IT Next September 2012 by Manan Mushtaq

SEPTEMBER 2012 / ` 100 VOLUME 03 / ISSUE 08

STRATEGY: Next100 Winners’ Dreams

BOSS TALK: Security deficit in government

44 BIG Q

INTERVIEW: SAP Labs’ Neumann on customers’ innovation

Private Cloud breakthroughs Pg 71

Girish Rao Head-IT Marico Industries

Rostow Ravanan CFO, MindTree

K Vaitheeswaran CEO, India Plaza

GET, SET, CIO! CXOs chalk out what they expect from IT managers as future CIOs Pg 16

Editorial

Road Map To The C-Suite Wonder what that’s about? It is about progressive minded upward-looking IT managers finding the right path to move up the career ladder and take up the role of a CIO or CEO; - which I call the C-Suite. You have all read various reports from industry experts and research groups saying the CIO career is getting over, outdated, obsolete; that it may cease to exist in future. This is a grossly absurd statement. In fact, the CIO role is indeed evolving and opportunities for CIOs to prove their mettle are only increasing. Why then do experts want to claim the opposite? How can something get outdated when technology is becoming all pervasive and influencing every individual, both professionally and personally? That’s why a CIO will definitely not be a thing of past, but will blossom into a new personality, a new domain. The new avatar will primarily be influenced by the other Cs, such as CFOs, CEOs ; who are, in reality, increasingly depending on the CIO and IT teams to establish processes, to help in business expansion and growth. And that’s why IT Next’s cover feature in this edition highlights various ways and paths for IT managers, leading to the CIO role. And to take a pragmatic view of the reality prevailing in the industry, the story attempted to gain insights from CEOs, Board of Directors and CFOs, along with CIOs about their expectations from IT managers, plus the professional, business and management skills future CIOs must imbibe to adorn the role of a CIO. The study provides perspectives from all Cs on what the changes in the business world mean to future CIOs, what steps will help them take the reins at this ideal position--a position which elevates and empowers them to take business responsibility and control.

“It is about progressive minded upward-looking IT managers finding the right path to scale up to take up the C-Suite” Geetha Nandikotkur

Blogs To Watch! The CXO in the NextGeneration Enterprise https://blogs.oracle.com/ webcenter/entry/the_cxo_in_ the_next CXO Expectations Still Clouded on Virtualization http://meship.com/ Blog/2011/06/14/cxoexpectations-still-clouded-onvirtualization/ The NEXT Quality professional http://nareshchoudhary. blogspot.in/ Information Optimized http://informationoptimized. com/blog/tag/cxo/ Professional Network for CIOs and IT Professionals ... http://www.ciozone.com/ index.php?option=com_ myblog&show=Open-Seasonon-CIOs.html&Itemid=713

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Content For the l atest technology uPDATES Go to itnext.in

September 2012

Volume 03 | Issue 08

Facebook: http://www.facebook. com/home.php#/group. php?gid=195675030582 Twitter: http://t witter.com/itnext LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/ groups?gid=2261770&trk=myg_ ugrp_ovr

gET, SET, cio!

Page

CXOs chalk out what they expect from IT managers as future CIOs

Cover Story

boss talk

interview

19 Mind the Entire Business Imbibing business and management skills are critical for IT managers to become the CEO of the IT department

22 Defining Personal Skills Chiefs emphasise the importance of personal skills which can help IT managers to tide over the challenges

24 Road map to CIO’s New Avatar Future CIO will play the role of a functional expert

26 Future CIOs’ Take on Skilling Fields Visualising a better path to scale up to CIO with necessary skills

28 14 Secrets to adorn a CIO Role A 360 degree approach for moving up the ladder to take on the CIO role IT NEXT

SEPTEMBER 2012 / ` 100 VOLUME 03 / ISSUE 08

STRATEGY: Next100 Winners’ Dreams

BOSS TALK: Security deficit in government

44 BIG Q

INTERVIEW: SAP Labs’ Neumann on customers’ innovation

Private Cloud breakthroughs Pg 71

GET, SET, CIO!

Girish Rao Head-IT Marico Industries

Rostow Ravanan CFO, MindTree

K Vaitheeswaran CEO, India Plaza VOLUME 03 | ISSUE 08

GET, SET, CIO!

cover design: shigil n photograph y: jiten gandhi & srivatsa shandilya

CXOs chalk out what they expect from IT managers as future CIOsPg 16

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

06 Insecure Governance | Atul Khatavkar, VP-IT, AGC Networks on security deficits in the government sector

44 Customers Inspire Innovation| Clas Neumann, Senior VP, Global Head SAP Labs talks about HANA development

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

EDITORIAL

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Group Editor: R Giridhar Executive Editor: Geetha Nandikotkur Consulting Editor(Online): Sanjay Gupta Senior Assistant Editor: Manu Sharma

Dreams: What they mean to Next100 Winners | The winners have dared to dream about their future roles, projects, education, etc

Sr Creative Director: Jayan K Narayanan Art Director: Anil VK Associate Art Director: Atul Deshmukh Sr Visualiser: Manav Sachdev Visualisers: Prasanth TR, Anil T & Shokeen Saifi Sr Designers: Sristi Maurya & NV Baiju Designers: Suneesh K, Shigil N, Charu Dwivedi Raj Verma, Peterson, Prameesh Purushothaman C & Midhun Mohan Chief Photographer: Subhojit Paul Sr Photographer: Jiten Gandhi

the big Q

INSIGHT

34 Reverse Gear for High Cloud | Suresh Karra, Head of

Consulting for Cloud, Infosys Ltd advises IT managers to work backwards to develop and determine what is needed under cloud strategy

15-MinuTE Manager

59 MDM for Mobility | Sunil

Lalvani, Director Enterprise Technology, RIM India says IT managers find new ways to manage the increasing mobility trends 63 Virtually Real | Vijay Mhaskar, VP-Information Management Group, Symantec insists on being innovative to put business critical apps on a virtual platform

71 Breakthrough the Clouds |Expertsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; views on what kind

of cloud model is suitable and which applications should migrate to the cloud and the benefits to expect

cube chat

66 Learning is Living | Sharat

M Airani, Chief-IT (Systems & Security), Forbes Marshall says his deep interest in the IT security space prompts him to do research, probably take up a PhD

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Big Data 30

Editorial _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 01 Inbox _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 04 Industry Update _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 10 Open Debate_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 75

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My Log_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 76 advertiser index Microsoft IFC ISACA 5 Airtel 7 Ricoh 9 BRY Air Asia 13 Schneider 14-15 NEC 29 PID Ltd 33 Gartner 37, 42, 43 Adobe 38-39-40 IBM 41, IBC Lenovo BC

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IT NEXT

TPL EVENT | TECH PROBLEM & SOLUTION

CAPTAIN’S VIEW POINT

TEAM SPEAKS

AUGUST 2012 / ` 100 VOLUME 03 / ISSUE 07

INTERVIEW: Raritan’s Frank Huang on Data Centre Consolidation

BOSS TALK: IT needs fool-proof business case

FEATURE: From the Next100 Winners’ Bosses

31 BIG Q

Transforming DC for Profit Pg 67

THE FINE-TUNERS

Mangalam Ganesh

VP - IT, ICICI Securities Ltd

Build social connectors to derive right data Big data techniques help in unlocking value from the enterprise information

llied Bank has a pan-India network of branches, ATMs and associates. With a total of 1,342 branches and 4,537 ATMs, the bank compares well with the leaders in the industry. To support its core merchant and trading community, the bank also has a branch presence in 15 overseas locations. The bank runs a mix of systems, both legacy and modern, on a variety of systems and platforms supplied by multiple vendors. The bank’s group CIO held a meeting of senior IT managers to review the entire infrastructure of the bank. This group concluded that. Dramatically improve the analytics and ‘big data’ capabilities of the bank to add value to the business.

Yagnesh Parikh

Senior VP - IT, ICICI Securities Ltd

gainst the given backdrop and assumptions that the bank is keen on driving business growth and expansion, I think the project around enabling the bank to cross-sell its products would help in meeting the said expectations. It is true to a certain extent that use of analytics would definitely help in this cross-selling initiative. This would obviously relate to big data. Most enterprises, including banks, depend hugely on the intelligence they derive from data which is then translated to business growth. Like any other large enterprise, data is generated through millions of customer interactions daily. In this case, it is most relevant to cross-selling where the IT teams are responsible to extract strategic business value through data that is derived and use appropriate solutions to structure it for business benefit. It would then depend upon how the groups leverage the structured data to their business advantage. Looking at big data as an extension of existing information architecture would also help the bank in the process of structuring the data.

Sangeet Kumar Sinha VP - IT, ICICI Securities Ltd

ore than the benefit, the IT team is keen on bringing in certain innovations in the big data project related to crossselling, which would drive better business benefits. For instance, just-in-time analytics for crossselling, leveraging the customer data generated through the social site platform to cross-sell and up-sell. The platform will enable the teams to tap new customers and understand their buying patterns. Streamlining the work flow using analytical tools would ease the payment procedures with the help payment gateway solutions. The use of analytical tools to analyse this big data is enabling IT systems to optimize themselves using M2M and customer interaction data. These tools are enabling the teams to provide an internal feedback mechanism while analyzing data patterns, creating the ability to self-optimise and providing the business agility which can result in enhanced growth.

What would be the one specific Big Data project that can be taken up in the organization and what could be the challenges? What key implementation steps for the project should be undertaken, stating certain assumptions? What kind of benefits will the organisation reap through this big data project?

Fine-tuners The

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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.

The just concluded TPL 2012 event was a good learning experience not just for me but also my team. It is one platform where CIOs and IT managers all worked together to win a competition. I especially liked the format of the competition and also the location of the event. However, when it came to the scoring pattern, there were some issues. We were expected to be among the top 5 teams and at least become runners up. But we did not. If we received some insights into our scores, it can help us understand where we went wrong. I hope that from the second year onwards, the scoring pattern would be different and shared with all participants. I would appreciate it if you could make it more transparent; that would make for an even better experience.

IT managers learn the art of fine-tuning the datacentre components to align with business expansion Pg 16

VOLUME 03 | ISSUE 07

THE PROBLEM | Big Data

s the big data phenomenon gains momentum and the bank initiates a project on crossselling, it would be critical to build social site connectors to extract the right kind of data. While it is important to derive better business value out of the data extracted, I would think it crucial to capitalise the huge existing data including the payment gateway information to cross-sell the products. It would be ideal to use analytics as a business operations tool to dig out real-time data from the niche customer segments and used on a daily basis by product teams and customer services teams to enhance their offerings around the project. There are varied analytical tools available in the market, which is going beyond the traditional business intelligence (BI) tools. Big data techniques complement business intelligence tools to unlock value from the enterprise information.

BALIGA B S AGM-IT&S, BHEL

RAJIV AGARWAL HEAD-IT, HAL

LALIT SHARMA HEAD-IT, ERNST & YOUNG

august 2012

IT NEXT thanks its Readers for the warm response www.linkedin.com/ groups?gid= 2261770&trk= myg_ugrp_ ovr300members

read this issue online http://www.itnext. in/resources/ magazine

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Hari Krishna Maram, Head-IT, Imperial Group

IT Next is an excellent platform for IT managers who are aspiring to become CIOs. I have read several issues, Ifeel the magazine focuses more on technology and less on Indiacentric case studies. For example, I participated in a webinar on enterprise mobility earlier today and one of the vendors showcased an Indian company implementing a mobile application to overcome challenges. I feel if such Indian case studies are published in IT Next, it would help IT heads leverage technological initiatives better. With regard to the TPL event, the business situation given to the participants should be more relevant to technologies like BYOD, cloud, mobility, social networking etc. This would provide participants good learning.. Rajesh Verma, Head-IT, Cafe Coffee Day

In the article titled, ‘Smart Steps to Virtualisation’ in the July, 2012 edition of IT Next, Citrix’s spokesperson Nilesh’s designation has been incorrectly mentioned as Manager Systems Engineering-India Subcontinent, Citrix. The correct designation is Nilesh Goradia, Head - Pre-Sales - India Subcontinent, Citrix. Error Regretted. Editor

Raghu Kumar Paruchuri, Head-ERP & IT, Tata Power (Strategic Electronics Division)

The TPL event was very good and relevant to all IT heads and managers. All the arrangements were excellent including the location of the event. However, our team feels that some changes must be incorporated next year which will make it a richer experience. Firstly, participants need more briefing and mentoring on how to present the case study. Even though they were briefed, many doubts cropped up while preparing the presentation. Moreover, the judges were not entirely from a technology background. They appeared to be into business than technology. We feel that the judges should be a mix of both business and technology, maybe in the ratio of 50:50. As far as IT Next is concerned, I feel it covers more of technology and less of subjects like

education. Everyone knows the importance of education and its future benefits. I request the editor to include new technologies and developments in education in your future issues.

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

567678 *Special rates apply

(Note: Letters have been edited minimally, for brevity and clarity)

Competition can be tough...

Gain the upper hand. Register today! Exam Date: 8 December 2012 Registration Deadline: 3 October 2012 ISACA members save US $150 off exam registration. Become an ISACA member today!

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Boss talk | Atul Khatavkar

B u si n ess M a n ag e m e n t

Insecure Governance

ne key focus for government entities is to enable all government bodies with adequate IT infrastructure to serve the public better. However, the roles of IT managers are confined to just keeping the lights on. The new concept of IT aligning with business to drive growth is still not nurtured in the sector. There is absolutely no doubt that government bodies including PSUs are aggressive about absorbing new technologies, focussed around network up-gradation, data security, building data centre across locations, increasing focus on building SWAN etc. When it comes to information security, the approach is lackadaisical.

“The government sector fails to understand that information is money and that every department is responsible to protect it”

CISO Challenges As long as there is no structured designate, CISO’s (chief information security officer) role in the government sector is not taken seriously. The tools deployed are not up to the mark and the technological advancements are not leveraged to the fullest extent. Also, the technological deployment process has to undergo multiple levels of verification and approval right from inception to post-delivery management. This, at times, takes very long. But, today, technology evolves at a very brisk pace: by the time a project reaches initiation of execution, the technology could be so advanced that the process could have to start from scratch again. The government sector fails to understand that information is money and that every department or group is responsible for protecting information. Best Security Practices It is crucial for any IT manager in the government to evangelise the importance of governance, risk and compliance within the company. The first step towards addressing security challenges is to align the solution

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Suggestion BOX

“All I want to know is where I’m going to die so I’ll never go there.” title: Emotional Intelligence Author: Daniel Goleman Impressed with the concept of social and emotional learning which is shaping human life. Publisher: Barnes & Noble Price: `850/-

delivery model to government requirements. This model would enable the partner to undertake quick and effective implementation of IT projects within the given timeline. Having an effective project management office is critical. The hygiene factor could be established by Deploying a good IT Service management (ISMS) framework solutions based on ISO 20000 to measure as well as monitor the effectiveness of IT services Establishing a Business Continuity management system to prepare and avoid disruptions in services Adopting new security tools and technologies for cost saving, and building a transparent ecosystem which is the need of the hour Active involvement of decision makers and faster processing of security project; this is important to secure the environment Security heads in the government sector have to work out an effective RoI strategy. A matured security model to justify security investments and single integrated management systems which can address both business continuity and IT services need to be evolved. eriodic security audits will create a good hygiene factor. The author is VP-IT Governance, Risk & Compliance, AGC Networks

Opinion

money wise Somenath Nag, Director in Alten Calsoft Labs

Coping with Cloud

he cloud is becoming a reality in most organisations, and research groups such as Gartner, are endorsing the prevailing trend-indicating that the adoption of public cloud services has increased from 12 per cent to 27 per cent (private cloud from 19-26 per cent) in organisations. A report by consulting firm Zinnov Management Consulting estimates that the cloud computing market will grow from US$400 million (currently) to US$4.5 billion by 2015. What are the drivers? Obviously, a lower than estimated growth in the economy along with high inflation puts pressure on enterprises to reduce overall operations cost. IT managers of Indian enterprises today must optimise their IT budget to support growth initiatives without compromising the quality of the service, and find a solution in cloud.

