. The company wanted to take a holistic view of the cabling infrastructure, as it also planned to integrate the networking infrastructure at their two Orissabased production units. Of course, it was necessary that the solution be standards-compliant. Finally, a combination of Cat6 copper cable and single-mode fiber optic structured cabling was selected. While factors such as vendor’s reputation, high quality performance, budget and lower installation costs influenced the company to select the solution, the decision to upgrade to the Cat6 standard was largely driven by the high bandwidth requirement to support future applications. Emphasising upon the detailed planning that went into determining the right solution, Ojha says, “There is always ambiguity over the bandwidth needed to support future communication models. Therefore, an appropriate planning is a prerequisite to avoid any issues in performance.” Agrees Milind Tamhane, Vice President-ITS, Manufacturing at Digilink: “78% of network related problems occur because of a wrong decision in deploying an efficient structured cabling solution. The irony is that many organisations in India still do not understand this logic.”

Identifying the right solution Given lower TCO as a top priority, the need is to identify solutions that facilitate

more efficient operations, reduced power consumption and lower life cycle costs. IT managers, should, therefore carefully assess the future voice and data requirements of the organisation when planning for a new cabling system. While Cat 5e solutions are still being considered for environments where the applications are not very bandwidth intensive in nature, Cat 6 solutions are perhaps seeing the largest share of greenfield deployments. Cat 6A solutions which offer 10G Ethernet over unshielded twisted copper have gained a great deal of traction over the last couple of years, especially in data center environments. For higher requirements, fiber is still a preferred media, also because it is immune to electromagnetic interferences and cross talk. However, technological advances have also made copper-based solutions for a number of applications. Market data suggests that over 85% of all new installations will be cabled with Cat6 solutions, which costs about 35% more than the Cat5e. In view of this significant cost difference, it is often argued that if there is no visible requirement for high-gig applications, or if your organisation has plans to move to a new premise or site in 2-3 years time, then Cat 5e solutions may still be worth considering. However, such exceptions apart, Cat 6 solutions are a de-facto standard. This also helps you accommodate other IT initiatives such as Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE), IP convergence and server virtualisation. “IT professionals upgrading or deploying their network today should therefore consider MPO solutions, highdensity solutions, higher bandwidth cabling, and cable management that ensures reliability, flexibility and scalability,” says Dileep Kumar, Director of Product Management, ADC Krone, India & SAARC. Another high-gig copper standard is Cat 7, which is a shielded technology, aimed at supporting 10G for high-speed bandwidth intensive applications. However, the adoption Cat 7 standard

SOLUTION “IFISTHE DEPENDABLE

AND ADHERES TO STANDARDS, SUBSTANTIAL AMOUNT OF OPEX CAN BE SAVED ON ITS UPKEEP OVER A LONG RUN

”

—Ajay Kumar Pandey, DGM (IT), BL Kashyap

“APPROPRIATE PLANNING

WHILE GOING FOR CABLING IS A PREREQUISITE TO AVOID ANY ISSUES IN THE PERFORMANCE —S Ojha, IT-Head, Birla Tyres, Balasore Unit

”

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INSIGHT | STRUCTURED CABLING has been relatively limited in India, which primarily remains a UTP (unshielede twisted pair) country.

Sticking to standards

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IT managers often have to deal with the problem of network going down due to cabling-related problems. In most cases, according to the industry experts, the problem lies with the substandard cabling systems, rather than with the hardware or the applications. To minimise this, experts strongly advocate installing standards-compliant based solution (such as TIA/EIA and ISO) rather than proprietary solutions. “If the solution is dependable and adheres to standards, substantial amount of operating expenditure (opex) can be saved on its upkeep over a long run, thus giving a better ROI for any IT manager,” says Ajay Kumar Pandey, DGM (IT) at BL Kashyap. In this context, it is also important to ask for a performance certification from the vendor to be certain of the actual delivery of the network. Such certification assures that the system will industry industry standard performance, as well as ensure the support for emerging applications. Last but not the least, a consultation from cabling design engineers will be helpful in designing the network in a way that it is not only able to accommodate future active networking equipment and technologies, but also accommodate planned changes in the easiest possible way. And of course, who would be better than you—the IT manger with the ground view of the organisation’s IT requirements—to cut through the hype and judge which solutions will be the right fit for your organisation. This ground view, combined with an informed selection process, will help you arrive at the right cabling recommendations for your organisation!

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15MINUTE MANAGER

TRAINING EDUCATION WORKPLACE COMPENSATION WORKFORCE TRENDS SKILLS DEVELOPMENT PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT

ASANAS FOR STRESS RELIEF PAGE 50

Manage IT Four steps to controlling IT opex PAGE 51 IT Strategy How to map enterprise IT needs PAGE 52 Power Dressing 5 simple steps to buing the right suit PAGE 5 4

BY M O H I T C H H A B R A

PHOTO GRAPHY: PHOTOS .CO M

arvesh Rana was befuddled. He had just stepped out of the third presentation on a foggy winter morning in Delhi. He had been looking for advice from consultants to help him enhance productivity at his Rs 150-crore auto ancillary company. All the presentations that day suggested adding a new CRM application and tweaking the existing supply chain system with some additional hardware and more software. Most of these systems would pay back for themselves within a year or two, promised the guys in blue suits. Somehow, Sarvesh felt this approach to enhancing productivity was counterintuitive. He desired simplicity. Unknown to Sarvesh, something similar, at a far larger scale, happened a few years ago. Mark Hurd took over the reins of HP in early 2005. His single-minded focus to trim costs was as clear then, as it is now. Some of the ‘hard’ decisions he took then seem so simple and commonsensical, with the advantage of hindsight.

Hurd at HP Hurd came in during good times and sliced off 15,200 jobs, or almost 10% of the company’s headcount. He then led the initiative to slash the company-wide use of applications from 6,000 to 1,500.

MANAGE IT

FROM FAT TO FIT

Surgical interventions on IT operating budget can deliver benefits without loss of efficiency

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15-MINUTE MANAGER

OFFICE YOGA

By Dr Naveen Arya | aryansclinic@gmail.com

ASANAS FOR STRESS RELIEF Watch out for signs that indicates you are stressed COGNITIVE SYMPTOMS MEMORY PROBLEMS INABILIT Y TO CONCENTRATE POOR JUDGMENT SEEING ONLY THE NEGATIVE ANXIOUS OR RACING THOUGHTS CONSTANT WORRYING

PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS ACHES AND PAINS DIARRHEA OR CONSTIPATION NAUSEA, DIZZINESS CHEST PAIN, RAPID HEARTBEAT LOSS OF SEX DRIVE FREQUENT COLDS

The basis of this technique lies in the art of breathing from the abdomen. This helps the lungs get as much fresh air as possible. When you take deep breaths from the abdomen, rather than shallow breaths from your upper chest, you inhale more oxygen. The more oxygen you get, the less tense, short of breath, and anxious you feel. So the next time you feel stressed, take a minute to slow down and breathe deeply. l Sit comfortably with your back straight. Put one hand on your chest and the other on your stomach. l Breathe in through your nose. The hand on your stomach should rise. The hand on your chest should move very little.