More than CAPEX & OPEX Cloud based services offers both challenges and opportunities for IT departments of organisations. Though these services are always associated with lower CAPEX and operations cost, IT departments still have to demonstrate how these can be achieved. Another challenge is to decide from where and how to start the cloud journey.

Approach from non-core to core A suggested approach is to start with non-core services which are not absolutely critical for operations/ business, and have less security related issues. Ideally, these services should be

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

â&#x20AC;&#x153;IT managers must optimise their budget to support growth initiatives without compromising the quality of service, and find a solution in cloudâ&#x20AC;?

an enterprise think of moving their core IT systems like ERP and other LOB applications to move to the cloud.

Preparing a business caseâ&#x20AC;&#x201C;calculating TCO Before starting, IT managers must prepare a business case for cloud adoption. They need to understand that it is not really only a CAPEX vs. OPEX story. To make a business case for cloud adoption, they must calculate TCO over three years, a typical period for hardware refresh. TCO calculated over three years across three categories including internal IT, Managed Services and the Cloud. With an average capital investments of Rs 10 lakhs on internal IT, besides AMC charges going up to Rs 1.5 lakhs, monthly service charges amounting to Rs 500 and monthly labour charges accounting for Rs 1 lakh and other miscelleneous cost for three years accounting for Rs 50.68 lakhs, the savings that the IT managers would derive is nil. Against the same logic, with no upfront capital investment, if they opt for Managed Services or Cloud, the savings are relatively significant, except fo rthe monthy service charges that are incurred. As discussed above, enterprises can save around 25-30 per cent over three years by moving two applications and two database servers to cloud.

Cloudy Road Ahead those where the IT department is the sole decision maker. Some of these are: Mail and other collaboration applications like Intranet Disaster Recover system--this is the fastest growing cloud services in India Development, QA, and Staging environment HRMS, Payroll, CRM, and other supporting process applications Self service / internal support portals Only when these apps/services are successfully migrated to cloud, should

The large enterprise segment in India is seen more inclined towards private cloud environments, while SMBs adopt public clouds to suit their requirements. BFSI and government verticals are seen as potential early adopters of cloud technology in India. As the market matures and services evolve, Indian enterprises will slowly start moving mission critical applications to cloud. By 2018, we will see ERP applications, or data intensive and core applications such as core banking software for banks moving towards a cloud model.

update

Update I n d u s t r y

Indian IT spend will grow at 16% in 2012: IDC TECH TRENDS | International Data Corporation (IDC) recently

I llustratio n: Pramees h purushothaman

released a new research report, India IT Market Overview Report 2012, which provides stakeholders in the IT ecosystem and related firms with a holistic understanding of the IT market scenario in India. Some of the key highlights of the report: Despite economic volatility, IT spending will grow by 16.3% in 2012. Traditional verticals such as BFSI, Communication & Media, Government, Manufacturing and IT/ITeS continued to be the

Cloud

Focus on Asia for cloud services Asian telecoms operators can take advantage of the region’s burgeoning cloud services market.

In a survey by Alcatel-Lucent, the majority in Asian selected the local telecoms incumbent as the most likely player to win their cloud services business.

Currently In 3 Years

41 26

37 40

Source: www.totaltele.com

SMEs and emerging technologies to drive domestic IT investment; social media, cloud, mobility, big data on the upswing

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

France

India

South Corea

Taiwan

Hong Kong

trends deals products services people

highest spenders in 2011 with a moderate CAGR (20102015) of 14%-18%. Retail & Wholesale, Energy & Utilities, and Healthcare witnessed tremendous growth (23%) in IT spending. The trend is expected to continue. India is witnessing a phenomenal increase in SME spending on IT. SME accounted for 38% of Enterprise IT spending in 2011. This is expected to grow to 43% by 2015. Investments on emerging technologies such as Social Media, Cloud, Mobility and Big Data are on the rise. The total IT market is expected to grow to US$43.57 billion in 2012, up from US$37.46 billion in 2011. Despite lesser than expected GDP growth figures in 2011-2012 followed by a similar trend in the quarter ending June 2012, India still commands a high growth rate, next only to China among the BRIC countries--and higher than several developing economies. Rupee depreciation and high inflation have slowed down consumer spending, but this is expected to be temporary. “Cautious optimism will continue with most enterprises. However, this is not expected to reduce IT investments. It merely indicates that future investments will undergo intense scrutiny and that effective financial and risk management will gain priority in the days to come,” said Ravi Sharma, Research Manager, Consulting Group, IDC India.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX7

Motorola Atrix HD

Nexus Q New Roll out

Panasonic has refreshed its Lumix line of cameras and launched LX7 to succeed LX5. Sporting a 1/1.7-inch sensor, the optics on the LX7 is crafted by Leica. It’s capable of shooting in RAW mode. Price NA.

It is perhaps the most powerful handheld gaming device available today. Powered by an ARM Cortex and A9 quadcore chip, it allows nearly every form of input. Price: Rs 19,990.

According to Google, this orb-shaped device is the world’s first social streaming media player at Google I/O, allowing multiple Android devices to queue and play content on the same Nexus Q. It comes priced at $299.

India Second Riskiest Country for Data Centres

Illustration: anil t

TECH TIDINGS | India emerged

as the second most risk ridden data centre location among the top 30 countries in a study conducted by Cushman & Wakefield and Hurleypalmerflatt. The ‘Data Centre Risk Index’ study evaluated the risks to global data centre facilities and international investment in business critical IT infrastructure. In addition to water availability, India’s major risk factors are high energy costs, difficult business environment, high corporate taxes, high possibility of natural disasters, scarcity of educated workforce, energy insecurity, low GDP per capita and high inflation.

Indian data centre market set for rapid growth over the next 5 yrs Source: Agencies

While the Indian data centre market is poised for rapid growth over the next five years, power security is a significant consideration there, the report reads. High barriers to entry into

the market, such as restrictions on foreign ownership, make India the world’s most difficult country to do business in, the report said. The main deterrent factors on which the country scored the lowest were ease of business, inflation, GDP per capita and corporation tax. India, however, ranked high on parameters of cost of labour and sustainability. Criteria such as quality of power and outages represent a challenge in India which is often exacerbated by increasing IT loads. Brazil is the riskiest country to operate a data centre in. According to Arvind Nandan, ED, Consultancy, India Cushman & Wakefield, “India remains to be the preferred location for data centres and I have witnessed a growth in demand owing to certain advantages.”

quick byte

Around The World

Salesforce.com closes deal for Buddy Media Salesforce.com has recently completed its $689 million acquisition of social media marketing platform Buddy Media, the company said. The acquisition, announced in June, was rooted in the social synergy between the two companies. The duo claimed that the addition of Buddy Media’s service will vastly improve Radian 6, a social media listening platform. Founded in 2007, Buddy Media has expanded to social media platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+.

S D Shibulal, CEO of Infosys

“Infosys will stick to its target of hiring 35,000 people this fiscal but is not looking at wage hikes for now. The hiring plan includes 13,000 jobs for its BPO operations”.

S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

update

Netmagic & Sanovi Partner to Bring DRaaS in India Customers can deploy their DR infrastructure either on physical and or on virtual environment to meet their business requirements.

Tech Partnering| Netmagic Solutions became India’s first managed IT hosting services provider to offer true Disaster Recovery (DR)-as-a-Service to support business continuity and IT disaster recovery needs for enterprises. DRaaS will use Sanovi’s CloudDRM software and Netmagic’s multi-location Datacentres and Infrastructure Management Services for end-to-end management of DR Operations. Customers can deploy their DR infrastructure either on physical and/or on virtual environment to meet their business requirements. The model provides built-in data replication, customisable DR SLAs that are monitored in real-

News @ blog

time, automated DR drills and tamperproof audit and compliance reports. With this joint offering, Netmagic and Sanovi help customers deploy a comprehensive DR strategy without incurring huge upfront investment, provide assured DR SLAs, and reduce the business exposure to IT outages in a pay-as-you-grow model. It is an end-to-end DR Solution bundled as a service. It can be availed not only by customers whose Primary Data centre is hosted with Netmagic, but also by others providers. This service is ideal for organisations evaluating the hybrid strategy and is a natural best fit DR solution for the SMB sector.

TECH TRENDS

Sify appoints Kamal Nath as CEO Sify Technologies Limited, a global player in the Managed Enterprise, Network and IT Services in India, with growing global delivery capabilities, announced the appointment of Kamal Nath as Chief Executive Officer. Raju Vegesna, CMD said, “Kamal has led various transformational engagements with large enterprises, incubated business lines, created innovative business models and promoted entrepreneurial decision-making. His knowledge of Systems Integration Services, IT Infrastructure Management Services, Technology Integration Services & Strategic Outsourcing will be vital for achieving growth.” Kamal will lead the team that will work to realise Sify 3.0, the vision to make Sify Technologies a Services and Solutions leader. Kamal was a Founder Member of HCL Comnet, the Infrastructure Services division of HCL Tech and has been a key member of HCL Tech’s growth story over the years. In his 17-year career at HCL Tech, he had front-ended engagements with customers of various verticals like BFSI, Energy & Utilities, Large Enterprises, Manufacturing and Retail.

Google acquires start-up Wildfire Blogs report that Wildfire will help the internet search company expand further into social media

Google Inc said it acquired marketing start-up Wildfire to help the world’s largest Internet search company expand further into social media. Wildfire provides software that links to Facebook Inc, Twitter, LinkedIn Corp and other social networks, allowing customers to manage their online brand and presence. Clients include Sony Corp and Amazon.com Inc. Source: Agencies

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

update

IBM Analytics Solution for More Operation Efficiency TECH-Connection| IBM has announced that HMEL, a joint

venture between Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) and Mittal Energy Investment Pte Ltd, Singapore, has adopted a new IBM analytics-based solution to transform the way the company manages its financial and operations data. HMEL has built the 9 MMTPA (million metric tonne per annum) Guru Gobind Singh Refinery in Bathinda, Punjab. HMEL had earlier engaged IBM as its strategic partner for the design and implementation of manufacturing execution systems (MES). The new IBM solution integrates information from various components of the MES, (ERP), and control systems within the refinery and delivers a consolidated, single view of the data. It will enable HMEL to analyse key corporate business processes. “As a green-field project, we wanted to leverage the best of technology. We needed a solution that would provide a centralised view of all our assets and IBM’s framework, built for our industry, addressed our requirement,” said Moiz Tankiwala, COO, HMEL.

SMEs Opt for Oracle Cloud tech trends | Indian Small and Medium Enterprise

(SMEs) are also finding cloud application a secure and cost effective way to improve their customer relationship management, while Oracle has been making headway in attracting numerous customers. Some of the new cloud customers that Oracle has added include: Flipkart, Idea, 3M, Make My Trip, Schneider, Tech Mahindra, Mahindra Satyam and Tech Nova, among many others. Oracle offers over 100 different Oracle applications on the cloud that include: ERP, HCM, Talent Indian cloud Management and CRM experience. “Our market in CY cloud platform, gives an option to port 2011 codes to and from cloud to the premises and the functionality of hybrid that lets the organisation have the best of private and public cloud,” said Atul Tuli, Sales, CRM On-Demand (Applications), Oracle India. Venky Vijay, Principal Consultant, Virtous, says that now Flipkart has the ability to have a 360 degree view communication which was not possible before; this has raised its customer portfolio by leaps and bounds.

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ASK THE EXPERT ALLOCATING DC ENERGY COSTS AND CARBON TO IT USERS

Simple, no-cost model, with few measurements and

modelling capabilities is recommended for effective Data Centre energy use and carbon allocation Can you describe the sources of data centre carbon emissions? With regard to carbon allocation, the carbon impacts of data centres are indirect, coming from three sources: • Carbon emissions created during the fabrication of the data centre and its IT equipment (embedded carbon) • Local carbon emissions from heating systems, emergency generators, or co-generation systems • Carbon emissions created during the creation of electrical power necessary to power the data centre In general, most discussions, benchmarking, or reporting of carbon are limited to those due to emissions caused by operations.

How do you define the goals of a system for assessment of energy efficiency or carbon impact of a data centre? If the objective is to bring in an overall reduction in energy use and carbon impact, one has to set a combination of goals with reduced focus on benchmarking. There are three different goals to consider: • One-time or periodic benchmarking of performance

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

dossier

aniket Patange Director– Datacenter Lifecycle Services, Schneider Electric, says that assigning a standard energy cost per server is an effective approximation for data centres with a relatively uniform server population

• Pass-through allocation of energy or carbon to users • Use of information to reduce infrastructure energy use or carbon impacts The first goal can be useful to determine if an ongoing energy management programme should be investigated or started. If benchmarking reveals performance that is comparable or better than other similar data centres, then perhaps the whole issue can be ignored. Conversely, if benchmarking reveals performance that is below par, an ongoing energy management programme is likely to have good returns. However, for impact, one or both of the two goals must be implemented. The second goal indicates that some data centres act like a data centre utility provider to other organisations - supplying either physical data centre infrastructure or providing IT infrastructure on a per-compute or perserver basis. However, the opportunity to save energy and reduce carbon impacts in a data centre is enormous, ranging from 10 per cent to 80 per cent reductions, depending on the existing level of maturity and virtualisation. The third goal uses a metric to benchmark data centre infrastructure energy use through

ask the expert CUSTOM PUBLISHING

“An effective model of how the data centre works needs to be evolved before using measurement to identify and quantify improvements”

What would be the appropriate measurement protocol to manage the systems effectively? If a perfect model of a data centre could be created, there would be no need for any measurements. The model should have complete information about the nature, quantify the operating conditions of the IT load, contain the characteristics and operating conditions of all of the infrastructure equipment, and should be capable of accepting inputs from historical data. It could simply compute all energy flows. A perfect model of a data centre might require a huge amount of custom programming and maintenance. But a good model can be created using only a rough inventory of the infrastructure and IT devices deployed, information about their configuration (N+1, 2N, etc) and some basic knowledge of the electrical characteristics of the IT and infrastructure devices. Such a model, with very few measurements, can provide acceptable accuracy for an energy management program.

Can you explain the process of measuring and allocating IT capacity to users? IT capacity can be measured and allocated in a variety of ways, including compute cycles, servers, cores, terabytes, rack cabinets, square feet, virtual servers, etc. An ideal model of IT use might include all of these factors in assigning costs, energy, or carbon. However, to start with a simple model, measuring IT capacity in number of servers can be evolved to map other measures too. If an IT user can be allocated a number of servers, then to assign energy and carbon to that user, all we need to do is assign energy to a server; in which case the total energy use of an IT user is simply the number of servers assigned times the energy use allocated per server. The total energy allocation of a server becomes a sum of the server’s own energy use, plus

Lighting 15 W

20 % to 90 %

savings in energy and carbon usage can be evolved with effective IT behaviour and physical infrastructure management Source: Schneider Electric-Data Center Science Center

Auxiliary 15 W

r support ener rve gy Se us e

Power Usage Effectiveness, or PUE and DCiE. In many data centres, the power consumed by the physical infrastructure is greater than the power used by the IT loads (PUE). Therefore, the reduction of energy use in physical infrastructure, on a percentage basis, is nearly as important as reducing the IT load. Effective physical infrastructure management can reduce the energy use and carbon impacts from 10 per cent to 40 per cent based on the condition, settings, configuration, and loading of the data centre.

The server itself 340 W

Cooling 360 W Power 75 W

Network 35 W

Storage 90 W

allocations of energy use for storage, networking, power and cooling, lighting, and auxiliary loads. For those data centres that have a relatively uniform server population, assigning a standard energy cost per server is an effective approximation.