The stepping stone

l Exhale through your mouth, pushing out as much air as you can while contracting your abdominal muscles. The hand on your stomach should move in as you exhale. l Continue to breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth. Try to inhale enough so that your lower abdomen rises and falls. Count slowly as you exhale.

The body’s natural relaxation response is a powerful antidote to stress that can be achieved by deep breathing, meditation, and yoga

If you feel uncomfortable in breathing from your abdomen while sitting, try it lying on the floor. Put a small weight like book or flower on your stomach, and try to breathe so that the book or flower rises as you inhale and falls as you exhale.

PHOTO GRAPHY: PHOTOS .CO M

Taking the lawnmower approach to cutting costs may be faster and involve less effort but it runs the risk of endangering future business outcomes. Experts suggest that the first step in understanding what to cut is to find out where business has its costs. Business areas–or domains–that are consuming a lot of IT services (and thus cost) may be doing so in a strategic or tactical drive. That’s fine. But if it’s due to sloppy business processes or inefficient IT support, there is an opportunity to drive potential IT savings. A recent study by Savvis, an outsourcing provider of managed

Taking full, cleansing breath is a simple and powerful, relaxation technique. It’s easy to learn, can be practiced almost anywhere, and is the quickest means to overcome stress.

PHOTO GRAPHY: JAYAN K NARAYANAN

Hurd also forced a consolidation of HP’s data centre, bringing down the number from 85 to six! And HP’s own IT department was slimmed down to 8,000 from the original 19,000 people. All this, Hurd made clear, was with the intent to hire more sales staff. The results are clearly reflecting on HP’s balance sheet today. Hurd’s unwavering attention on trimming costs, both capital expenditure (capex) and operating expenditure (opex) have seen HP’s bottom line grow even in hard times. HP recently forecast that sales for 2009 would decline as much as 5%, but Hurd still is projecting a nearly 6% rise in profits. Sarvesh decided that he would make no additional investments in IT. “Let’s get more juice out of the existing facilities, and reduce operating costs,” he thought. Outsourcing the company’s IT organisation seemed like an intelligent and easy answer, but Sarvesh knew that the theory and practice of outsourcing were entirely different things. He knew that once he decided to outsource, it would expose his company to new forms of risk. An inferior supplier of outsourced services would only dent his relationship with his suppliers and customers, he thought. Sarvesh wanted to adopt a common pragmatic approach to reducing his operating expenses on IT without having to issue pink-slips.

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15-MINUTE MANAGER

FOUR STEPS

TO CONTROLLING IT OPEX Understand the constitution of operating expenditure. Use this analysis to list the areas of opportunity, and potential risks associated with cost cuts

Assess the impact of each cut. Review each initiative strategically in the context of its impact on finance, operations, technology and interface with clients. For instance, sometimes a tactical efficiency move might increase the risk of complexity and resource utilisation

“IT managers must proactively look for ways to improve or standardise procedures”

“We have saved a huge amount by standardising all applications for the 44 countries we operate in”

—S K Mishra, Regional Manager (IT), Raheja Builders

—Dhiren Savla, CIO, Kuoni India

“THE FIRST STEP TOWARDS COST RATIONALISATION IS TO CREATE AN INVENTORY OF ALL APPLICATIONS”

—Sanjay Mittal, Manager (IT), Indofarm Tractors & Motors

computing and network infrastructure for IT applications, reveals that the drive to reduce operating costs is a concern among IT managers at a global level. The study shows that nearly two of the five IT managers surveyed felt that standardising IT infrastructure solutions could help cut costs. Confirms Dhiren Savla, CIO at Kuoni India: “We have, in the last one year,

saved a huge amount of money by just standardising applications and support for all the 44 countries we operate in.” In the same study, more than half of the IT managers surveyed noted that the greatest cost savings would emanate from reducing infrastructure costs and introducing a virtualisation strategy. Basically, it is the magnified focus on reduction of operating expenses.

Implement cost efficiency measures in a controlled way to reap appropriate benefits, and ensure that these initiatives are correctly aligned to reduce opex

Monitor and report cost efficiencies. Once the process to build efficiencies into the system have been set, it is critical to supervise and measure them to create a self evolving system

More practical steps Fortune favours the brave and one area where IT managers must show bravado is to adopt virtualisation, which can help servers do more tasks than originally planned for. It can also help IT managers extract “more juice”. Smart thinking and configuration can enable virtualisation software to run eight machines off a single server. “IT managers must proactively look for ways to improve or standardise procedures. Internal systems and processes must be tailored to reflect the realities of the outside world,” feels S K Mishra, Regional Manager (IT) at Raheja Builders. For example, the pace of technological change is slowing down. Most developments taking place are improvements in already established systems. HP’s Hurd feels that most of the R&D investment is actually ‘maintenance spend’–expenditure that

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15-MINUTE MANAGER is needed to keep existing technology running. He is trying to cut that expense. Heavy IT users can adopt the same approach by revisiting all procedures that were developed when the pace of development was far more scorching. “Software licenses can total millions of rupees depending on the size of your workforce. A first step towards costs rationalisation is to create an inventory of all applications,” suggests Sanjay Mittal, Manager (IT) at Indofarm Tractors & Motors. According to him, while this will help provide clarity about the user and purpose of applications, it will also help the management ascertain which licenses and applications are underutilised. The screws can then be tightened to make necessary adjustments. IT managers across the board must sit and work with vendors to re-examine maintenance contracts to make sure all critical needs are covered, expenditure is routed in the right direction and all wasteful spend is eliminated.

IT-finance wedlock The final step is reassessment of service level agreements. Significant monies can be saved if the penalty clauses are removed, and service levels are rationalised. The whole data service market has seen a huge buildup in strength and delivery. Therefore, it is not a bad idea to consider what uptimes are being delivered at a commoditisation level of these services, and then fine-tune SLAs accordingly. For example, IT managers could reduce a 99% uptime requirement to 95%, and in lieu get a far more efficient pricing. Cost containment options must move beyond adoption of new technologies or improved practices. It must constantly focus on exercising sound judgment and identifying opportunities to save as soon as they emerge. An enterprise can make this possible by involving IT managers in financial planning; one must not forget that IT managers are as concerned about the colour of the balance sheet as the finance people.

IT STRAT

HEALING ACHILLES’ HEEL

When project requirements are not captured completely and correctly, project budget and timelines go haywire. How to keep things on track BY S U M A E P

t is often said that 80% of all enterprise projects that fail, do so because of basic flaws that occur at the time of defining project requirements. Numerous instances can be cited when the project, on completion, turned out to be fairly different from what was desired. The reasons, more often than not, lie in the ambiguous and unclear project requirements formulated by the team. Here is a compilation of the most common errors while creating a project requirement document, and the best way to avoid them.

Inefficient communication Misinterpretation is, by far, the biggest culprit behind the creation of wrong project requirements. It can start from the top, says Surendra Kapur, a senior business IT analyst with a leading financial services company’s India unit. “The CTO or the CIO knows what he wants out of the IT project. But he does not have the time to spend with the delivery team and work out details. So he assigns a senior IT manager to look after the project and conveys his vision to him,” Kapur explains. The senior IT manager then tries to make sense of the vision to define what is required from the project. This is often not congruent with what the CIO has in mind. If the CIO is involved in intermediate discussions, then the gaps can be sealed early enough. However, if the top stakeholders come in at a later stage a lot of effort may have been made on the basis of the senior IT manager’s briefing. Sometimes, a customer may not even have complete vision of what is required. He may have ideas that could evolve as the business analyst probes about the business and its various processes. The analyst will have to be skilful enough to not just balance technology with solid business sense, but also be extremely good at eliciting information

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15-MINUTE MANAGER

“...there is no process for requirement gathering in majority of Indian organisations” —Shivshankar Singh, DGM (Operations & Trading), BSE India

from various stakeholders. If this does not happen the IT project can land in a mess where must-have features turn into optional ones, and a debate starts on change requests. “Generally, there is an attempt to obtain requirements by asking customers or users what they want. Naturally what is actually provided is a list of ‘wants’ instead of needs,” says Shivshankar Singh, DGM (Operations & Trading) at BSE India. He reiterates that there is no actual process for requirement gathering in majority of Indian organisations, or it is limited due to time constraints, forcing the analyst to accelerate interviews and information-gathering sessions to capture the bare minimum information and then attempt to interpret what the user needs. “The result,” he adds, “is incorrectly stated requirements, missing requirements, unnecessary

requirements, too many requirements and unclear requirements.” Agrees Mohan Verma, Executive Director at PricewaterhouseCoopers when he says many times the definition of certain terms is not clear, and hence there could be a difference in their interpretation by the user groups. “For example, when one talks about customisation in ERP projects the definition is not clear. Both sides could be responsible for confusion. While the solution-provider, in his enthusiasm to push the sale, may keep some aspects of the scope blurred, the client, in his bid, to contain the cost may do the same,” he explains.

Inadequate scoping More often than not, during a pre-sales cycle while doing a scoping study, there is only so much one can do. It is only when you actually get into delivery and

“The mantra is simple. You should define the scope in layman’s language and avoid jargon” —Virendra Deshpande, Sr Manager (NOC), Reliance Big Entertainment

“The IT manager should understand the business processes or application for which the solution is required...” —Krishnamurthy Hegde, Founder of Interactive Media Worldwide community on LinkedIn

start getting into the details that you realise that many aspects of the scope have not been covered. “The scope issues may be with respect to business functionality. Or they could be about the nature of rollouts to different locations. It could also be about training the end-users , even though you may have adopted the train-the-trainer approach,” says Verma. Another issue with scoping or defining the project requirements is trying to define all the requirements upfront. According to Johanna Rothman of Rothman Consulting Group, “Users don’t know what they really want until they see it, or at least, some of it. So, using an agile approach to define and implement some requirements will work much better than trying to define all the requirements upfront.” “Gathering and defining project requirements is a continuous process. It is so critical that many companies treat this as an independent project within the bigger project,” says Krishnamurthy Hegde, Enterprise Solutions Architect and founder of the Interactive Media Worldwide community on LinkedIn. “The IT manager has to thoroughly understand the business process for which the solution or application is required. He should know what

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15-MINUTE MANAGER POWER DRESSING

5 SIMPLE STEPS

TO BUYING THE RIGHT SUIT

users are doing, how they are doing it (manual, automated, or using a thirdparty tool), their knowledge of the process and role of technology in that process,” adds Hegde.

Digging better

Feel the fabric: Suits in this part of the world are largely bought when winters set in, and thus it is not a bad idea to buy something that is 100% natural wool. Apart from providing you the protection, wool is a natural fibre, that is comfortable and durable.

Select sober shades: Experimentation is for lads. If you are buying your first or even second suit, then go for dark shades such as navy blue, gray or black. If, however, the suit is in line with a few others that you have in your wardrobe, then you could consider pinstripes. But remember to go for colours and patterns that are classic, and will withstand fashion erosion.

Style it right: If this is your first suit, then opt for a single-breasted one. It has buttons in front in one single row. If you have a heavy frame, then better avoid a double-breasted suit as it will only add bulk. Don’t forget the vent—the cut in the suit on the back. Side vents are considered more European and more suave. Never buy a suit without vents.

Fit it and forget it: Make sure the salesperson takes all your measurements. Ensure that the suit’s shoulder hugs you, and the shoulder pads do not protrude over your shoulders, and that you can button the coat comfortably. As for the coat’s length, you should be able to cup your fingers under its sides. The pants should sit on your waist and not hips.

Complement it: The suit is only complete with matching shirt and tie. The classic colours for a shirt to accompany a dark suit are light blue or white. A very formal shirt will come with linked cuffs, which are closed using cuff links or silk knots instead of buttons. However, they are going out of fashion. Ties should always be darker than the shirt.

—By Mohit Chhabra

Requirements document critical Finally, it all boils down to the requirements documentation. Hegde says, “Instead of focusing on actual use cases and interactions, people involved in requirements gathering often start writing essays on the requirements. This leads to problems in interpretation.” He further states that the various teams involved—requirements elicitation, development, functional expertise and testing—can interpret the document in different ways. “They need to be in complete sync with one another,” he suggests. Similarly, Kapur points out that companies use templates to avoid misinterpretation. Short and to-thepoint descriptions, flow charts and visual explanations are better for this kind of a document. Sums up Virendra Deshpande, Sr Manager (NOC) at Reliance Big Entertainment, “The mantra is simple. You should define the scope in layman’s language, and avoid jargon. Scope that is set by vendor and well understood by customer is the stepping stone to success of the project. Learn to manage the perception of your customer.”

PHOTO GRAPHY: PHOTOS. COM

Clothes indeed make a man. And wearing the right suit can spell the difference between success and failure. Some tips on how to select the right suit

Verma explains, “Solution architects play a key role in this process. Hence, deploying highly experienced solution architects, who bring in an appropriate blend of business knowledge and technology solution expertise, can make this exercise fruitful. “Depending on the nature of the IT solution and the maturity that the industry has attained in deploying the solutions around that technology, the template and methodology used for capturing scope can range from being very basic to very advance. The more mature the solution, higher the likelihood of good scoping,” adds Verma.

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WIRELESS

THE BIG

WHAT CHOKES MY INTERNET? EXPERT PANEL

BASANT CHATURVEDI HEAD IT, PERFETTI VAN MELLE INDIA

THE SITUATION...