What are the strategies that DC operators should evolve for better RoI and benefits? Any discussion on energy management focuses on two factors—measurement, metering of energy. A rational approach to energy management requires some interpretation to measure the energy use. A model of how the data centre works must be evolved before using measurement to identify and quantify improvements. It is important to have either implicit models (knowledge of experienced experts) or explicit models (software tools) to determine this. Allocation of energy costs to IT users, too, requires a specific model. While the power consumption of servers could be measured directly and conceivably associated to IT users, the majority of the power in a data centre is used by loads other than servers. In the energy management process, IT changes are made in response to energy and carbon data from the data centre model. The physical infrastructure changes are implemented in response to energy guidance from the model. In both cases, measurement is used, but it is the model that provides the interpretation and guidance to achieve the improvements. BROUGHT to YOU BY

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cover story | cxosâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; benchmark

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CXosâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; benchmark| cover story

All Chiefs â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

ONE

It managers become the target as enterprise chiefs chalk out key expectations from them as future CIOs

Target Imaging: Shigil N | Design: Suneesh k Photography: Jiten gandhi & srivatsa shandilya

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cover story | CXOs’ Benchmark

ower.It is all about power. The importance of every role in an enterprise is determined by the power the group wields. Taking a leap forward, holding the reins in one’s hands depends on the power you possess. That being so, the power of IT or the CIO cannot be undermined.. Thus, today, a new kind of CIO has emerged, one who’s a blend of a business strategist and operations tinkerer, one who’s altogether soaring to power beyond IT. IT Next seeks perspectives from enterprise heads such as CEOs, Board of

Directors, CFOs and CIOs, (the CXOs as we call them) to understand how they perceived IT and their expectations from future CIOs such as senior IT managers. It also aims at digging into the minds of these CXOs to solicit their suggestions and recommendations for budding CIOs on those skills they must imbibe related to business, management, and so on. Besides providing insights into qualifications and certifications that they deem fit for future CIOs, they also define the road map for CIOs in the midst of a changing business environment.

The CXOs’ Many Expectations Business heads are experimenting with the hierarchical structure within the organisation to leverage IT to the fullest. One such case is at India Plaza: its CEO, K Vaitheeswaran, has made the software engineering team part of marketing to enable the two teams to work closely for better business results and understanding. Rostow Ravanan, CFO of MindTree is pleased with the fact that he is able to exchange emails while on vacation, sitting on the beach - this, he believes, is possible through evolution in the IT function. However, there are gaps that IT managers need to fill, plus they must gain in expertise to measure up to the expectations of the top management. Ajit Awasare, DGM-IT, Larsen & Toubro, says, “The challenges that IT managers face are addressing time management and operational efficiency, multi-domain knowledge and people management skills.”(Read inside sections).

“The challenges that

IT managers face are addressing time management and operational efficiency, and multi-domain knowledge” Ajit Awasare DGM-IT, Larsen & Toubro

itnext | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

CXOs’ Benchmark | cover story

To become a CIO,

Mind the Entire

Business

Imbibing business and management skills are as important as IT skills for IT managers to become CEOs of IT

All chiefs, without exception, agree that for IT managers,business and managerial skill development and understanding corporate goals and strategies are as critical as becoming the CEO of the department or enterprise. IT Next survey also reveals that nearly 80 per cent of CIOs and IT managers agree that it is important to contribute to business growth by acquiring the best skills possible. All Cs echoed that future CIOs should start minding the entire business and not just IT. That clearly means that all skills under the business and managerial skills umbrella would lead to the path of adorning the role of a CEO in the long run. As for becoming a CIO, all pre-requisites of a business head are imperative. For CIO Girish Rao, Head-IT, Marico Industries, mapping the value of the change and business impact due to the increased use of technology is a priority. “IT managers need to focus on imbibing people management and talent management capabilities and channelise individuals to a newer growth path,” he says. T G Dhandapani, CIO of TVS Motors, does agree that understanding business needs and proactively developing IT strategy for business is important. Dhandapani reiterates that providing solutions for solving business problems will reduce or control cost but developing solutions to grab opportunities will bring more value to the organisation. “IT managers should focus on “Shelf Engineering” and

mANAGemeNT SKILLS Understand corporate goals/strategies and their impact on IT

Provide leadership, motivation and direction to IT team

Contribute effectively to corporate planning, agenda setting Understand corporate governance, risk management, and compliance needs

Effectively lead transformational IT projects

Obtain buy-in, funding and approvals for IT projects Forecast future IT needs

Set proper expectations from stakeholders Manage unstructured situations and emergencies

Perform risk assessment and mitigation

Design, implement and manage IT processes, best practices & standards

Prepare and effectively manage IT budgets

Very Important

Important

Slightly Important

Not Important

120

Not relevant

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

cover story | CXOs’ Benchmark

“Drive technology based innovations while

proving how those solutions can add value for the organisation via thorough financial analysis”

Rostow Ravanan CFO, MindTree

keep solutions ready in anticipation of future business expectations,” says Dhandapani.

As the finance head, Rostow Ravanan, CFO, MindTree, lays emphasis on future CIOs to understand who the customers for the business are, at what price points these customers would buy the organisation’s products/services, and in that context, what technology solutions can add value (ie, to either increase margins through cost savings, or increase sales or improve customer service levels etc) to the organisation. “Drive technology based innovations while proving how those solutions can add value for the organisation via thorough financial analysis,” points out Ravanan. Be proactive, plan for growth, IT based threats etc. In today’s world, IT systems are core for any organisation, so high availability of IT systems is also a critical factor for success. Deploying solutions around mobility is also necessary since today’s workforce is more on the road, and also expected to be available 24x7, unlike before. “People skills, facilitation skills, business domain understanding, negotiation skills, finance awareness and a “curiosity” mindset to look at diverse tech trends and see how they can benefit his/her organisation are key,” adds Ravanan. Holding a finance portfolio, Narayan S Iyer, VP-Finance, Privy Organics avers that IT managers should understand the pulse of the business that the company is in. “I expect the CIO to deliver and ensure that the software or the ERP tool used to generate Financial Statements and MIS are free of any bug and error. As the organisation grows, and people become scarce, it is very important that systems are set right properly, thereby avoiding manual intervention. That apart, customised reports required for generating various types of MIS and Statutory payments must be

itnext | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Photog raphy: s rivatsa shandi lya

What does finance expect?

CXOs’ Benchmark | cover story

buSINeSS SKILLS Prepare and effectively manage IT budgets

Negotiate effectively with stakeholders, contractors & vendors

Create and implement innovative solutions

Contribute to success of business units

Very Important

Important

Slightly Important

120

Not Important

Not relevant

correctly evolved. Lastly, a dashboard on the Finance heads’ PC to reflect major parameters like Sales, Bank Borrowings, collections, profitability etc., should also be evolved; this will help in taking any strategic decision,” avers Iyer. Iyer adds, “The CIO of any company should definitely understand the corporate goals and strategies to formulate

and evolve an IT system which will ensure and take care of not only today’s requirement of the enterprise but also take care of the next 5 to 7 years of the company’s growth.” From a CEO’s perspective, K Vaitheeswaran, CEO, India Plaza, admits, “Five years back, I would not have expected the CIO and team to think business. Now, I want my IT team to not only provide the platform for e-commerce, but expect them to track consumer behaviour, buying patterns, personalisation and monetisation of the information drawn through social media, and overall, be a businessman,” says Vaitheeswaran. It is also important to use technology to figure out changes in the consumer behaviour and demand. “I think there should be a cultural shift in how IT is treated and bring in the required change in the attitude among various teams towards IT and vice versa,” remarks Vaitheeswaran. To enable this, I am following a reverse flow; I brought in a structure where the software engineering and development team report to the marketing head.” The early results, according to him, are encouraging. As a future CIO, Ajit Awasare, DGM-IT, Larsen & Toubro, points out that the CIO can influence the profitability, market reach and availability of products using innovative approaches based on customer need.

“IT managers should focus on

“Shelf Engineering” and keep solutions ready in anticipation of future

business expectations” T G Dhandapani Group CIO, TVS Motor

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cover story | CXOs’ Benchmark

What Defines

Personal Skills for IT Mgrs. ersonal skills contribute a great deal towards enabling aspiring IT managers to tide over the tough journey as they climb up the career ladder towards the role of a CIO. Needless to say, there is complete consensus about this among the top management across business heads, finance heads, board of directors and technology heads. It is crucial to understand the important personal skills that they need to develop towards meeting their goals.

What do personal skills mean to the chiefs? TG Dhandapani, CIO, TVS Motors says, “I would say that IT managers should acquire business acumen and customer orientation as two important skills for their individual growth.”

“IT managers bring in

adaptability skills which help the project management team lay the path for future growth” Vaitheeswaran CEO, India Plaza

itnext | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Ph otography: srivatsa shandilya

The three chiefs, including CEOs, CFOs and CIOs, reiterate the importance of developing personal skills which bring in the agility necessary to tide over challenges

“Future CIOs need to

adapt

to changing environment at a faster pace and be open

to fresh ideas and be able to change the status quo” Girish Rao Head-IT, Marico Industries

Narayan S Iyer, VP-Finance, Privi Organics Ltd., lays emphasis on developing effective practical communication which would help IT managers to put across their point clearly to the team, particularly in non-IT areas. “Developing listening abilities is crucial in diving deep into the subject; this helps analyse the issue in the right light and thereby improves his\her communication skills,” adds Iyer. As finance head, Rostow Ravanan, CFO, Mindtree, drives home the point that future CIOs should nurture PERSONAL SKILLS Ability to interact with seniors across departments Effective listening skills Adaptability to changing environment Good presentation skills Ability to interact with peer managers across departments

Public speaking skills

Ability to build networks outside the organization Diplomacy & conciliation skills Participation in professional events as a resource person

Very Important

06 Important

08 Slightly Important

100 Not Important

the ability to understand business drivers and be open to the technologies that can give business a competitive advantage. As a result Rostow says, “The ability to develop problem solving and thinking skills are vital, which will help them to get closer to business.” K Vaitheeswaran, CEO, India Plaza, an e-commerce enterprise, finds a serious transition in the way technology and related teams are perceived. “The CIO and the team are

120 Not relevant

considered the fulcrum of technology and marketing, driving the business growth; this is where personal skills have contributed enormously.” The CEO says that IT managers are no longer technical people in the e-commerce industry. “They bring in adaptability skills which help the project management team lay the path for future growth,” says Vaitheeswaran. The CIO of Marico Industries, Girish Rao, finds evolution in the role as well as expectations, as he finds being adaptable to change to be critical. “Future CIOs need to adapt to changing environment at a faster pace and be open to fresh ideas and be able to change the status quo,” says Rao. Future CIO, Ashish Khanna, Corporate Manager-IT, Infrastructure, EiH Ltd., (Oberoi Hotels) believes that understanding business needs and alignment with IT systems is the key skill needed to move up the ladder. What bothers him most is that a lot of IT managers lack this quality and keep blowing their own IT trumpet, whether it is a discussion with key IT vendors or with key business stakeholders.

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Photo graph y: J iten gand hi

Written communication skills

cover story | CXOs’ Benchmark

Road Map to CIO’s

New Avatar

hange is always refreshing. Little wonder then that the current buzz in the industry is ‘Be the Change.’ CIOs and the top management, be it the CEO, CFO and the like, have emerged from their cocoons and embraced change. Most CIOs who IT Next interacted with emphasised that future CIOs should change their status quo--this will drive them on the growth path they have carved for themselves. The change one can perceive among most enterprises, whether small, medium or large, is that every boardroom discussion invariably has the CIO keenly observing the changes in the strategies of the top brass. Any change that is made is towards driving better profitability, better work environment, better returns on investments

“I have witnessed scenarios

where the CIO has become the CEO in many enterprises and the positive change is that CIO is now involved in the dayto-day governance” Narayan S Iyer VP-Finance, Privi Organics Ltd

itnext | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Photography: Jiten gandhi

In the new garb, a CIO adorns the role of a functional expert who draws a crucial intersection between business and technology in leading business expansion and growth

CXOs’ Benchmark | cover story

Vital Best Professional Essential Skills Practices to Scale Up * Develop skills to implement ERP

* Hold a Master’s Degree in Business Processes

* Actively participate in business review meetings

* The number of hours spent on the shop floor a day, critical

* Associate with company’s business growth and strategies

* Two facets of CIO—Application and Hardware and communication skills

* Develop soft skills to negotiate, decide and present strategies

* Engineering, MBA and Certifications associated with network security, negotiation skills, and finance for non-finance executives

* Challenge the status quo

* A Bachelor’s in IT Engineering and degree in management

* Mature as an individual

* Leadership courses, very critical * Doing Executive Management Programmes from leading institutes

hardware tools (this ensures error free data flowing with no down time). * Try to adopt the latest IT tools in the market and use them in the business / company in the best way possible * Be an innovator * Build alliances and partnerships * Build strong peer networks with CIOs in other companies, both within the same industry and across industries, on a global basis

* Bench mark with other colleagues * Adapt to change management

* Be able to understand corporate policies and company’s strategies before implementing any IT tool. * Ensure that the IT department is well managed both in software / ERP and

and a sincere need to be ahead of the competition. All these would be possible only if the operations were streamlined and efficient processes brought into being.

A future to-do list for a CIO From a CIO standpoint, Girish Rao, Head-IT, Marico Industries, rightly points out that the change that is observed now is to believe that the CIO is not a technocrat, but the idol behind engineering the change in an organisation using better business processes and practices. T G Dhandapani, CIO, TVS Motors, admits that the CIO should think of moving business metrics favourably using solutions, and think like a businessman. “I would recommend a sabbatical of one to two years of working in functional areas like logistics, operation, finance, in every four-year experience in IT,” says Dhandapani. From a CEO’s standpoint, K Vaitheeswaran, CEO, India

Plaza, argues that the role of a CIO is completely businessdependent as certain sectors have a strong play around technology; this makes the job of the CIO much more critical, as he or she is the business enabler. Finance heads receive many more demands from the CIO and team as they get much closer to the business than before. As the finance head, Rostow Ravanan, CFO, MindTree, defines the road map for the future CIO: to become a functional expert whom business heads approach to seek innovations, thus drawing a business and technology intersection. From a finance perspective, Narayan Iyer, VP-Finance, Privi Organics Ltd., finds the role of a CIO evolving. “I have witnessed scenarios where the CIO has become the CEO in many enterprises,” says Iyer and points out, “The change which is positive is that CIO is now actively participating in the dayto-day governance of the company and contributing towards corporate governance, security and policy matters.”.

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

hese future CIOs have learnt the tricks of the trade and also understand the importance of possessing personal skills, business and management skills. These vital professional skills form part of their goals, and while taking into account the needs of various groups within the organisation, they also help carve out a road map for the CIO of the future.

Ashish Khanna

Corporate Manager-IT Infrastructure, Eih Limited (Oberoi Hotels) On Finance Knowing the numbers well and understanding finance is critical for IT managers. This is the primary reason why IT still reports to the CFO in many organisations: IT is always on the back foot when it comes to numbers.

On Management Skills A good listener, adaptability to a changing business environment, people management, effective communication and time management are must-have skills. The future CIO should also know the art of delegation.

Best Essential Practices * Formulating a detailed IT strategy *Understanding in depth a five-year road map for the enterprise

Future CIOs arguably find several gaps existing in the skills necessary to scale up to CIO and visualise a better path 26

itnext | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Future CIOsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Take on

Skilling

Fields

CXOs’ Benchmark | cover story

Retaining talent and developing design agile

IT sysems to support business in a competitive market is one of the best practices followed

* Retain talent and design agile IT systems to support business in a competitive market * Keeping the operating cost low

Visualising the CIO Role The CIO role is becoming more and more a business leader’s role than a technical head’s; it is expected to add value in improving revenue, customer experience and cost optimisation, rather than only technically evaluate a system.