CUT IT FROM HERE

“Ravinder, can you check what is wrong with the Internet again,” exclaimed exasperated Manoj Tyagi, Vice President of an investment banking firm in Delhi. “I need to urgently download the presentation that Kartik has sent from Mumbai,” he added. “I am already printing this 300 page document for the client and need a copy of this presentation to complete it,” he added, raising the alarm bell. The delegate from the UK-based company was expected to reach the office soon. Ravinder looked at his wrist watch to see the time, and it read 10:30. It had been only an hour into the Monday morning and this was already the fourth call. And all of them were about Internet connectivity. Unknown to Manoj, Ravinder was already speaking to the service provider on the other line. “Sir, your dedicated 2 Mbps line is working absolutely fine. The problem is at your end. The Your responses count. Log on to www.itnext.in/bigQ to submit your replies. The best entry will be published in the next print edition.

FALGUN SHUKL A SR GENERAL MANAGER (IT), HIKAL LTD

SURESH A SHANMUGAM HEAD-BUSINESS IT SOLUTIONS (BITS), MAHINDRA & MAHINDRA FINAN CIAL SERVICES

connectivity is clean and there are no issues,” said the customer care executive. “Please check again, it can’t be,” an irritated Ravinder said. Ravinder had hit a wall. He was the IT Manager at FreidCorp, an investment banking firm that employed 120 people at the Delhi office. The office was an icon in itself. Designed by a specialist firm from Hong Kong, the office was swank and modern. Everything was wireless, and the equipment had been pre-configured to ensure there were no problems, as some of the senior folks were Mac users. What really confused and intrigued Ravinder was that everything was working fine. The wireless printing worked well, the backups happened, but the Internet was always a problem. The ISP kept on repeating that there were no issues. But there were issues—all the time. All Ravinder could think was, “What would Sherlock Holmes do in a situation like this?” Everything, on the face of it, is fine, but something is afoot. Getting to the bottom of mystery was gnawing Ravinder.

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THE BIG Q

THE BIG QUESTIONS... WHAT COULD BE CHOKING THE INTERNET BANDWIDTH AT FREIDCORP? THE

DEDICATED 2 MBPS LINE SEEMS TO BE WORKING WELL AT THE SERVICE PROVIDER’S END.

WHAT SHOULD RAVINDER DO TO PERMANENTLY SOLVE THE PROBLEM?

HERE ARE THE ANSWERS... ‘BUILD A WIRED NETWORK’ FIRST ANSWER

BASANT CHATURVEDI Head IT, Perfetti Van Melle India About me: Consummate tech professional with expertise on SAP platform. In the past have been associated with Basell India and Seagram India

The closest analogy to this problem is that your car hit a bottleneck. That’s because the eight-lane freeway you are driving on has terminated into a two-lane road. The reasons could be many. Printing a 300-page document over the Internet could be resulting in massive data flow from the end-user machine to the print spooler, which can cause the pipe to choke. Since the same content goes to copying and printing, the server will need time to respond, and it could be causing the delay. Besides, copying a 300-page document can also lead to a surge in Common Internet File System (CIFS) traffic, with huge TCP acknowledgement flowing through the same line. The other notable point is that all 120 users at FreidCorp and the entire IT resource are on wireless, which is limited to 54 Mbps. Ravinder’s problem could be getting compounded by the fact that a lot of data—file transfers, data backups and printouts—is also flowing through the same network. Since all the devices in the office are wireless, such data flows can clog the network. There could be other possible reasons. Since its the beginning of the business hour, and a Monday, there is a possibility that the security templates are getting applied on user machines. Also, antivirus and software definition updates could be running when users log-in to the business network. Though the line connectivity is reported to be normal, a high latency rate could be causing the delay, and thereby choking the pipe.

SECOND ANSWER Ravinder needs to build a wired network for backup, printing and FTP services. The wires in the FreidCorp office will free the wireless network from a lot of data packets. The WiFi network can then complement and augment the wired network, instead of substituting it. He can also prioritise a key user group on wireless rather than putting everybody on it. Besides, there is a need to sensitise users that large documents should be downloaded from remote servers to the local desktops before printing. This will make the printing traffic local, and save a large amount of Internet bandwidth. Copying of large files is classified under CIFs traffic, and other methods like portals, FTP, and managed downloads can be considered to improve speed. He could also explore the option of payload compression hardware and software that can help reduce the line utilisation while copying large documents. In case it is not already done, he should look at securing the wireless network first and hide the SSID broadcast, so that only legitimate users are able to connect to the wireless network. Also, the back-up window can be planned in a way that it doesn’t clash with the peak business hours.

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THE BIG Q

‘CHECK CONNECTIVITY STRINGS’ FIRST ANSWER At times, it is hard to pinpoint the problem till all the issues have been studied in depth. There could be several factors responsible for choking the Internet bandwidth at FreidCorp. In many enterprises like this, the network uses multiple wireless routers and switches to create a local wireless mesh network, which is uplinked to the gateway router. This connectivity between internal and external network needs to be checked. In such cases, local processes like printing and file sharing will work because there is no local connectivity problem. Also, connectivity between ISP and the gateway router will work perfectly, and that is the reason the ISP did not find any problem in the connectivity. There is a possibility that the local network is not properly connected to gateway router. FreidCorp’s network might also be suffering from Denial of Services (DoS), Trojan or worm attacks. In such cases, while the connectivity to ISP may work fine, the network under hacker attack or because of internal malicious attacks could experience slow Internet connectivity. Also, it could be a proxy issue—if Ravinder has a proxy or firewall set up then he should check whether the users are permitted to use it. There could be a possibility of caching overflow or blocking, so he should initialise the cache and restart the network.

FALGUN SHUKLA Sr General Manager (IT), Hikal Ltd About me: An advance accountancy graduate who ventured into the field of IT and technology and stayed put. Has been in the industry for over two decades, of which the past eight have been with Hikal

SECOND ANSWER To resolve the issue, Ravinder should ensure that the local network is properly connected to gateway router, and conduct regular check for proper connectivity strings. He should also ping the gateway router and ISP router to verify connectivity, and both the networks. If it is the security issue that is creating the problem, Ravinder should isolate the problem and clean the network. The communication should be renewed only after putting in place a mechanism to properly monitor the routing packets. He should also review the firewall settings and other security rules to avoid such incidents. Ravinder should also check the DNS resolution on the user’s work station by using NSlookup to ensure that DNS resolution is happening properly.

Enterprises in India are using Wi-Fi network to complement wired networks, and in some cases for building-to-building connectivity (NUMBERS IN (US $ MN))

WI-FI 800

744 600

517 400

2011-12

2010-11

2009-10

124

2008-09

2007-08

2006-07

2005-06

342

207

200

SO URCE: TO NSE TELECOM

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THE BIG Q

‘CONTROL UNOFFICIAL BANDWIDTH’ FIRST ANSWER Choking of bandwidth is an issue that many enterprises grapple with, and the cause could be either the internal network or at the ISP end. At the user-end, high volume of discreet content uploads or downloads can choke the pipe. Similarly, online games, streaming media applications, peer-to-peer file sharing and such application all consume high bandwidth. If all these factors are not the cause, then it could be the issue of physical connectivity and hardware. Improper firewall configuration could also be the culprit. Finally, it could also be virus, worms, spyware or Trojans that are causing the bandwidth to choke.

SECOND ANSWER

SURESH A SHANMUGAM Head-Business IT Solutions, Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services (M&MFS) About me: Member of the Shadow Board on IT in M&MFS. Was associate with Appsoft in the past

Ravinder needs to take some basic steps to resolve the problem. First, he should check if there are any connectivity and bandwidth issues from the service provider’s end, and whether the ISP is indeed providing 2 Mbps connectivity. While he needs to check the firewall configuration for proper access control, it is also important to control Internet usage through proper policy implementation, and ensure that adequate security measures are in place at the user end. It is also quite possible that FreidCorp has peaked ‘official’ bandwidth usage. In this case the only way is to upgrade bandwidth and go for a backup link from a different vendor. However, Ravinder should certainly map the company’s existing and ‘near future‘ requirements before deciding to get a backup link.

NOTES NOTES

MORE RESOURCES

What causes network congestion?: http://tinyurl.com/ITNext-NetworkCongestion Managing a Wi-Fi network: http://tinyurl.com/ITNext-ManagingWi-FiNetwork Securing a wireless network: http://tinyurl.com/ITNext-ManagingBandwidth

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TECH TALK OPINION

JAIDEEP BILLA Advisor to Chief Architect & CEO, Polaris Software Lab

Resolving the ‘Open’ dilemma

PHOTO GRAPHY: AJAY CHAW L A

or a few years now, we have been witnessing a vociferous debate on the use of Open Source Software (OSS) within enterprises. Juxtaposed against the might of proprietary software, OSS has often been portrayed as the right thing to do, more from a philosophical rather than a business point of view. But what are the business benefits of going the open way? Let us demystify the OSS first. It can be described as a piece of software that is governed by a license that allows the user to modify and redistribute the software without any restrictions. The 10 conditions defining compliance to Open Source are listed at http://www. opensource.org/docs/osd. Initially, the OSS movement was an expression of the desire to be in charge. The IT manager too is equally eager to control his own destiny. However, the manager seeks to do so more by making vendors responsible for providing a reliable infrastructure and less by seeking access to the code and making his own changes. But using and modifying software written by a multitude of people does not intuitively appear to be the smartest way of providing reliable infrastructure to run a business. Yet, OSS continues to find takers, thanks to its low cost vis-à-vis that of proprietary software. But while cost provides a compelling reason to

The fundamental law that governs the quality and reliability of all Open Source is the hypothesis that “with enough eyeballs all bugs are shallow” opt for OSS, the IT manager exposes himself to the risk of low reliability and security. However, the Open Source group asserts that it is a development method for software that harnesses the

power of distributed peer review and transparency of process. “The promise of Open Source is better quality, higher reliability, more flexibility, lower cost, and an end to predatory vendor lock-in,” the group says on its website www.opensource.org. The claim of open source, while counter-intuitive, is not without merit. But not all OSS can lay claim to the above. Only a certain genre of OSS has lived up to the promise. The manager, therefore, needs to identify the characteristics of the right genre of software. The fundamental law that governs the quality and reliability of all Open Source is the hypothesis that “with enough eyeballs all bugs are shallow”. Therefore, the one defining characteristic that a manager must evaluate while making a choice of OSS is whether there is a strong and vibrant community around the product. A strong and vibrant community assures that the OSS in question would be reliable and of high quality. However, these two, in themselves, do not make OSS the best choice. For a given situation, the manager must map the “fitness” of Open Source with needs of the organisation. An IT manager must evaluate (a) the “fitness of purpose” on whether the licensing puts any restriction on the way that the product is to be commercially exploited, (b) the level of training required by users, (c) the support assistance if any required by the CIO, (d) the security rating of the product, and (e) the scalability and functionality of the product. While the IT manager can look forward to resolving his dilemma with OSS, he must remember that what is good for Peter need not be good for Paul. So, do your homework well before you decide to embrace or keep away from OSS.

The author has been associated with firms like NCR and Sutherland and is an alumnus of IITKanpur and IIM-Calcutta

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CUBE CHAT | RANGANATHAN N N

ASPIRE TO

INSPIRE “Being a role model for someone is more satisfying than holding any fancy designation,” believes Ranganathan N N, Joint Manager, Business Information Technology Solutions (BITS) at Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services (MFFS) BY JATIN D E R S I N G H

“

MY SUCESS

MANTRA Have faith in your potential and give your best shot to whatever role you play

othing is impossible in this world. Even the word ‘impossible’ says ‘I’m possible’. Have faith in your potential and give whatever role you play the best shot.” This is how aspiring CIO, Ranganathan N N, enunciates his success mantra. Currently working as a Joint Manager, Business Information Technology Solutions (BITS) at Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services Limited (MMFSL), Ranganathan believes in setting a goal (for himself and his team) that is SMART—specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound. Armed with degrees in commerce and computer science, Ranganathan started his career as a programmer with Satyam Computers before moving on to Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services in August 2002.

“My present organisation has shaped and moulded me, and I will remain indebted to my bosses who offered all the support that I needed,” he comments. When asked about the most challenging project he has tackled so far, Ranganathan describes an ERP implementation project that happened in 2004. “We underwent a transition from Fox Pro to Oracle, and during that delicate period, many team members quit the organisation. The challenge was to make the new team members understand the complex algorithms, provide them domain knowledge, and strive for user acceptance,” he reminisces. He now heads several projects in the company. “We are developing a handheld device that has three levels of authentication to reduce chances of frauds or refusal of payments to assist the company’s field officers record customer

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CUBE CHAT

FACT FILE NAME RANGANATHAN N N CURRENT DESIGN AT I O N JOINT MANAGER BUSINESS INFOR M AT I O N TECHNOLOGY SO LU T I O N S (BITS) AT MAHIN D R A & MAHINDRA FINA N C I A L SERVICES CURRENT ROLE RESPONSIBLE FO R N E W IT INITIATIVES PEOPLE MANAGE M E N T, PROGRESS REVIE W A N D REGUL AR REPORT I N G TO THE MANAGEMEN T PROJECT MANAG E R FOR MF-BIZ CON N EC T SOFT WARE PROJ EC T