Ajit Awasare DGM-IT, Larsen & Toubro On Business and Management Skills Understanding business and architecting solutions according to business needs is critical: they can impact profitability, market reach and availability. Project management, time management, finance management, long term capital and operational impact of any proposed solution are most necessary.

Best Essential Practices * Future CIOs should be part of business decisions and play a key role in decision-making * Checking frequent end-user or client feedback and ensuring improvements as per expectations * Keeping the IT budget slim * Constant ROI tracking * Talent acquisition and retention

Visualising CIO Role The CIO role is changing from a back stage to a centre stage person, who has transitioned into an individual who can shape the company’s future, not be seen as a cost centre anymore. The CIO can change the company’s outlook by impacting the top line, profitability, reach, cash flow prediction, or accuracy of inventory, or supply chain, which in turn can reduce the time line of back office processes. Soon, this position will become the pillar of the company’s future growth and sustenance, like the CFO’s.

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cover story | CXOsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Benchmark

14 Secrets to Adorn a CIO Role

IT managers need to take a 360 degree approach to take on the role 1. Leadership Skills--Move from being a manager to a leader, to make things happen despite limitations and beyond expectations

2. Business Acumen--Strong business acumen means awareness and understanding of business functions; getting insights into the challenges / concerns / problems / needs and enabling IT; resolving business issues

3. Team Player--Be cross functional to make things happen

4. Business IT Integration--Aligning business needs and integrating through technology to deliver value 5. Project Enablement--Move from project management to project enablement with regard to projects / initiatives that include leading and effectively managing the team 6. Discipline of Execution--Speed, timeliness and quality of execution

7. Committed to the role--A sense of responsibility and accountability besides great ownership for the role defined and assigned. 8. Customer Centric Approach--Walking the extra mile to render service beyond the defined role

V Subramaniam

Director - Information Technology & CIO (Otis India and Gulf Area), Board of Directors â&#x20AC;&#x201C; OTIS ISRC OTIS Elevator (India) Ltd

9. Effective Communication--this involves effective communication on Business IT Initiatives including periodic update / tips on IT to create and strengthen the awareness of business IT across the enterprise

12. Continual Learning -- Continual

10. Effective presentation--Articulation and

13. Technology Acume--In-depth understanding

presentation of Business IT initiatives; this includes training to end users in non-technical (IT) language, aligning to respective functional needs

/ awareness of technology, emerging trends; this includes evaluation of technology (understanding of technology) and aligning to business needs

11. Vendor Management--Effective vendor management to ensure vendors are partners and extended team players; this includes outsourced and managed services

14. Balance and Agility--Besides a work life

itnext | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

enhancements of skills such as Leadership, Effective Managerial Skills, Business Acumen, Project Enablement, Technology Skills, Business IT Integration, Soft Skills etc

balance, they need to know how to balance between multi roles and between technical and non-technical teams.

insight | BIG Data

Spotting the

Big Data 30

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

BIG Data | insight

IT managers need to focus on core issues with a unified data management strategy to spot the big data and its benefits

illustrati on: Anil t

By Simo n greg ory

here’s not an iota of doubt that businesses are under immense pressure to manage massive amounts of complex data. Information levels are estimated to be growing at up to 80 per cent year on year, and the biggest challenge associated with that comes from the dramatic increase in managing unstructured data from emerging sources, such as desktops/ laptops, audio/visual files, images, databases, social media and a variety of other data types that are prominent in an organisation, but frequently managed in ‘silos’. This unrelenting growth is a major force driving the big data debate, which is further compounded by the universal adoption of virtualisation, the rapid shift to cloud-enabled services, the influx of mobile computing devices, demand for 24x7 operations and increasing consolidation. Whilst big data brings with it a lot of good regarding new ways to create information that offers real business value, it also presents a new set of challenges for the IT department as organisations struggle to find ways in which to keep pace with more demanding service levels for recovery and collapsing backup windows--which often leads to overloaded networks and a tendency to turn to more costly alternatives. A fundamental issue here appears to simply be that there just isn’t enough time, resources or budget to manage, protect, index and retain massive amounts of unstructured data. The negative side effects of Big Data, which include risk, complexity and

cost, clearly need to be met head on if the positive benefits are to win out.

Preparing to Manage Big Data There is still a long way to go in managing this change effectively, according to recent research. A survey of 207 security and IT operations professionals by LogLogic recently found “significant” gaps between theory and practice, across industries, with regard to preparation for and management of big data and cloud environments with more than a third of those questioned citing that they did not understand the concept of ‘big data’. In fact, just under half (49 per cent) said they were “somewhat” or “very” concerned about managing big data, whilst 38 per cent said they did not have a clear understanding of what big data was. A further 59 per cent said that they lacked the tools required to manage data from their IT systems, resorting to using separate, disparate systems and even spreadsheets.

to multiple products being deployed to manage backup, archive and analytics and resulted in complex administration, information silos have now been created causing upgrade concerns and bringing forward the debate around the cost of alternatives versus current maintenance issues. Traditional solutions also have two stages for each protection operation-scan and collection. In order to perform backup, archive and file analytic operations, each product must scan and collect files or information from the file system. Synthetic full, de-duplication and VTL solutions may have been introduced to try to reduce repository problems but a lack of integration capabilities causes these solutions to fall short in the longer term. Typically, incremental scan times on large file systems can also require more time than actual data collection. We believe

Best Solutions

Approach to Big Data

Legacy solutions found not ‘fit for purpose’ Unfortunately, legacy data management methods and tools simply aren’t up to the task of managing or controlling the data explosion. Originally created to solve individual challenges, which has since led

According to Gartner, there are several categories of vendors that claim to offer big data. There are so many solutions available today. All major IT vendors have solutions but no clear mandates for interoperability and standards: Some of them include: Storage vendors and data management system vendors: EMC, Oracle, Netapp, IBM, Tera Data BI and analytics: IBM, SAP, Pentaho, SAS, Oracle Big data in the cloud: Amazon Elastic Map Reduce, Microsoft Azure, Google Packaged Hadoop distributions: MapR, CLoudera, Hortonworks Data integration and management: Informatica, Talend, Composite software Data warehousing tools

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insight | BIG Data

“Unified data management approach enables data analytics and reporting to be performed from the index in order to help classify data and implement archive policies for data tiering to lower cost media” — Simon Gregory, Technology Evangelist, CommVault

that there is an alternative approach, which is to adopt a unified data management strategy which collapses data collection operations into a single solution enabling the copying, indexing and storage of data in an intelligent, virtual repository that provides an efficient and scalable foundation for e-Discovery, data mining, and retention. Such an approach also enables data analytics and reporting to be performed from the index in order to help classify data and implement archive policies for data tiering to lower cost media. This also serves to reduce the total cost of ownership. The advantages here are immediately clear. Built-in intelligent data collection classification will help to reduce scan times, which in turn allows companies to maintain incremental backup windows. Improved single pass and data collection for backup, archive and reporting also helps to reduce server load and operations. Integration, source-side de-duplication and synthetic full backup then further reduces the network load whilst a single index instantly decreases the silos of information. The converged solution will create a single process that has the potential to reduce the combined time typically required to backup, archive

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and report by more than 50 per cent as compared to traditional methods.

Follow the ‘Core’ Approach Whilst there are many ways to create big data, organisations that want to take control of the data tsunami would be advised to consider adopting a ‘Copy Once Re-use Extensively’ (CORE) strategy if they want to manage big data cost effectively in the long term. The key benefits to CORE are simple: Process data once Store data once Retain data once Search data from one place Centralise policy management Automate tiering of data while maintaining hardware and storage flexibility Synchronise data deletion and automate space reclamation There is no doubt that many organisations are having to walk a fine line between over-collection of data, which brings companies higher review costs, and under-collection, which presents them with the risk of missing key information, perhaps located in one of the emerging data sources - a critical issue in today’s world of informationon-demand, regulation and compliance. The overall idea that all data sources, even those at the “edge” of the network could be accounted for – without adding

to the data heap is the objective behind recommending converged backup, archive and protection. Companies should leverage a single platform that will enable those working with the information to intelligently manage and protect enormous amounts of data across a number of applications, hypervisors, operating systems and infrastructure from a single console. A policy-driven approach to protecting, storing and recovering vast amounts of data whilst automating administration will always be the best way to maximise IT productivity and reduce overall support costs. Eliminating manual processes and seamlessly tiering data to physical, virtual and cloud storage helps to decrease administration costs whilst increasing operational efficiencies. A single data store would empower businesses to streamline data preservation and eliminate data redundancy during the review process which is now considered to be one of the major causes of skyrocketing data management costs. The ability to more easily navigate, search and mine data could fundamentally mean that big data is finally viewed as an asset to the business, not a hindrance. Simon Gregory, Technology Evangelist, Commvault

insight | Cloud Computing

Reverse Gear For

High Cloud With little or no defined cloud standards available, cloud experts advise IT managers to work backwards to develop and determine what is needed under cloud strategy By s u r esh k ar r a

tâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not utterly farfetched to contend that every G2000 company is seriously exploring some aspect of cloud computing or the other. Some are early adopters, and have even implemented their core business systems on the cloud. Irrespective of where the enterprise is in its adoption journey, key stakeholders often wonder if all the moving parts fit together harmoniously, or if they will become a disastrous integration experiment. It would have been great if there were cloud computing standards which were as simple and as widely adopted as, say, XML. It must however be noted that even though the first working draft for XML was published in 1996, it took almost a decade for it to become the de-facto standard for exchanging information (application interfacing, office productivity, etc.). The question to ask ourselves is

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whether it is economical to adopt some rudimentary standards now, or wait till much later. Meanwhile, though, cloud technologies will continue to proliferate within the organisation; so, if an enterprise wants to adopt cloud standards, should it start developing something from scratch, or is there something readily available?

Current State of Cloud Standards Today, the cloud standards arena is a very crowded place. The protagonists predominantly are the various cloud vendors. Various new organisations have been newly set up to focus on developing cloud standards. The Open Stack project promoted by Rackspace and NASA is focusing on standards for a massively scalable infrastructure. The IBM-backed Cloud Standards Customer Council is trying to bring

about customer-driven prioritisation in standards development. The Open Data Center Alliance backed by Intel is focused on defining usage models and standards to speed the migration to cloud computing. Standards are also being developed by various existing organisations. DMTF (Distributed Management Task Force) has created standards on Cloud Management, The Open Group has a Cloud Computing Workgroup, NIST has detailed a Federal Cloud Standards Roadmap, and OMG has built a multiview specification for cloud computing. In addition, there is the Cloud Security Alliance, the Open Cloud Manifesto and The Open Grid Forum. It appears that The Cloud Computing Interoperability Forum has shut shop. The domain address pends deletion at the time of publishing.

Cloud Computing | insight

ILLUSTRATION BY PC ANOOP

What Should Enterprises Do? Rummaging through all the standards websites to determine which best fits the needs of a large enterprise is a daunting task. Each of the above groups has a different focus. Being part of one of the aforementioned fora might not be the best solution either. Standards fora are typically divided into working groups that focus on specific areas. Each working group has hundreds of

members. Hence, the turnaround time for recommending new standards is usually long because deliberations are always consensus driven. 1.Purpose-driven Retrograde Approach To solve the dilemma, we recommend a goal-oriented approach. This starts by determining what needs to be achieved, and then systematically works backwards to develop what is needed. The method is a little counter-intuitive

to the way standards are typically adopted in an enterprise. However, it must be noted that this approach is very lean, and results in minimal wastage of time and effort. In a fast-paced cloud landscape, frequent course corrections are necessary, and a retrograde approach gives organisations the flexibility to adapt. The first step in this process is to clearly lay out the drivers for cloud adoption. â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Drivers for Cloud adoptionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;

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insight | Cloud Computing should not be confused with ‘drivers for standards adoption’. Often, teams go down this rabbit hole and lose precious time. Once the drivers for adoption are clearly laid out, the next step is to determine the primary purpose of cloud adoption.

Purpose-based Standards The primary purpose of cloud adoption should be one of the following, viz. Internal Cloud, Hybrid Cloud and Cloud Provider. This is an oversimplification. However, creating an elaborate taxonomy of 20 different purposes is also not very useful. Internal clouds are set up by a small percentage of companies, either because of the nature of their business, or because of concerns regarding the security of their data. A hybrid cloud set-up is a superset of the setting up of an internal Cloud. Hybrid clouds need an internal cloud for the existing infrastructure and an external/public cloud for burst capabilities. Similarly, becoming a Cloud Provider is a superset of the setting up of a hybrid cloud. A Cloud Provider needs an internal cloud for existing infrastructure and provides the hybrid cloud to clients.

Vital Aspects in Cloud loudification is typically a 3-to-5 year C journey and, during this period, both Cloud and traditional IT will co-exist

new standards is usually long because deliberations are always consensus driven

Key stakeholders often wonder if all the moving parts fit together harmoniously, or if they will become a disastrous integration experiment

n a fast-paced cloud landscape, I frequent course corrections are necessary, and a retrograde approach gives organisations the flexibility to adapt

ey question is--should it start developK ing something from scratch, or is there something that is readily available?

learly laying out the drivers for cloud C adoption is critical

The turnaround time for recommending

Do not Create Anew, Instead Modify In all the cases mentioned, new cloud standards should be built on top of traditional standards and processes. Most of the traditional aspects, especially such as security and access to systems outside the company firewall, should continue to be what they were before cloud adoption. It is not recommended to first adopt the cloud and then work on setting up the standards. Instead, adopt the cloud under the purview of the existing standards, and then modify these standards to account for the cloud. Modifying something that exists takes a much shorter turnaround time than creating something new and getting it approved. The fundamental

“In a fast-paced cloud landscape, frequent course corrections are necessary, and a retrograde approach gives organisations the flexibility to adapt” —Suresh Karra, Head of Consulting for Cloud, Infosys

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etermining the primary purpose of D cloud adoption is important

assumption here is that standards that currently exist have already gone through various stages of revisions and approvals. It is important to arm ourselves with the right templates and frameworks to ensure standards adoption does not become a multiyear exercise. 2.Key Takeaways Many large organisations typically spend effort and resources setting up a Quality or EA group to ensure consistency of technology adoption across the enterprise. Cloudification is typically a 3-to-5 year journey and, during this period, both Cloud and traditional IT will co-exist. Creating standards ground up will require re-training people and longer adoption cycles. Resistance to change and overscrutiny is also something that cloud standards adoption will have to contend with. Some organisations (SMBs in particular) might not have any standards to begin with. In this case, there is nothing much to modify. It is recommended that these organisations should invest in creating standards from scratch. Otherwise, they will find themselves in a technology jungle within a short period of time. Head of Consulting for Cloud, Infosys Ltd.

advertorial | ADOBE

Success Through Collaboration With its rich features, ease of use and collaborative capabilities, Adobe Acrobat can accelerate and enhance enterprise projects, especially in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction segment

oday, IT organisations are faced with shrinking budgets and increased end user demand for better collaboration tools. As organisations create competitive positions centred on collective knowledge and resources of their workers to build better products and create effective solutions, they need tools to make those assets more efficient and effective. IT executives are continuously aiming to position IT as a business enabler rather than a cost centre. To maintain that balance, IT executives are looking into solutions that let IT do more with less while remaining agile and continuing to innovate. The need for collaboration and information-sharing is being particularly felt in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) segment. Companies in the AEC segment have to constantly share architectural and engineering drawings, virtual models and other rich data among different sets of users, including architects, consultants, engineers, build-

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ers and suppliers. Given the highly customised nature of AEC projects and their dependence on multiple local/regional factors (different subcontractors, various building codes, etc.), the success and speed of projects often rests on collaborative tools. That is where Acrobat from Adobe comes into the picture. With a rich set of features and easy deployability, the software offers organisations, especially in the AEC segment, a proven way to connect people, ideas, and information to increase productivity and achieve better results. Millions of customers around the world—including several AEC customers—rely on Acrobat to streamline how they work, integrate rich media to engage in entirely new ways, and deliver high-impact communications.

tions. According to an Adobe-commissioned study by Forrester Consulting, titled “Building the Future of Collaboration,” workers report an increasing need to create high-impact deliverables—from sales proposals and presentations to how-to guides and financial reports—but have concerns about the ability of email and file attachments to convey their information effectively. The expectations around documents are changing. With the increase of devices and software available to more easily produce rich content, knowledge workers want to use rich media to deliver better context around information and to produce more engaging, compelling content. This is fuelling the shift from static documents to dynamic documents. Unlike traditional static documents, dynamic documents are in us & Europe regularly interactive. They can include collaborate links, buttons, embedded calwith people in other time culations, and rich content, zones including drawings, images,

66% workers

High-Impact, Engaging Communications The bar is rising for compelling and persuasive communica-

ADOBE | advertorial

videos, embedded web pages, and forms. Dynamic documents display and behave as intended across platforms. They are also easy to create, can be shared with others using existing means, can be secured, and can be quickly integrated into existing document-based processes or document management systems. Acrobat allows users to: Rapidly assemble a wide range of file types—including email, forms, web pages, audio, video, and interactive media—to create and preview an engaging, organised PDF Portfolio. Customise PDF Portfolios with new, professionally designed layouts, visual themes, colour palettes, and other properties to reflect their company branding or personal style. Share PDF Portfolios with others to communicate information the way they intend to. Quickly bring ideas to life through rich, interactive documents. By easily inserting Adobe Flash Player compatible video into PDF files they can allow anyone to play them back, online or offline, using only the free Adobe Reader—no external player required. Convert information from the web into PDF files that preserve links, fields, structure, and multimedia content.