PHOTO GRAPHY: R CH ANDRU

“A LEADER SHOULD NOT SHY AWAY FROM TAKING NEW RESPONSIBILITIES AND CHALLENGES TO SET EXAMPLES FOR HIS TEAM” statements along with pictures and thumb impressions,” he elucidates. “With this device we will be able to minimise the time spent for trivial things like field investigation, duplication of work, authentication, arranging photographs and so on,” he explains. IT achievements apart, Ranganathan has been a district champion in carom during his college days. He is also a movie buff. “I am an ardent fan of Amitabh Bachchan and Rajnikant, and do not miss their movies,” he enthusiastically recounts. However, spending time with the family and his toddler during weekends is his top priority. For him, relationship-building with his peers and team members is an important exercise that helps to accomplish projects in a better way. “Every week I go for lunch with

my team members. It helps us to understand one another, and build mutual trust which is very important for any team,” opines Ranganathan. According to him, a leader should not shy from responsibilities and challenges and should set an example for his team. So, is he ready to take on the responsibility of being a CIO? “Maybe in another two years. However, we have got over 430 branches and every IT manager of the branch handles operations independently and, in reality, acts as a CIO of that location,” he states. “What matters at the end of the day is how well you manage new responsibilities. I’ve always aspired to be a role model for my team members, and I guess that’s more important than any fancy designation,” Ranganathan signs off.

EXPERTISE PROJECT MANAG E M E N T, PEOPLE MANAGE M E N T, VENDOR MANAGE M E N T AND IMPLEMENTAT I O N WORK EXPERIEN C E 2002–PRESENT JOINT MANAGER – BUSINESS INFOR M AT I O N TECHNOLOGY SO LU T I O N S (BITS) AT MAHIN D R A & MAHINDRA FINA N C I A L SERVICES 2001–2002 PROGRAMMER, SAT YA M COMPUTERS EDUCATION 2007-2010 MBA, IGNOU (PUR S U I N G ) 1999 -2002 MCA (COMPUTER SCIENCE), ASIAN MEMORIAL INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT, M A D R AS UNIVERSIT Y 1996 -1999 BACHELOR IN CO M M E R C E (COMPUTERS), CA L I C U T UNIVERSIT Y

F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0 | IT NEXT

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EVENT | BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE

MANAGING DECISIONS

BETTER

I NNA ) C HE CEE M B E R 1 5 E (D OR G A L 16) B A( DNE C E M B E R BAI M EUC EMM B E R 1 7 ) D ( HI D EE MLB E R 1 8 ) ( D EC

200

The IT Next-Sybase ‘Enterprise Analytics Workshop’ engaged and informed more than 200 senior IT managers on the power and application of business intelligence solutions

It is often said that when the going gets tough, the tough get going. This is even more true for enterprise IT managers who face the double-edged sword of cutting costs even while strategising for growth. However, there is one solution that lets them do both—Business Intelligence (BI) and Business Analytics (BA). By implementing BI solutions, IT managers can not only help improve enterprise productivity, but also aid and abet growth by delivering insights to the sales and marketing function. These and other such issues were discussed, debated and deliberated at the ‘Enterprise Analytics Workshop’ for IT managers. The event was jointly organised by IT Next and Sybase, and drew over 200 IT practitioners across four cities—Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, and Mumbai. As a run up to the workshop, IT Next had conducted a nation-wide survey of IT managers to understand the usage of technology, and issues related to BI and BA. The findings were shared at the workshop. The survey revealed that the rapid increase of data volume and data sources amongst enterprises had added to the

demand for ad-hoc queries and reporting. The survey also found out that while companies were mainly using the analytics to monitor and manage their business, the access to intelligence was limited to a few— top level management, and departments like finance, accounting, marketing and sales. The interactive workshop was designed to not only provide insight on how BI solutions can be leveraged within the enterprise, but also provide operational nuances that can help IT managers in theimplementation process. Talking about the Need of Smarter Analytics, Chase Hacker, Senior Technical Evangelist (Asia Pacific) at Sybase said, “Owing to the growing competition, the organisations, today, need faster, more accurate answers delivered to all their decision-makers, from all their information, on their terms.” He further added that businesses not only lose market share and competitive advantage, they also lose opportunity because decision-makers don’t always get the right answers and very often the answers are drawn from incomplete information.

H IT managers going through the problem statement at the interactive Enterprise Analytics Workshop in New Delhi

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BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE | EVENT

A Sudesh Prabhu, Director, Pre-sales & Services at Sybase B Barrie Sheers, Senior VP & GM - Sybase, APAC C Chase Hacker, Senior Technical Evangelist, APAC, Sybase E F

D Sunil Jose, Managing Director, India and Sub-continent, Sybase E Shubhendu Parth, Editor, IT Next in Delhi F Rajgopalan Giridhar, Group Editor, 9.9 Media in Bangalore

G Attentive participants at the Bangalore workshop

LU C

Sunil Jose of Sybase gives away a phone, Nokia E-71 to a lucky winner

Y DRAKW WINN ER

J K

I IT managers lend a close ear to the presentations at Bangalore event

J IT managers at the Chennai workshop ponder over the implementation of BI

K A group of IT managers discuss the case study in Mumbai

F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0 | IT NEXT

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UPDATE

OFF THE SHELF

A sneak preview of enterprise products, solutions and services

Wipro launches green PC The toxin-free desktops ensure safer recycling by reducing release of poisonous chemicals to the environment

Toshiba launches Satellite notebook Toshiba has announced the availability of its latest 14-inch Satellite L510P401A notebooks in India. The new product comes with a dualcore 2.2GHz Intel Pentium T4400 processor with Intel GL40 chipset and Intel GMA 4500MHD graphics. It also supports 1 GB DDR3 memory, which can be upgraded up to 4GB DDR3 and a 250 GB SATA HDD. It also features a LED backlit display equipped with clear super view (CSV) technology, and boasts of a high performance six-cell battery.

The laptop has a sleek black leather texture finish, while the (HD) LED cover and the keyboard surface have a scratch proof coating. PRODUCT SPECIFICATIONS CPU: Intel GL40 Chipset on a Intel GMA Display: 14-inch (35.56 cm) TFT widescreen Display (HBCSV), 1366 x 768 pixels screen resolution Memory: 1-GB DDR3 SDRAM expandable to maximum 4-GB, 2MB internal L2 Cache Front Side Bus (FSB): 800 MHz Operating System: Linux Battery: 6-cell Li-ion Battery, 3.7 hours backup Weight: 2.35 kg PRICE: RS 24,990

PHOTO GRAPHY: JAYAN K NARAYANAN

In its bid to help better manage e-waste in KEY FEATURES * Meets RoHS standards the country, Wipro Infotech has launched * Free of harmful chemicals like a new range of eco-friendly, and toxin-free PVC and BFR desktops that comply with the European * Based on Intel Core 2 Duo Union standard on Restriction of Hazardprocessors ous Substances (RoHS). * Designed to provide energy The green desktops are free from efficient performance carcinogenic materials such as polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and brominated flame retardants (BFRs). The green PCs employ Intel Core 2 Duo processors and designed to provide energy efficient performance. “Wipro considers the launch of PVC and BFR free products a major breakthrough in clean production and recycling policy. It is a very difficult process with no alternative solution, and we worked with 37 overseas suppliers for more than two years to come out with the completely toxin free product,” said Anurag Behar, chief executive of Wipro Infrastructure Engineering Ecoeye, Social and Community Initiatives. The company claims that with removal of the toxins, recycling of the electronic products will be safer. Wipro has 17 e-waste collection centres in India where products are collected and recycled.

The notebook comes with a preinstalled Linux-based operating system (OS) and built-in, six-in-one bridge media slot, which is capable of supporting SD media, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, MultiMedia Card and XD-Picture Cards.

IT NEXT | F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0

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UPDATE

Fujitsu unveils high volume scanner Price Rs 15,995

KEY ADVANTAGES * Image quality checker to scrutinise irregularities in soft copy images * Colour graphics adapter (CGA) board * VRS professional imaging software * Light-emitting diode (LED) lamp for energy savings * Consumes less than 4W of power in sleep mode * Paper protection and multifeed protection to eliminate paper jams during scanning

Fujitsu has launched new fi-6800 colour A3 production scanner to meet the high-volume centralised scanning demands of enterprises. According to the company, the scanner is able to digitise documents ranging between A8 and A3 sizes, and up to three meters in length. The product also has a Automatic Sorting feature that enables users to choose between unique sorting sheets or barcode printed sheets to cleanly separate various kinds of office documents. Besides, the Colour Graphics Adapter (CGA) board and VRS professional imaging software enable quick processing. The scanner can be deployed as part of an integrated enterprise content management or document management solutions.

ZyXEL makes its router green Aimed at providing enterprises higher capabilities for running audio, video and voice applications over wireless networks, ZyXEL Communications has announced the launch of its green NBG 419N Wireless N router. With Wi-Fi protected set up, the product features wireless control for energy savings. It is also said to be compliant with 802.11n technology which is six times faster than the standard than 802.11g networks. The company claims that the new router is designed with a user-friendly corporate interface, and provides easy mode for navigating functions, basic setup tasks and a comprehensive network map.

Intel unleashes Core i3, mobile i5 processor power Intel has introduced more than dozen new processors, including the mobile Core i3 and mobile i5 processors. According to the company, the two mobile processors are built on the new Arrandale graphic platform, and will offer nearly 70% better integrated-graphics performance than the old Core2 i3 and i5. With 20% more pixel shaders, the processor maintains the same low TDP (thermal design power). The 2010 Core processor family is being launched with Intel’s new HD Graphics technology, Turbo Boost Technology (only on i5 and i7) and Intel HyperThreading Technology. The new Core i3 processors are all based on the 32nm fabrication technology, as are most of the Core i5 processors. The topend Core i5 processors, i5-750S and i5-750 desktop processors, are the only i5 processors not to feature Intel’s Hyper-Threading Technology.

Price Rs 8,500

KEY ADVANTAGES * Detachable antenna * Pure AP mode with full WDS * 802.11n technology * Six-level output power control capability * 64/128-bit WEP, and WPA/ WPA2 to support stringent wireless transmissions. * Wi-Fi Multimedia (WMM) technology, for enhanced audio, video and voice applications

F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0 | IT NEXT

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UPDATE

INDULGE

The hottest, the coolest and the funkiest next generation gadgets and devices for you

Give yourself a makeover and whip up your work appeal with these stylish fast-forward devices. While Activa can become your new personal trainer, it’s hard to snub the appeal of Nexus and iPad. Check them out HOT

APPLE IPAD

A 9.7-inch multi-touch screen for efficient browsing, 1GHz Apple A4 chip processor, upto 64GB flash storage, 3G, Wi-Fi, data speeds up to 7.2 Mbps PRICE: $499 AND ABOVE

WI-FI DETECTOR T-SHIRT This glowing animated shirt dynamically displays the current signal strength of 802.11b or 802.11g networks PRICE: US $ 20

PHILIPS ACTIVA MP3 PLAYER Its Tempo music and progress monitoring feature inspires you to exercise harder PRICE: INR 6,000

NEW NEW GOOGLE’S NEXUS MOBILE PHONE Features a 3.7 inches screen, 1 GHz processor, Organic LED screen, 5MP camera, 4GB extendable memory and a dual microphone

iHOME iA5 Alarm clock speaker system for iPhone and iPod, touch screen interface, equipped with Bluetooth and a built-in microphone PRICE: TO BE ANNOUNCED

PRICE: INR 27,500

Like something? Want to share your objects of desire? Send us your wish-list or feedback to editor@itnext.in

IT NEXT | F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0

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UPDATE

OPEN DEBATE

BOOK FOR YOU A platform to air your views on the latest developments and issues that impact you

What are the top three technologies for 2010?

PRABODH PRABHUGHATE MANAGER-STAFF & WEBSITE, IDBI FORTIS

CHETAN V MANJREKAR SR EXECUTIVESYSTEMS, SKYPAK SECURITIES

I think cloud and cloudbased applications, and infrastructure will gain higher acceptability this year. The big next thing on the list is business analytics. The slowdown has clearly taught us that any future investment and capital outlay has to be backed by projections based on Business Intelligence (BI). This is the reason why BI will find much acceptance within the community. Besides, the marriage between social networking and collaboration tools can become a reality in 2010; Google Wave was a good attempt of the same.

I see SaaS, and for that matter cloud computing, reaching maturity during the year. Another movement that might grab attention in 2010 is Green IT. The hype surrounding the term seems to have finally settled down, and CIOs and CTOs are looking at ways and means to green their infrastructure, right from the server to the desk top. And finally, with the expansion of enterprise mobility, I anticipate a big change in the way companies will reach out to their customers. Overall, 2010 for me looks like a cloudy, green and mobile year.

UNNI NAIR MANAGER IT, ARAMEX Enterprise focus on getting more bang from the money will ensure that cloud computing continues to lead during the year. Vendors will come out with new service models on this front. On the datacenter and desktop front, virtualisation will garner much mindshare. While virtualisation on the server front has been well received, I feel it will now move strongly to the desktop environment. Finally, the focus will shift to storage management. Thanks to the ever increasing data needs, enterprises will be compelled to adopt solutions to make storage more accessible.

The Professional It is not qualification and skills, but attitude and integrity that matters

PUBLISHER : PENGUIN BOOKS INDIA PRICE : INR 399

Who is a better professional, Mahadeva, the man who has buried more that 42,000 unclaimed corpse in Banglore or the thousands of high performer doctors, engineers, MBAs? This book by Subroto Bagchi provides examples from a cross section of the society to explain what professionalism is all about. The Professional is not a management book. It is not meant to be one. Instead, it’s a diary of the son of a small-time government servant and the values that he learnt from his father that have stood the test of time—from his days in Orissa’s tribal district Koraput to Texas and back in India—work with integrity of purpose. The book is divided into six parts, and while the first three sections talk about the key attributes that make a true professional, the remaining three are more like DIY tools that can help any individual manage volume of work, and complex situations and problems. Bagchi also asks, and gives answers, to the toughest question every professional faces: Is my decision the right professional choice to make?