Collaboration and Productivity are Key In today’s information-centric enterprises, individuals rarely produce and deliver work in isolation. Forrester reports that 99% of knowledge workers in the United States and Europe work together with others, with more than two-thirds saying they regularly collaborate with people in different time zones and geographical regions. With

“Earlier, we circulated the hard copy or scanned copy, which consumed time and cost, while now with markup on PDF, we can directly circulate PDF files. So it saves the time, money and paper” —Jigar Patel, Manager (Design Team), Jyoti Ltd

increased awareness and availability of collaboration tools such as Adobe Acrobat, organisations in India are adopting them faster than ever. This is especially true for AEC companies with dispersed teams working on complex projects. Acrobat allows these teams to: Save more time by accelerating document reviews. Using Acrobat they can easily manage and accelerate electronic document reviews without the cumbersome manual process of exporting, emailing, and importing comments from multiple reviewers. Confidently share documents and collect comments from others using services at Acrobat.com, a network folder, a shared

web folder, or SharePoint. Track review progress, deadlines, and participation. Enable Adobe Reader users to participate in shared reviews, fill and save forms, and digitally sign and approve PDF documents without requiring them to purchase and install additional software. Easily create a simple, consistent workflow for customers, a single department, or an entire organisation.

Enhanced Security Companies increasingly seek to reduce costs by streamlining expensive paperbased processes. However, they do understand that with increased collaboration,

S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

advertorial | Adobe

these solutions and, in some cases, are bringing these tools into the environment, creating more complexity for IT. To maximize success, IT needs to deliver document collaboration and exchange solutions that are broad enough to scale across a wide variety of knowledge worker needs, can cost-effectively scale across and beyond the organization, offer required document controls for maintaining security and privacy, and can flexibly span languages, computing platforms, and computer skills.

Top new features and enhancements in Adobe Acrobat X Pro:

“Our employees use Adobe Acrobat which has helped us in streamlining document collaboration and review across project teams with reliable and more secure documents in dynamic PDF” —Prakash Lalwani, Head - IT, KEC International

they must do a better job of protecting their sensitive information and intellectual property. Here’s how Acrobat helps better protect sensitive information: User can leverage built-in support for digital signatures and certification to foster trust utilizing hardware tokens, support for timestamp servers, and compliance with digital signature standards, such as PAdES (PDF Advanced Electronic Signatures). Companies can restrict access to confidential information by encrypting documents using Adobe LiveCycle Rights Management ES. In Acrobat, users can identify and permanently delete hidden information, or leverage the Sanitise

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Document tool to remove sensitive data, such as metadata, with one click. When converting files to PDF, Acrobat can be used to maintain critical document properties, including layers, object data, and structures from across supported Microsoft Office applications, as well as specialised applications such as Autodesk AutoCAD, Microsoft Project, and Visio.

What Next? To help an organization meet its business objectives, IT must be proactive in increasing the efficiency of document collaboration and enabling more dynamic methods of communication. Knowledge workers are already seeking

Customise PDF Portfolios with an all-new collection of layouts, visual themes, and colour palettes. Automate tasks with the Action Wizard. Search and reuse scanned content with greater accuracy through improved optical character recognition (OCR). Seamlessly integrate PDF files into Microsoft SharePoint workflows. Easily create interactive forms Streamline online document reviews Share files online at Acrobat.com Easily edit PDF files and quickly export PDFs as Word or Excel documents.

Future OF IT

www.itnext.in/futureofit

TOP READ

$2.1 Trillion: Global consumer spending on tech in 2012 Spending will continue to grow at a faster rate, at around $130 bn a year, to reach $2.7 trillion by 2016, says Gartner Consumers will spend $2.1 trillion worldwide on digital information and entertainment products and services in 2012, according to Gartner, Inc. That’s a $114 billion global increase compared with 2011. Spending will continue to grow at a faster rate than in the past, at around $130 billion a year, to reach $2.7 trillion by end 2016. http://www.itnext.in/ content/21-trillionglobal-consumer-spending-tech-2012.html TOP-DISCUSSION

Top 5 investment priorities of board directors 86 per cent of directors said in a survey they believe that IT’s strategic contribution to business will increase by 2014. Board directors are prioritising customers, core competencies and competitive advantage. http://www.itnext.in/ content/top-5-investment-priorities-boarddirectors.html-0

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The IT firm has been selected by Philips to make its business more agile and competitive through technology Cognizant has been selected by Royal Philips Electronics, a global provider of healthcare, lighting, and consumer lifestyle solutions, as a strategic partner to drive a broad range of technology-enabled business transformation and growth programs. Under the multi-year engagement, Cognizant will provide a comprehensive range of consulting and application services globally to help Philips consolidate znc rationalise its IT landscape. http://www.itnext.in/content/cognizantphilips-let%E2%80%99s-make-itbetter.html

TOP INTERVIEW

Mobile is Driving Cloud Testing David Taylor, President of Asia Pacific & Japan, Micro Focus, talks about the mainframe business in India and how COBOL is no more restricted to the platform. He also talks about companies that are offering mobile access to applications. http://www.itnext.in/content/david-taylormobile-driving-cloud-testing.html

OPINIONATED

IT Managers have entrepreneurial edge Swami Manohar, founder and MD of LimberLink Technologies, says given the rapid changes, complexities and choices faced by IT managers, they are capable of starting out on their own. At some point in life, each of us is bitten by the entrepreneurial bug and we cling to the strong desire to carve out a niche for ourselves. Being an entrepreneur, even the journey towards making it big, is akin to hang-gliding where you are ready to jump off the cliff with nothing but a flimsy glider holding you up. However, the desire doesn’t die. So where does the entrepreneurial journey begin? It begins the day you tell your boss you are quitting to be on your own. Once the words are out, there is no going back, except for a fervent hope by the rational part of your brain that the boss will convince you to stay back. http://www.itnext.in/ content/it-managershave-edge-entrepreneurs.html

from the web SECURITY NEWS

FEATURE READ

Cyber criminals use Olympics as bait The first Olympic-related spam that was seen was an email that asked for personal information. Cyber criminals are known to be opportunists. They will take advantage of anything newsworthy and craft their schemes around (for example) sporting events like FIFA and the Olympics. As the London 2012 Olympics opening event drew near, Trend Micro Researchers spotted spammed messages using the 2012 Olympics as bait; one involved an email that said “winning notification”, another message asked for personal details in exchange for a prize, while yet another asked users to notify a specific contact person. Users who fell for any of these traps were at risk of having their information stolen or their machines infected with malware.

Over 150% performance improvement in unified threat mgmt New WatchGuard XTM 5 Series claims to break price/ performance barriers and redefine next-gen UTM WatchGuard Technologies, a global leader in manageable business security solutions, has

http://www.itnext.in/content/cyber-criminals-use-olympics-bait.html

VENDOR NEWS

Wipro implements core banking for 5 co-operative banks Core banking solution to help banks provide the latest e-banking facilities to rural customers in remote areas. Wipro Infotech has announced implementation of core banking solution (CBS) for 5 co-operative banks under National Agriculture Bank for Rural Development (NABARD). The application is hosted from Wipro’s Data Center and would be supported for 5 years from the date of Go Live. As a part of the contract, Wipro is currently implementing the project for co-operative banks across different states. http://www. itnext.in/content/ wipro-implementscore-banking-5-cooperative-banks.html

TOP INSIGHT

Knowing the Numbers It is critical that IT managers understand finance if they want to take up bigger roles, says Sharat Airani, Chief - IT (Systems & Security), Forbes Marshall. While effective communication is critical to the success of every business, understanding finance and financial terms is equally vital. For IT managers whose activities primarily revolve around IT, internal or external, understanding organisational goals is critical

announced a ground-breaking change for the unified threat management (UTM) market with the release of the New WatchGuard XTM 5 Series network security appliances. As next-generation UTMs, the New WatchGuard XTM 5 Series sports the fastest throughput in its price class without sacrificing security efficacy, manageability and ease of use.

http://www.itnext.in/content/ knowing-numbers.html

http://www. itnext.in/content/ arkadin-acquiresconferenceplus.html

PRODUCT NEWS

Speeding up the Cloud Automated discovery capabilities of HP’s CMS 10 decrease the time spent on manual discovery by more than 50 per cent. HP has introduced new offerings that improve visibility into the relationship between software and physical, virtual and cloud IT infrastructure. http://www.itnext.in/content/speeding-cloud.html

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

An MBA may not make you a CIO, but this can The CIOs of tomorrow are expected to be outstanding business leaders, not just good technical experts, who can collaborate and communicate in their professional environment ITNEXT invites you to participate in the 2-day Pocket CIO programme to equip yourself with strategic, technical and soft-skills needed for senior management roles. The training sessions will be hosted by experts, and will feature eminent CIOs. SESSIONS WILL COVER

Contemporary trends in a current technology area Delivering innovation or improving business outcomes through IT solutions Best practices for installing, operating and improving enterprise services/infrastructure Thinking strategically about IT Leadership in the corporate context Communication skills for top managers Visit www.next100.in to register for Pocket CIO programme. The full-day (9:00 am to 6:00 pm) program is entirely free of cost.* PRINCIPAL PARTNERS

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LEADERSHIP | NEXT 100

Dreams:

What They Mean to

Next100 Winners

Next100 winners have dared to dream about their future roles, projects, education or goals and are making concerted efforts to pursue with confidence

veryone has a dream. Whether an Olympic hopeful, or an individual or a professional. “All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them,” said Walt Disney, and there can be no better example of a man who dared to dream. While all have dreams, some chase their dreams in a concerted manner, with unwavering focus; others are rather casual in their approach. What about IT professionals? Don’t they dream? About their future? About their work? What are the dreams that keep them going, lift them out of the mundane and prod them

on to achieving the impossible? This brings us to the Next100 winners, have special dreams they focus on, and make a conscious effort to achieve. So, ITNext attempted to get insights into what dreams meant to the Next100 winners. The study tries to focus on the dream projects that the winners had in mind, dream roles they aspired to adorn, the dream industry they liked to be associated with and dream sources of knowledge that they looked at. Most Next100 winners instantly vouched for the fact that Next100 awards gave them the necessary credentials.

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

NEXT 100 | LEADERSHIP

Shiju George, Senior Manager, Shoppers Stop Ltd

â&#x20AC;&#x153;It has been my dream to lead an IT governance project which envelops a whole lot of enterprise risksâ&#x20AC;?

Your Dream Project

Dream Certifications or Dream Courses

It has been my dream to lead an IT governance project which envelops a whole lot of enterprise risks. While working out strategies to capture and evaluate varied risks in the project, I would aspire to arrive at all possible mitigation plans which can help nullify the risks. I am waiting for the opportunity to take up such a project.

I have a keen interest and am passionate about acquiring new qualifications and possess certifications which have helped me grow in my career. I have a strong desire to complete the COBIT 5 certification. I aspire to acquire this certification over the next year or so - it will help me to get ahead in my career.

Your Dream Industry

Your Dream Role

Retail and banking industries have been my all-time favourites. While I have had a stint in the banking sector, I am happy to have got into the retail sector - I carry a lot of aspiration to grow in this segment, a segment which shows much promise.

A dream role? I have dreamt of becoming the CIO in a leading organisation in the future. Being an IT professional, I want to lead a team which can add value to business growth. I intend to be instrumental in driving the top line business growth through IT processes and projects. Besides, I have always been keen to be clued into organisational strategies which can translate into growth. This I expect to happen in the next five years, growing at a consistent pace.

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LEADERSHIP | NEXT 100 Archie Jackson | Senior Manager & IT Service Delivery Manager, Steria India Pvt. Ltd.

“I wish to be a CIO, CEO or a COO of an organisation and contribute to the nation’s social responsibility”

‘Dream’--it is a very ‘volatile’ word, for dreams may or may not happen. To succeed at anything, we should not expect things to happen on their own, without all necessary efforts on our part. For me, dreams are my goals, not only for professional growth but also for personal contentment.

Dream Goal Whatever our dreams or goals, they are critical, and can be a challenge, if we are not good at time management, if we do not have visionary support from our family or do not have a monetarily /materialistically contented self and family. Before I invest in my dreams, I would like to ensure all these parameters are met. As an individual, I dream (want, not hope) to work towards improving India’s technology sector, along with looking equally at taking up the social responsibility of bringing about uniformity in technology across the nation. I wish to be a CIO, CEO or a COO of an organisation and contribute to the nation’s social responsibility. But that would still be an interim step. So, what lies beyond? The human responsibility to take everyone along, on the path to success.

Contribute to Technological Progress India has emerged as a global IT leader, despite ups and downs in the economy. There are schools and colleges where pens and note books are no longer essential. Tabs and cloud schools operates efficiently. On the other hand, there are still many schools where the same prototype black-board and chalk exist, while some more operate under a tree. My dream is to bring about uniformity across all sectors by utilising IT. IT can do that--empower the students of today, into the skilled professionals of tomorrow. India is one of the major

exporters of agricultural crops but also continues to use deadly pesticides which are banned across the globe. India is also one of the largest producer of waste which actually goes waste, never recycled. IT can implement effective recycle units to conserve loss of our natural resources and make use of what we have already wasted.

Wish List to Make the Dream Come True I have framed clear objectives to achieve my dream. The first objective is to aspire and work to attain a CxO (CIO, CEO, COO, CDO) role which will help me gain exposure, experience and competency. The next is to aspire for an entrepreneurship role which will help me expand the scope. That would be my first step towards my goal. I wish to achieve this before I turn 45, not beyond. I intend to keep myself up to date with trends, current affairs and enrich my skills and knowledge periodically through case studies, practical scenarios etc. Sharpening the tools required will also help--to attain perfection, to always deliver, identify and focus on the best possible solution.

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

Kaustav Das, Delivery Head-SAP, Highbar Technologies Ltd

“My immediate aspiration is to successfully play the role of a CIO and imbibe all the qualities of a CIO”

infrastructure construction sector. It had many other firsts to its credit, such as no precedence and hence, SAP too lacked industry know-how. It was the first time in Asia that a particular sub-module IS-ECO was being implemented. The project redefined how future business would be done in the organisation. As a team member, it was an exhilarating experience throughout and a great learning curve which has helped in shaping my career. It had all the elements required for a successful project – world class software, highly committed and motivated team, high visible commitment from the top management, adherence to methodologies, tightly controlled project management ably led by the CIO of the organisation.