IT NEXT VERDICT Written in a simple language, the book provides the explicit and implicit codes of conduct— the boundaries which separate a

Your views and opinion matter to us. Send us your feedback on stories and the magazine to the Editor at editor@itnext.in

skilled individual from a professional. STAR VALUE:

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MY LOG

RAJIV SAXENA Head, Corporate Communication, Birlasoft

I L L U S T R AT I O N : A NOO

P PC

Fly away, my love!

Technology-driven communication has made direct interaction with fellow beings a rarity

My Log.indd 68

3 ESSENTIAL

READS

INSIGHT | DATA CENTRE

DATA CENTRE | INSIGHT

PUTTINGTHE

SQUEEZE ON ENERGY CONSUMPTION Rationalising power and energy costs in data centers can help improve resource allocation and facilitate the move towards green enterprises BY MOHIT CHHABRA

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Blade servers consume about

10 45

less power than rack mount servers of equal performance

of the TCO for a typical rack in a high availability 2N data centre is contributed by power and cooling equipment

reduction in the fan speed of computer room ACs can help cut over 50% of power consumption by these fans

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Rationalising power & energy cost at data centers can help build a greener enterprise. Pg 30 INSIGHT | TELECOMMUTING

TELECOMMUTING | INSIGHT

GETTING ’EM

WORK HOME Telecommuting employees can deliver big gains only if enterprises adopt robust technologies and the right policy measures BY PRAGYA SINGH

PH OTO GR A PH Y: PHOTO S. CO M

being. We were soul mates. We had all the time in the world for each other in the sylvan surroundings of the small town we inhabited. There was no TV, cable, telephone, Internet, and of course, no cell phone or Blackberry to disrupt our communion. Life was bliss. However, as I moved to the big metro to eke out a living, our trysts became infrequent. The big city boasted of record number of smoke-belching automobiles, arrogant skyscrapers obliterating the stars and the skies, ramrod telecom towers, maze of electricity poles and wires, and all the paraphernalia that development brings in its trail. Noxious vapour reigned as numerous humans lived a miserable existence on pavements and along frothing sewage drains. In such a scheme of things, there was, obviously, no place for you. I am reduced to communicating with the world largely through the gadgetry development has thrust upon us. Direct interaction with all fellow beings is becoming a rarity. You too have abandoned me. But I daren’t blame you. Flap your wings, my dearie, and fly away to the deep jungles where mankind’s greed-driven development may dread to venture. But rest assured, you will continue to live in my heart. Till it flutters!

FROM

I was hoping against hope that you would pay a visit, at least, on the New Year day, for old time’s sake. But you did not. And now that more than a month has gone by, I resign myself to a life without your company. An incessant stream of your memories rushes through my barren heart. But that’s not solace enough. It still hurts. Even as a small child, my favourite pastime was watching you with awe. You could do things I could only dream of. Perched elegantly atop a tree, you would suddenly take to the skies. Having pierced the low-lying clouds, you would hurtle downwards like a shooting star, suddenly shifting into a gentle glide to alight atop the tree. And as if to congratulate yourself at the feat you would break into a celestial song, every note of which still remains preserved in my heart—for ever. What poise, what grace, what melody, and, most enchanting of all, what fanciful flights! They kept me enthralled. I often tried to mimic you. Preened and pranced like you. And you lovingly watched. I could never take physically to the skies like you. But you did train my spirit to soar to indescribable heights and to unimagined lands. From childhood, to youth to the twilight of my life you have inspired me. A look at you and my blues would be blown away. A strange sentiment would suffuse my

Security and performance management Security becomes a major issue in telecommuting. Adopting measures such as secured access to business data, phone systems, applications

HOW TO MAKE IT WORK ■ Provide telecommuters with proper technical, technological and logistical support to ensure that they are able to do their job effectively ■ Put in place proper data security measure to avoid intrusion or cyber attacks triggered from a telecommuter’s system ■ Install a mobile management system to keep a regular check on data security policies for remote devices ■ Ensure adequate communication infrastructure is in place for real time interaction and collaboration from point-to-point, and point to multi-point ■ Frame policies to restrict unauthorised access and downloading of files ■ Help telecommuters understand the tools, and provide special handbooks or reference guides to help them use technologies, access information and expertise

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Put in place right policies to make telecommuting employees more productive. Pg 34 INSIGHT | STRUCTURED CABLING

MAKING THE RIGHT

N CON ECTIONS The right cabling solution need not be bleeding-edge, but must be standards-compliant and suitable for existing and potential application requirements BY JATINDER SINGH

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“

of network related problems occur because of a wrong decision in deploying efﬁcient structured cabling solution

”

—Milind Tamhane, Vice President- ITS, Manufacturing, Digilink

Planning matters When Birla Tyres planned to augment their production capacity to 500 tonnes of tyres per day, the IT team decided to take a close and careful look at the structured cabling plan, as part of the bigger IT infrastructure plan. The company wanted to take a holistic view of the cabling infrastructure, as it also planned to integrate the networking infrastructure at their two Orissabased production units. Of course, it was necessary that the solution be standards-compliant. Finally, a combination of Cat6 copper cable and single-mode fiber optic structured cabling was selected. While factors such as vendor’s reputation, high quality performance, budget and lower installation costs influenced the company to select the solution, the decision to upgrade to the Cat6 standard was largely driven by the high bandwidth requirement to support future applications. Emphasising upon the detailed planning that went into determining the right solution, Ojha says, “There is always ambiguity over the bandwidth needed to support future communication models. Therefore, an appropriate planning is a prerequisite to avoid any issues in performance.” Agrees Milind Tamhane, Vice President-ITS, Manufacturing at Digilink: “78% of network related problems occur because of a wrong decision in deploying an efficient structured cabling solution. The irony is that many organisations in India still do not understand this logic.”

Identifying the right solution Given lower TCO as a top priority, the need is to identify solutions that facilitate

SOLUTION “ISIF THE DEPENDABLE

AND ADHERES TO STANDARDS, SUBSTANTIAL AMOUNT OF OPEX CAN BE SAVED ON ITS UPKEEP OVER A LONG RUN

”

—Ajay Kumar Pandey, DGM (IT), BL Kashyap

“APPROPRIATE PLANNING

WHILE GOING FOR CABLING IS A PREREQUISITE TO AVOID ANY ISSUES IN THE PERFORMANCE —S Ojha, IT-Head, Birla Tyres, Balasore Unit

”

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Follow standards for a perfect structured cabling solution. Pg 46

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2/10/2010 5:33:26 PM