Dream Courses \ Certifications Considering the fast paced IT industry, it is critical to be informed about changes; otherwise, you run the risk of becoming obsolete. I believe that one needs to acquire basic degrees and certifications to the post graduation level and then acquire knowledge through various other sources. Besides having hands-on experience, it is good to be part of various groups to share and receive knowledge on various topics. The areas of interest, of course, would depend on what one’s goal in life is. One of the reasons whyI applied for the Next100 award was that it gave me instant access to the cream of IT professionals across the industry. I had the benefit of gaining and sharing knowledge much faster than perhaps would have been possible by just doing a course or a certification.

Your Dream Role

ph otog raph by Ji ten gandhi

Your Dream Project

I think all professionals, whatever the field, want to lead a dream project. My aspiration has been no different. In my opinion, a dream project will comprise of these: a) the delivery outcome should lead to a quantum (not marginal) value addition (b) it should be unique (c) each and every member of the team must gain out of it, both personally and professionally. I have been fortunate to be part of one such project, a comprehensive SAP implementation in the Indian

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My dream role is one which allows me to create value to the organisation through effective use of IT. I have been fortunate to get this opportunity for the past 4-5 years in my current profile as Delivery Head for SAP & other allied applications. The next logical path would be definitely to play a greater role covering the entire gamut of IT applications and infrastructure. My immediate aspiration is to successfully play the role of a CIO and imbibe all the qualities of a CIO, and as part of this endeavour, I acquired an MBA degree in finance. The Next100 award has enabled me to get exposed to the outside world, a rich source for acquiring knowledge.

LEADERSHIP | NEXT 100 Vijay Choudhary, DGM-IT, HRH Group of Hotels

“My dream role would be that of a ‘CIO,’ sitting in the codriver’s seat, helping the CEO to drive business agility and transformation”

Your Dream Project I have always aspired to lead a dream project whenever I notice business problems and then tried my best to apply technology to fix it. Being in the hospitality industry and management of IT infrastructure, my dream project is something which can be a BI tool, where in the system draws up the future strategies, while taking inputs from the environment, industry, research organisations, in-house data. It will be about coping with Big Data advantage and its analytical capabilities.

Your Dream industry The service industry accounts for the maximum in our GDP growth. Hospitality and tourism is one of the prime drivers of this segment, and I have been working in this segment for the past 13 plus years. It’s my favourite as technology is always at the forefront playing a big role. The reasons I love to be part of the hospitality industry are: Exposure: Being in the hospitality industry, we face/learn about varied processes/people/technology/ stakeholders. Unique Workflow integration: The IT department is like an organisation in itself, running within an organisation. Even the smallest department is integrated with the main core application/platform because the most important factor is uninterrupted guest services. Respect given to IT: High and deserving. Team work: In this sector, the team’s work is immediately reflected in quick ‘guest/client feedback.’ It’s required as a strong KPI measuring business insight.

Dream Courses\Certifications I have enrolled myself for research, for a Ph.D. I also plan to do ITIL, CISM and PMP, the globally accredited and accepted certifications. To achieve academic excellence and to acquire a research mindset, I am pursuing my dream course--a Ph.D--and getting into intricacies of how researchwork is done. The aim is to cover various methodologies, report writing, study statistics and analytics, mentor the next generation of IT leaders and beneficiary communities. The Ph.D is already under way. I will start on other professional certifications from January 2013 onwards.

Your Dream Role My dream role would be that of a ‘CIO,’ sitting in the co-driver’s seat, helping the CEO towards complete business agility/transformation/innovation. I’ll look forward to wearing a business cap in addition to technology responsibility. It is indeed my favourite, as it offers greater space for innovation. ITNext has already geared me up by bestowing the ITnext100 award in 2011. As a Next100 winner, I was able to recognise my potential and I am now putting in more efforts to understand what inventory of skills really matters to reach a CIO’s position.

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NEXT 100 | LEADERSHIP

Balaranjith T General Manager, Atul Ltd

“My current dream project is to lead an end-to-end ERP implementation project with 100% automation” Your Dream Project My current dream project is to lead an end-to-end ERP implementation using a single software stack for a company which will totally re-engineer the way the processes are handled with 100 per cent automation of processes. Also the implementation should be cost effective and well managed, a lack of which is the primary reason for failure. I am yet to see an ERP Implementation which has resulted in 100 per cent automation of processes. Having all the requirements met in a single consolidated ERP Software is a dream come true for me.

Your Dream industry My dream is to be associated with a web-based start-up which involves lot of creativity and innovation. It would be an exciting opportunity to build an IT team from scratch for

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such a company. I can think of a change in the next three years only as I have many tasks to perform and challenges to address.

Dream Courses\Certifications My dream has been to do a PhD in Business Management from a premier institute. I would be interested in carrying out research on the reasons for failed IT implementations, particularly in the ERP space and discover the best approach for such projects. I have started applying for a part time course to pursue my PhD, which should take off in the coming year.

Your Dream Role Since Chief Strategic Officer and CIO, CIO and CSO roles go hand in hand with most business operations revolving around IT and its efficient use, I would aspire to be one. As a strategic officer, I would be able to merge both the IT system and the company’s long/short term strategy and bring about efficiency in operations. To reach this goal, besides IT, I am also learning about and overseeing the IT infrastructure space and have taken to reading a lot of books on convergence of business and IT. I should be well equipped to take up this role in two years as I have begun associating myself with strategy and business in a small way.

LEADERSHIP | NEXT 100 Jatinder Aggarwal, Group Manager, HCL Technologies Ltd

“I do believe a certification like NEXT100 has more value than most courses currently in the market with fancy price tags and a lot of jargon”

Your Dream Project For me, a dream project is one which changes the life of the common man by way of simplifying processes. For example, the “Unique Identification Number,” a project which hopefully should benefit our nation in a big way and make processes simpler for our countrymen. I have also been fortunate to be associated with some very good and challenging assignments in my career so far which also involved working with clients like UBS, Deutsche Bank, Citibank, RadioShack, Debenhams and many more.

Your Dream Industry New trends like BI, Voice Recognition, social networking and Internet-Retail boom (in India) are among my favourite segments. These are the segments which will lead the next change in the life of people. Currently, voice operated assistant (for example, Siri) is available on cellular devices and this is just the beginning. Fortunately, my work involves working on some of these segments, it’s part of my current profile.

Dream Courses\Certifications I do have many interests and passions but I am not sure if it’s the best way to go about acquiring a certification or a qualification, since there are several ways of acquiring knowledge.

I am yet to find certificates which offer the knowledge that we have acquired over decades, especially those related to leadership and entrepreneurship skills. However, I must share that programmes like “NEXT100 & Future CIO” are programmes which I really admire. For one, it is available in open space for all participants to share their experience and knowledge. I do believe a certification like NEXT100 has more value than most courses currently in the market with fancy price tags and a lot of jargon.

Your Dream Role My dream role is to contribute to life changing initiatives. I do agree a designation like CIO and CEO does give you authority to take final decisions and would help in realising dream projects. I haven’t set any designation-oriented goal. What is more important to me is to lead teams to develop more technology solutions that will make people’s lives easy.

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15minute manager

training Education workplace compensation workforce trends skills development personal development

Healthy tips for a better living Page 60

Strategy: MDM for Mobility this page Review: Nexus 7 Tablet page 62 Trends: Virtually Real page 63 Training Calendar: Telecom page 64

BY sun i l L alvani

imagi ng: Manav Sac hde v

nterprise mobility is among the most critical subjects that IT heads and senior IT managers handle currently. Four trends have helped mobility take centre stage and prompted IT heads to take control of the situation. The first is “consumerisation” of IT, where everyone brings his or her own mobile device to work, the BYOD (bring your own device) trend as it’s called. The second is a dramatic improvement in network bandwidth and lowered cost of access which has driven the trend. The third is the reducing cost of smart handsets. The fourth is the rapid growth in mobile apps, which is luring consumers and employees to use their own device. Research group such as IDC study endorses the trend through its survey, carried out in early 2012 (Worldwide Mobile Worker Population 2011-2015 Forecast), which says that the world’s mobile worker population will reach 1.3 billion by 2015, representing 37.2 per cent of the total workforce. However, the greatest impact will be felt on Infosec within the firm.

mdm for mobility

Research groups such as Zinnov, in its enterprise mobility study, identified the key challenges faced in enterprise mobility adoption relating to data

IT managers find new ways to manage the increasing mobility trend with best mobile device management strategies

Security Challenges

Enterprise Mobility

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15-MINUTE MANAGER breaches, increased threats from both internal and external sources, etc. The study indicated that enterprises are struggling with issues around software license conformance, support costs, tracking devices and device downtime associated with the mobility trend.

Best Mobile Security Practices It is critical to manage the risks emerging from increasing mobility or the BYOD trend. IT heads need to absorb technology that helps in managing mobile devices faster, easier and more organised than ever before. Adoption of mobile balance technology is another critical practice which enables smartphones and tablets to be used for business and personal purposes without compromising on security. Mobile device management (MDM) is made easy with BlackBerry or any smartphone. Today, there are a variety of devices, operating systems and environments that are giving birth to a plethora of MDM players. Shortlisting and picking the right MDM system is a thorny issue. CIOs need to think of remote wipes, locks, backups, authentication, encryption, restricting access by IP or network, selectively enabling access by device, automatically turning off mobile device functionality such as cameras and recorders in certain situations and environments, etc. The issues around mobile security can be roughly broken up into end user device management, application security, data security and network security. CIOs are struggling with rogue devices, network intrusions and threats from malware/ viruses. The real problem is that the perimeters of an enterprise are constantly being redefined and users have multiple access points. How can an IT head ensure that security policies, measures and updates are distributed and installed across devices that are with employees who are remote and always on the move? Device compliance is quickly emerging as a natural starting point for mobile security. Based on enterprise needs and employee demands, IT heads must create a list

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HEALTHY HABITS

Tips To Healthy Eating

Seven golden rules for Health Diet 1. Drink plenty of water. 2. Eat more fruit and vegetables. 3. Manage your portion sizes. 4. Eat less processed food. 5. Eat regular meals – don’t skip meals – and always eat a healthy breakfast. 6. Restrict your alcohol intake. 7. Limit your intake of extra food like lollies, chocolate, biscuits, cakes, pastries, soft drinks, chips, pies etc.

Healthy eating tips: Eat less red meat. Reduce the frequency and the serving-size of red meat portions. Add more poultry and fish to your meals: avoid sausage, frankfurters, bologna and other processed meat because they are usually high in fat. Eat only those dairy products which have low fat such as skimmed milk, cottage cheese and yogurt. Restrict the number of eggs to no more than three per week. As for cooking oil, use only recommended oils such as corn, soya, or olive. Eat more vegetables, particularly peas and beans - fresh or dried - because they are a very good low-fat source of protein. Eat wholemeal bread as your staple food. Eat wholemeal breakfast cereals. Take extra bran if the rest of your daily diet is rather refined. Dos and Don’ts Include a variety of whole grains in your healthy diet, including whole wheat, brown rice, millet, quinoa, and barley.

Longetivity: Keeping cool with healthy diet for a better living

Eliminate from your diet: saturated fats, found primarily in animal sources including red meat and whole milk dairy products; trans fats, found in vegetable shortenings, some margarines and processed foods. Source: www.helpguide.org

15-MINUTE MANAGER

mobility “IT managers will have to keep pace Challenges with changes in devices and constantly change permitted list of devices & policies” * Top management and CIOs are in a dilemma surrounding enterprise mobility

* Enabling relevant secure access across the entire network, while protecting corporate assets *Allowing access to personal devices is not an answer

Sunil Lalvani,Head-Enterprise Technology, RIM India.

“With a 10% increase in our IT budget, I plan to implement smart phone mobile apps among other projects” Manish Shah, GM-IT, Indusfila Ltd.

of devices that are permitted. The next step is to ensure that security software is deployed to determine non-compliant devices accessing the network and proactively blocking them. The upside of the strategy is that it helps an enterprise create comprehensive policies around device capabilities and behaviour. The

IT managers will have to keep pace with changes in devices and their adoption, constantly changing the permitted list of devices and security policies.

Security Checks End point security is the next biggest concern. Mobile devices are prone

“The solution to the growing mobility risks lie in well-integrated MDM systems that are geared to address the compliance needs of the firm”

* Creates heterogeneous environment and the integration process will challenge the internal security system * Data projection being the need of the hour, enterprise mobility should be restricted to accessing emails only * Increased risk of exposing company data and operational hassles of managing different types of devices * Enterprise data and applications such as HR and finance needs to be given special attention and avoid situations which would call for security violations

to getting misplaced and lost (unlike desktops). They must therefore be configured correctly to stay aligned with corporate security policies and compliance needs. User authentication, role-based access, and unique personalisation features need to be attended to at this step, along with ensuring that when a device is lost or misplaced, it can be backed up, locked or neutralised remotely and quickly. The selection of an efficient MDM system to enforce, manage and mitigate issues around end point security cannot be emphasised enough. The next step is to ensure secure network connectivity that also provides IT visibility to network activity. Manual and automated event management tools are recommended to improve control, risk reporting and administration, thereby also reducing costs and ensuring that productivity is not impacted. Mobile enterprise security has another dimension to deal with. Many applications have unpredictable

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15-MINUTE MANAGER REVIEWS

Indians excited about Nexus 7 tablet launch

behaviour; some may use the contact book or other data on the mobile device without adequate notification to the user. One method is to blacklist applications or prevent them from launching on the device. But for apps that users do need, IT may have to consider encryption of data and secure networks.

Effective Steps in Mobile Device Management

Google’s Nexus 7 ($199 or roughly Rs. 11,300 for 8GB, $249 or roughly Rs. 14,000 for 16GB) is a game-changer. The first tablet with Android 4.1 “Jelly Bean,” it’s the most bang for the buck you can get in the market right now. It’s versatile, well-built, fast, and a lot of fun to use. In fact, Google Nexus 7 tablet’s India pricing has not yet been announced, and for now, is only available for pre-order in the US; but the device is expected to be globally available soon, perhaps in August. Physical Features and Internet: The Nexus 7 feels well-built, even classy for a $200 tablet. Kudos to the hardware manufacturer, Asus, a company that typically builds good stuff. A Gorilla Glass screen dominates the front of the tablet, and around back, there’s a slightly grippy, stippled black rubber panel. At 7.8 by 4.7 by 0.4 inches (HWD) and 340 grams, it’s comfortable to hold in one hand for long periods. Turn the tablet on using the prominent Power button at the top right corner, and you’ll see a perfectly fine 1280-by-800, 7-inch IPS LCD with a huge black bezel around it. The screen is higher-resolution than the Kindle Fire, which clocks in at 1280-by-600. A Wi-Fi-only device, the Nexus 7 connects to the Internet using 802.11 b/g/n, albeit only on the 2.4GHz band. I had no problem hooking into several WPA2protected networks, although it dropped off of one of them at one point during testing. The tablet supports Bluetooth for audio and NFC to transfer files to other NFC-equipped Android devices.

imag ing: Shi gil N

Performance and Apps: The quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 chipset inside is one of the fastest mobile processors around. This unit runs at 1.3GHz in single core mode, and 1.2GHz when two to four cores are active. It’s far faster than the Kindle Fire’s older dual-core chipset.

The best small-screen tablet you can buy, simply put, the Nexus 7 delivers the best balance of price and performance you’ll find in the tablet market right now, so it’s an easy Editors’ Choice for best small-screen tablet. Source: Thinkdigit

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The solutions to the growing mobility risks lie in well-integrated MDM systems that are geared to address the risk management and compliance needs of the modern enterprise. An MDM solution must address the following: Mobile policy and standards management Remote device configuration management across multiple platforms Remote device control including data leakage protection (DLP) and data isolation Remote device monitoring including rogue app detection across multiple platforms Device locationing and tracking Inventory management Trouble-shooting across multiple platforms User support across multiple platforms Audit and reporting capabilities Ability to keep pace with changes in the mobility space The rapid change in mobile technology means that security solutions will need periodic re-assessment. Businesses must be prepared to as quickly extend the scope and coverage of their security policies and processes, always keeping user experience in focus. The bottom line is that users are more demanding. Devices are getting more sophisticated. Networks are getting faster. Access is becoming cheaper. Competition is growing. Not only is there a need to place mobile security on a high priority to-do list, there are ways to efficiently create solutions. Sunil Lalvani, Director-Enterprise Technology, RIM India

15-MINUTE MANAGER

virtualising Business critical apps

virtually real Being innovative to put business critical apps on a virtual platform By Vijay M hask ar

il lustrati on: Ani l T

t is natural to leverage technology to the fullest extent to deliver new customer services, improve operational efficiency and cultivate collaborative efforts that lead to innovation. Most IT heads across industry verticals have made positive strides in leveraging server virtualisation technology to transform IT and thereby reduce hardware and operating costs while increasing speed and responsiveness of the infrastructure. The effort is only getting better in virtualising applications, which are on the rise.

Some Virtual Insights Today, most organisations have already virtualised some of their applications and plan to virtualise more. While IT heads have virtualised less important applications, there are certain hindrances with regard to virtualising business critical applications as customers are skeptical about security. In one of the surveys conducted by Symantec, “Virtualisation and Evolution to the Cloud survey, 2011,” a majority of the respondents said security concerns stopped them from porting business-critical applications on virtualised servers. Besides, the main goals of the participants were improving

storage and server performance through virtualisation; however, over 81 per cent said they were not very confident about business critical applications meeting performance needs if placed on the virtual mode. But a deeper dive into the customers’ reaction over virtualising servers indicated that most of those who had virtualised the servers had realised the benefits of virtualisation. These included lowering capital and operational expenses, less downtime and faster delivery of applications from streamlined test and development processes. The success boosted the confidence of the IT heads towards considering virtualising infrastructure and applications.

The Promise of Virtualisation In general terms, it is critical to understand the benefit of virtualisation as its promise extends beyond economy and efficiency. Virtualisation has the potential to dramatically raise IT’s service levels and the ability to meet

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15-MINUTE MANAGER

event calendar Telecom Global

Event Calendar for September 2012

event

Venue

Dates

Asian Carriers’ Conference 2012

Shangri-La’s Mactan Resort & Spa Cebu, Philippines

September 4-7, 2012

Automation Mumbai

Bombay Exhibition Center(BEC)

September 7-10, 2012

APT Conference Preparatory Group for WRC-15 (APG15-1)

Danang, Vietnam

September 10-11, 2012

Negotiate Enterprise Communications Deals

Manchester Grand Hyatt, San Diego, USA

September 12 – 14, 2012

13th Meeting of the APT Wireless Group (AWG-13)

Danang, Vietnam

September 12-15, 2012

Telco Cloud Partnering Strategies 2012

Singapore

2012 BICSI Fall Conference Exhibition

Anaheim Convention Center, CA September 16-20, 2012

LTE Asia Summit

Singapore

September 18-19, 2012

P&T/ EXPO COMM China 2012

Beijing, China

September 18-22, 2012

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September 12-13, 2012

changing business requirements, while reducing development, deployment, and management costs of application infrastructure and operations. It is important to discuss the journey towards virtualisation before laying emphasis on business critical applications. For most organisations, initial projects focus on IT’s own test and development. As IT experience and business confidence with the technology grow, organisations begin to consider virtualising business production applications. Since the quality of service and resiliency determine the rate of adoption of virtualisation for business critical applications, it is slightly slow at this juncture. Before getting on to production applications, companies are making the environment virtualisation ready and ensuring high-availability, easy DR, making the environment secure, combined with high level of service offerings. A gradual progression is made to more important applications, while demanding SLAs.

Key Transformation Strategies IT organisations are trying to unlock the potential of virtualisation by combining three elements. They include: *Virtualising more infrastructure * Consolidating application silos into shared pools *Automating provisioning and service-level processes

Virtualising more infrastructure Virtualisation and cloud computing promise scalability, automation, elasticity, and cost-effectiveness. But restricting virtualisation to development environments or non-critical applications limits the benefits it can deliver; the best returns are achievable only by virtualising more applications. For most organisations, overcoming security, availability, and storage management challenges is an essential step to adopt cloud computing environment managed in-house to an extent, as well as externally.

15-MINUTE MANAGER Consolidate resources Virtualising application infrastructure delivers hardware savings and operational efficiencies, but real transformation requires more. True data-centre transformation requires consolidated pools of server, network, and storage capacity that can be applied to many different application workloads and utilisation requirements. Properly implemented virtualisation delivers flexibility, quick provisioning of new servers, dynamic allocation of storage on demand, and helps address business requirements like demand spikes. Such a shared-services model can reduce costs by increasing utilisation of server capacity and avoiding over provisioning.

“Rapid changes in demand for critical applications can affect latency, performance, availability, and other key service levels” Vijay Mhaskar, VP-Information Management Group, Symantec compliance, and more--are essential steps in delivering on the strategic promise of virtualisation.

Automate provisioning and service-level processes

Next Wave-Virtualising Business Critical Apps

Virtualisation and consolidation pave the way for dramatic increases in the level of automation an environment will support. Automating request, provisioning, and management processes for server, storage, and network resources cut staffing costs and accelerate execution. Automation of processes with service-level impacts — high availability, disaster recovery, data protection, security and

The most important and biggest step is to virtualise business critical applications, which will drive the real business benefits for any organisation. Here are some recommendations that organisations can follow to virtualise business-critical applications with confidence: Business-critical workloads need advanced security, availability, and storage management. Adopt solutions

business apps go virtual * Innovative approaches to migrate business critical applications to a virtualised platform * Virtualising critical servers resulted in lowering capital and operational expenses, less downtime and faster delivery of applications from streamlined test and development processes * Virtualising business-critical applications delivers significant strategic benefits, and is considered the first step towards moving to cloud * Before virtualising production applications, making the environment virtualisation ready is critical through ensuring high-availability, easy DR, making the environment secure, combined with high level of service offerings. * Unlocking the potential of virtualisation through virtualising more infrastrcuture, consolidating application silos into shared pools and automating provisioning and service-level processes * Rapid changes in demand for critical applications can affect latency.

that work effectively on all leading virtualisation platforms Rapid changes in demand for critical applications can affect latency, performance, availability, and other key service levels. Adopt solutions to instrument your virtual data centre and adjust processes that affect service levels automatically and continuously as demand changes. Virtualisation expands an organisation’s end points which get vulnerable to security attacks. Keep risks under control by extending current security policies across physical and virtual environments. Use technology that auto-detects rogue virtual machines and scans offline virtual machines to detect vulnerabilities before they cause a problem. Because server virtualisation can increase storage requirements dramatically, inefficient storage management can reduce or even nullify cost savings from server consolidation. Manage your storage efficiently with de-duplication, reclamation of orphaned storage, virtualisation of pooled storage and dynamic storage tiering and provisioning. Have the visibility and control to automate service-level processes, accelerate virtual server and desktop deployments, and cut the cost and complexity to manage and protect high-density virtual and physical infrastructure.

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cube chat | Sharat M Airani

Learning

is Living My deep interest in exploring the IT security space prompts me to do research, probably take up a PhD in the subject,” says Sharat M Airani, Chief-IT (Systems & Security), Forbes Marshall By Manu sha r m a

My sucess

mantra “Desire to acquire perfect skills ”

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e is insatiably passionate about learning the newer nuances of technology. Chief-IT (Systems & Security) of Forbes Marshall, Sharat M Airani’s quest for enriching his knowledge doesn’t seem to end ever as he aspires to bag a PhD in the IT security space in Advanced Persistent Threat (APT). “My deep interest in exploring the IT security space prompts me to do research, probably take up a PhD in the subject. This would give me personal satisfaction, and at the same time, enable me to help the IT community,” says Airani. A deep knowledge in such a specialised field would help him gain much recognition in the industry. Not surprisingly, Airani has been adding new credentials in the form of new degree/certifications every two years in the security, networking and storage arena.

Though Airani does not possess an engineering degree, he is a science graduate with Physics and Mathematics as his specialisation. He was fascinated by computers and fell in love with AT 486; so he did not hesitate to join UB Engineering in 1990-92 as a storekeeper. His proximity to computers created a strong desire in him to pursue his career in computers. In early 1992, he resigned from his job and nurtured his interest by learning Q BASIC, COBOL, PASCAL programming on DOS 3.2 and later, on Unix OS. “The early 1990’s saw a boom in email firms without Internet and I joined one such company --ICNET in late 1992. I used to maintain its UNIX server and helped in pre-sales support,” he says. “I opted for night shifts so I could get time to study and take up courses during the day,” he adds. In 1994, he joined DartMail when Windows 3.x and later, the Windows

cube chat

Fact File NAM E S HARAT M . AIRANI C URRENT D ES IGNATIO N C HI EF IT (SYSTEM S & S EC URI T Y) C URRENT ROLE M ANAGI NG AND S EC URI NG I T I NFRASTRUC TURE EXPERTIS E: C REATI NG BUS INES S VALUE S UPPORTED BY TEC HNOLOGY; ALI GNING I T WI TH BUS I NES S I T TRANS FORM ATION, TURN AROUND IT ORGANISATION AND I M PROVE EFFEC TIVENES S STRATEGIC OUTS OURC ING AND C O ST M ANAGEM ENT

“I opted for night shifts so I could get time to study and take up courses during the day” server, OS, was rolled out, and he learnt to work on them. It was here that Airani had the option to make a choice between programming, application support and end user server/infrastructure management; but he chose server/ infrastructure management as a career. In 1995, when Windows NT4 was rolled out, a course in computers from NIIT helped him gain experience in NT servers. In 1997, Airani joined Forbes Marshall as a network and server administrator and has since grown to the current position as chief of IT. One of the major challenges he faced at Forbes was converting the desktop to VDI. Being a large manufacturing company, design and production teams were spread across the location. There was a need to move the data to a centralised location.

“We involved the management as the key stakeholders in the project and created a proof of concept before we implemented a secured VDI project in 2009. “The benefits accrued in terms of centralisation of data, backup, and return of investment (RoI) of about Rs 50 lakhs from for the first year itself,” he adds. Others would have sat on their laurels, but not Airani, even after achieving so much. “My thirst for knowledge remains and I continue to present technical papers on various ICT subjects at international conferences,” he says. He owes his achievements mainly to his father and family members who supported him all through. He draws inspiration from the writings and philosophy of great thinkers like Swami Vivekanand and Guru Aadi Shankaracharya.

AWARD S * WINNER OF C IS O 100 AWARD 2012 * C I O AS I A M AGAZI NE ’S “THE 2012 C IO 100 HONOUREE”. * AWARD ED NEXT GENERATION C IO BY I T NEXT 2011 * WINNER OF THE “TOP 1 0 GREEN I T ENTERPRI S E AWARD 2011” S UPPORT ED BY APC -S C HNEI D ER * WINNER OF THE C I S O 100 AWARD 2011 - REC OGNI TI ON OF THE BEST AND THE BRI GHTEST I T S EC URIT Y LEAD ERS OF TODAY * “VALUE C HAM PI ON” FO R THE YEAR 2009 -10 FRO M FORBES M ARS HALL * WORK EXPEREINC E 22 YEARS FAVOURI TE QUOTE C ONC EIVE--BELI EVE --AC HIEVE (WITHOUT C OM PAS S ION)FAVOUR ITE D ESTINATI ON M AURI TI US & ANDAM A NNI C OBAR FAVOURI TE book D IFFIC ULT Y OF BEI NG GOOD -BY GURC HARAN DAS

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update

off the shelf

A sneak preview of enterprise products, solutions and services

Samsung rolls Slim Beam Smartphone Projector This is one of the slimmest projector smartphones launched

New Range of Smartphones from LG in India

The high-end phones launched are a seamless amalgamation of style and technology. LG Electronics announced the launch of 3 new smartphones in India - LG L series (L7, L5 and L3) and LG 4X HD Quad core. These sleek hi-tech phones run on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, except for L3 which runs on Android 2.3 Gingerbread.

key features mobility | Sharing memorable moments is * Android 2.3 OS platform now even easier, with Samsung Electronics * Share multimedia & digital media announcing the launch of Samsung Galaxy content Beam projector smartphone in India. The * Equipped with ultra-bright 15 smartphone enables users to display and lumens projector share multimedia content anywhere on * 5 mega pixel camera a large luminous projector screen or on a clear wall (surface). Based on the Android 2.3 OS platform, Galaxy Beam helps users to share their multimedia (including photos, video clips, maps, business information, and games) and other digital media content with their family or friends by beaming it directly onto walls, ceilings or improvised flat surfaces. Galaxy Beam’s ultra-bright 15 lumens projector and high-definition projection up to 50’’ wide at a distance of 2 metres, allows users to freely share their memorable moments instantly with crisp clarity. With the 5 mega pixel camera, you can capture and share pictures and videos with loved ones instantly, enriching the sharing experience. The beam is powered by an impressive 1.0GHz dual-core processor, ensuring great versatility and a highly responsive user interface. Priced at Rs. 33,900, it is available at exclusive stores.

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What’s more, these high-end phones are a seamless amalgamation of style and technology. The quad-core featuring 720p display-flashing LG Optimus 4X HD is a wonderful addition to LG’s mobile family. This 4.7 inch True HD IPS display on the Optimus 4X HD offers a superior high-clarity viewing experience with a superb resolution of 1280x720. The phone has a 2150mAh battery, the largest among quad core smartphones. The core essence of L style features a timeless design with defined details, which further differentiates LG mobiles from competition. L-Style’s design philosophy comprises of five elements Modern Square Style for a comfortable grip, The LG Optimus 4X HD is priced at Rs 34,990, the LG Optimus L7 at Rs.19,900, the L5 at Rs. 13,199 and the L3 at Rs. 8,895. KEY FEATURES *Allows to jot memos instantly * 1.5GHz quad core plus 1 processor * Comes with NVIDIA Tegra3 and Tegra3 * Near Field Communication * Android 4.0 and Android 2.3

update

Headsets for Mobile Workers

Samsung Galaxy Online

PRODUCT FEATURES * Active Noise Cancellation * Noise Blackout 3.0 * Nano Bluetooth USB adapter * Stay connected and switch seamlessly

Head set | Jabra Supreme UC headset sets the standard for workers constantly

communicating on the go According to a study from IDC, the worldwide mobile worker population is set to increase to 1.3 billion in 2015, accounting for 37.2 per cent of the workforce, indicating that workers everywhere are leaving 9-to-5 days in the office behind by working remotely, travelling and collaborating via the cloud. Much of this increase is driven by the popularity of laptops, smartphones and tablets. To meet the demands of the mobile worker, Jabra has announced the Jabra Supreme UCTM. After introducing the Jabra Supreme last year--the first non-stereo headset to incorporate Active Noise Cancellation to block out noisy environments for the user wearing the headset--Jabra is introducing a variant that expands the capabilities of the original product to work with all leading Unified Communications (UC) applications (Microsoft, Cisco, Avaya, Skype, and several others), as well as mobile phones and tablets. The Jabra Supreme UC comes equipped with a nano Bluetooth USB adapter, to support all mobile phone calls and available in retail and through partners at Rs. 11,000 (Inclusive of all taxes).

PC Cabinet Range With New Models

Comes with Android 4.0 with massive storage and front dual speakers. A leading e-commerce company has launched the all-new Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 510 P5100. The latest Android 4.0 comes with massive storage and front dual speakers. The All In Communication Tablet features powerful usability and is a total multimedia hub. The Galaxy Tab 2 510 P5100 is built to support voice calling, multi party video calling and includes preloaded messenger ChatOn to aid fun and easy communication. Plus thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 16 GB internal storage (expandable up to 32 GB). The Android 4.0 contains innovative features of Ice Cream Sandwich enabling greater accessibility, user-oriented features and quicker access to Google Mobile services. It is priced at Rs 32,990 and can be ordered through Snapdeal.com.

FEATURES * Attractive front panel design * Offset mesh grill front panel * Improved air circulation * Can hold five 3.5mm devices

Cabinet | New line-up comes with black interiors,

plus industrial designs and superior cooling performance. Infotronix, a supplier of products and accessories for Computers, Consumer Electronics and Communication under the brand Zebronics has introduced three new cabinet models--Scallop, Aero and Mines--that incorporate unique matt black interiors for that stylish look. The new cabinets come with attractive front panel design. Scallop is embellished with a combination of matt and glossy finish front panel shaped like undulating waves, while Aero has an offset mesh grill front panel that gives it a chic industrial look and improves air circulation. The third model, Mines, incorporates a mesh grill and elegant glossy finish on its front panel. All three cabinet models have the capacity of holding

five 3.5mm devices and two optical disk drives or 5.25â&#x20AC;? devices and can support both ATX and mATX type motherboards. While maintaining a simple layout, users still have heaps of space to manage their drives. Widely available through retailers in accessories markets and select online resellers, the cabinets are priced at Rs 1,699 for the Scallop, Rs 1,899 for the Aero and Rs. 1,899 for the Mines.

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

update

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

itnext | se p tember 2 0 1 2

the big q

PRIVATE CLOUD

the big

Break through the cloud EXPERT PANEL

Ajay Bakshi, Vice President – Process Automation & Improvements, Hinduja Global

The Situation...

Cut it from he re

Is private cloud the solution for Bhaskar Rajan to fetch better business results? The organisation is witnessing rapid expansion and the need for IT resources and services is increasing. Bhaskar Rajan, the Senior IT manager of a large discreet manufacturing firm is under pressure to drive better RoI and business benefits by leveraging IT to the maximum. The challenge before Rajan is to lower the capex. He and his team think it is time to consider deploying a private cloud that can put a layer of abstraction over the IT resources and offer users managed application services. There are umpteen challenges the team faces and Rajan, as head of the IT team, will have to work out a private cloud project plan. He must consider what kind of cloud model he needs to work out, which critical applications he must to put on the private cloud and who the stakeholders in the private cloud group would be. Besides, it is also critical to take into account the existing infrastructure and evaluate the proYour responses count. Log on to www.itnext.in/bigQ to submit your replies. The best entry will be published in the next print edition.

U C Dubey, Executive Director-IT, Iffco-Tokio General Insurance Co. Ltd

Pertisth Mankotia, CIO, SheelaFoam India

cess to ensure that the organisation is cloud ready. His next step is to define the scope of the project taking timelines and budgeting into consideration. There are several things running in his mind. The first obvious question is whether the private cloud would bring in the necessary results. Given that the cloud phenomenon is very nascent despite the hype around it, will it address all his challenges in driving better business benefits? The dilemma is also about choosing the right partner who can implement the cloud model effectively and address security related challenges. Rajan must convince the top management about how cloud computing standards will make sense to the business by lowering the cost. However, irrespective of where the enterprise is in its adoption journey, Rajan thinks that key stakeholders often wonder if all the moving parts will fit in harmoniously, or whether they will result in a disastrous integration experiment. Amid such confusion, Rajan seeks answers from experts on two intriguing questions, answers to which will help him make the right move.

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

the big q

the big questions...

What kind of private cloud model do you think is most suitable for Rajan’s organisation and who are the key stake holders; what kind of innovations should he think of?

What kind of applications should he consider migrating to the cloud, what should the key implementation steps be, what kind of business benefits can he expect to achieve?

Here are the answers... BE PREPARED TO HANDLE CHANGE FIRST ANSWER

Ajay Bakshi Vice President Process Automation & Improvements, Hinduja Global About me: Responsible for IT solution architecture, automation and process improvement; involved in building operational and strategic plans for various business groups.

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Given the backdrop and Rajan’s work environment, it makes perfect sense for his organisation to take advantage of a cloud environment. Of the two types of private clouds (on-premise private clouds and externally hosted private clouds), Rajan could expect a huge reduction in capex investment not only with new assets but also replacements in the hosted private cloud option, besides reducing manpower investment. While questions pertaining to RoI and benefits from cloud are inherent, experience shows that lack of support from line of the business group is one of the primary reasons for projects not taking off. Rajan’s cloud project plan will not succeed with the CFO sign-off alone; it requires an expanded team for understanding the change and subsequent improvement in the new work environment. SPOCs from various line departments must be part of the change group. Rajan must ensure this group is appropriately informed and empowered to play a crucial non-technical but functional role. The IT team must handle differences arising from various departments effectively without disturbing the regular routine of many functional end users during the change and post stabilisation period. In advanced stages of the maturity cycle, Rajan can think of connecting with key distributors, varied applications and data points relevant to the business.

Second Answer Rajan’s initial sequencing should be to first take pure internal applications to the cloud; and in the second stage, take up applications used and controlled by multiple owners. For successful implementation, Rajan must take certain steps: * Pick a suitable IT partner to take it through the cloud journey * Access the current hardware, their utilisation, make a priority list of applications to be moved to cloud. * Close the decision on virtualisation and hardware platforms, which impact the whole cloud journey. * Assess the scale of the project. Compatibility is the most important focus area. Most often, organisations invest only when required; so, in 5-10 years, there are different systems running parallel, a challenge. Hence, it is the right time for him to bridge the gap. As for business benefits, the cloud can help in reducing capex, reduced data centre costs, saving in real estate, less stress on access control and savings around air conditioning and power bills. Cloud also enables quick response time. It helps Rajan in embedding security through identity assurance and access control, encryption and key management and fraud protection. Private cloud would drive operational flexibility, enable dynamic provisioning and de-provisioning of servers in a secured environment.

the big q

CONVINCe the STAKE HOLDErs FIRST ANSWER Private cloud is an extension of virtualisation. Before embarking on the cloud journey, Rajan should deliberate with the IT infrastructure team, IT application team, key users in various business functions, finance, and the top management team. Once these stake holders are convinced, the journey for cloud adoption can begin. Cloud adoption can enable him to have agility in providing IT infrastructure faster. Apart from quick provisioning, it will also help in meeting fluctuating work load requirements. Any cyclic or seasonal peak load can be serviced without earmarked resources designed for peak load. Sharing of resources for various applications will also result in considerable reduction in IT cost. Thus a private cloud can meet his first challenge of supporting rapid business expansion.

U C Dubey Executive Director-IT, Iffco-Tokio General Insurance Company Ltd.

Second Answer Cloud adoption is a journey. The following types of applications may be considered for migrating to cloud. Application used by large number of users like e-mail Software development and prototype making Application testing Applications used as software as a service ( SaaS ) Applications having load fluctuation and demanding peak loads occasionally Collaboration applications Key implementation steps: Organise a cloud concept workshop for key stake holders Decide on private, public, or hybrid model of cloud adoption Identify applications to be migrated to the cloud. Clearly understand software licensing issues in cloud model Make sure that regulatory compliances are not violated by cloud adoption The benefits would revolve around reducing IT resources provisioning time from weeks to hours, having applications up and running faster, low cost due to sharing of resources, scaling the IT resource usage up or down as per requirement.

te Priva d clou

About me: Expertise in vendor management, IT strategy and planning, business alignment; mentor to employees..

Grouped Security/Compliance Requirement in the Cloud Private VLANs, network layer firewalls and DDoSs is imperative to ensure security and compliance in the Cloud 100% 90% 80% 70% 60%

Source : go grid

50% 40%

Not Required

30%

Required

20% 10% 0% HIPAA

PCI

Private Cloud Private VLANs, network-layer firewalls single tenant environment and DDoSs

Virtual Private Network (VPN)

Data Grouped from Prior Survey Question. s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

the big q

BUY THE BUSINESS TEAM INTO CLOUD FIRST ANSWER Given Rajanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s challenges, private cloud is an ideal option. The first step is to take up Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - it can streamline the process and straight away reduce certain investment. Then, focus on the software platform to work out an effective cloud strategy using Platform as a Service (PaaS). This would address his core challenges and bring in certain standardisation. Have the business teams buy in into the cloud game. Make a project plan around IaaS and Paas and share it with various internal stakeholders. Take up a pilot project and run a small group through the private cloud to understand its benefits.

Second Answer

Pertisth Mankotia Head-IT, Sheela Foam India Pvt. Ltd. About me: Instrumental in developing and implementing home-grown ERP; responsible for digitisation of an enterprise.

Do an impact analysis - it will determine the benefit of the cloud. The primary applications that can go on the private cloud are mailing, file servers, document management systems, sales force and the like. Never put core applications on the cloud â&#x20AC;&#x201C; the model is still not mature. The licensing cost may also be high. However, if there are home-grown applications, it is easy to migrate to the private cloud; and Rajan can find significant cost reduction as there is no role for a third party service provider. One aspect to keep in mind is MPLS connectivity. A robust strategy must address data leakage. Since the information load is unpredictable, putting small applications on the cloud mean better savings.

Notes NOTEs

More Resources 74

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Virtual Storage Platform anniversary: http://blogs.hds.com/hu/2011/09/happy-birthday-vsp.html How to avoid information overload: http://marksblog.emc.com/2011/09/episode-108-.html

update

open Debate

book For you A platform to air your views on latest developments and issues that impact you

How is security addressed in Enterprise Mobility?

KAPIL MEHROTRA CHIEF MANAGER – IT APPLICATIONS APOLLO MUNICH HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANY LIMITED A mobile is no longer a luxury, it’s a necessity. Right implementation of a mobile device strategy across the organisation and mapping that strategy to local device settings can address security concerns. Make and implement an IT policy that governs usage and employees’ understanding. Use threat management to identify the risks of moving applications to a mobile platform. Educate application developers in secure coding practices for mobile device platforms.

SDPL NARAYANA ASST GM-IT NEULAND LABORATORIES LTD To ensure security when using mobile computing, the protection should be commensurate with the risks. When using mobile computing facilities, eg. Notebooks, palmtops, laptops, smartphones and tablets, special care should be taken to ensure that the business information is not compromised. The policy should include requirements for physical protection, access controls, cryptographic techniques, back-ups and virus protection. Remote access to business information across public network using mobile computing facilities should be authenticated.

KANAKA DURGA BHAVANI PRASAD S SENIOR IT MANAGER FIFTH AVENUE SOURCING PVT LTD Some security challenges include protecting corporate data in transit over public Wi-Fi and cellular networks. Encrypting data stored on device, making it available only to authenticated users on domain. Limiting end user’s access, preventing harmful internet downloads and unauthorised software installation. IT managers can overcome the challenges by securing over–the– air communication to protect data in transit, use SSL / TLS Certificates to secure data and encrypted file transfers and store on the device etc.

Cheating the Impossible TITLE: Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist AUTHOR: Philippe Petit PUBLISHER: TED Books Pages: 50 (Kindle edition) Price: $2.99 Reviewed by: Sanjay Gupta

How much time and preparation would it take to cross 200 feet? The answer becomes less obvious and the question much less silly when you throw in other facts. We are talking about the space between the Twin Towers (of 9/11 fame), and the crossing was to be done on a rope slung nearly 1,400 feet above ground. In 1974, French high-wire wizard Philippe Petit actually performed this feat. It took him six years of meticulous planning—which involved multiple intricacies of architecture, engineering and aerodynamics. No wonder film director James Marsh has dubbed his exploit as “the artistic crime of the century.” In Cheating the Impossible, Petit recounts the lessons he has learned. Some of his musings would indeed be music to the ears of IT execs. Sample this: “Why does problem solving bring me joy? Because it’s a game. The solutions provide permutations—and multiply...” IT NEXT VERDICT

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

Petit, who is a self-taught artist, makes compelling points about learning and taking on challenges. Not to be missed. Star Value:

S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

my log

Sanjay Gupta Consulting Editor—IT Next (Online)

aman

Digital Debris io

pur

ushoth

The online world is replete with junk. Still thinking whether you need that email in your inbox forever? ill

Recently, Facebook made a startling revelation : 83 million of its 955 million users are not genuine but a mix of add-on profiles, fake identities, etc. Some suspect this number’s much higher. Then there are lots of people with multiple email profiles on services such as Gmail, Yahoo and MSN who never delete any mails. Not to miss matrimonial profiles, defunct blogs, long-lost online catalogues, and tons of photos and videos on the Flickrs and YouTubes of the world that hardly get seen. Now, why am I recounting all this? I’m pointing to something I like to call digital debris: a huge data mass scattered all over cyberspace. The digital equivalent of mountains of trash you see in city landfills, the debris seems to be proliferating at the speed of thought. Sometime back, Google Chief Eric Schmidt is said to have famously remarked: “Every two days now we create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up until 2003.” What he probably omitted? That much of that data is trash, junk, hardly used, of no use at all. Think about it: How many would find it useful to sift in Twitter archives and find out who ate what and when? Or to find some usable pictures of the Grand Canyon from millions of photos uploaded by tens of thousands of tourists?

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Beyond the euphoria of seeing our “creation” online — and coercing a few friends to gawk at them — much of these remain hidden deep inside the flood of bits and bytes. Which brings me to another interesting question: what happens ultimately to all that digital debris? With storage cost hitting rock bottom and the “likes” of Facebook, YouTube and others offering users more avenues to plonk their stuff online, it wouldn’t surprise me if data scientists end up scratching their heads in the same desperation as environmentalists do today: “Oh my, I feel so nauseated by all this trash!” And then, there is the physical aspect of digital junk: all those servers, racks and buildings where it sits. A growing clutch of cloud providers, social media giants and other ambitious souls are in a frenzy — not only to stock that junk (along with useful data, including biz apps, let me hasten to add) but also fetch it speedily and, I’m told, securely. Whenever, wherever, however you want. My question again is: Do we really, really want everything? Or can we return to the good old habit of deleting the unnecessary? Fortunately, in the digital realm, we can “incinerate” stuff we no longer want in a more effective and environment-friendly way than in the physical reality. But how many of us will?

3 Essential

Reads

Clas neumann | INTERVIEW

CUStOMeRS inSPiRe innOVAtiOn the indian development centre located in Bangalore has contributed about 20-25 per cent to hana development, says Clas Neumann, senior Vice president, Global head sap labs. in conversation with Manu Sharma, he discusses some of the co-innovations happening and technology road map

software services team who have worked on this.

What part of HAnA was developed in india? How is it impacting your customers’ requirements? HANA was jointly developed across all the SAP R&D centres in USA, Germany, China and India. The Indian development centre located in Bangalore has developed some of the applications on top of HANA. A significant part, say 20-25 per cent, of this product was developed here, which is a big deal for us. We are seeing increasing efficiency in the customer transaction and scheme (data points) redeeming process. Just to state an example: assume a customer accumulates several points on every purchase--it takes a lot of effort to keep track of the accumulated points and keep a tab on credit points. Using HANA solutions which are 1,000 times faster in real time processing, a customer can easily calculate these.

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

to what extent are your customers involved in your innovation strategy? Can you elaborate on some of the co-innovations happening out of india? While we constantly get feedback and requests from our 100,000 odd customers on a regular basis through the group forums, events etc, we work on co-innovation projects with our customers across the world. From our strategic customers standpoint, we run co-innovation projects together on a different scale which would be more customised. These projects revolve around enterprise mobility or any other technology they would ask for. The product or solution evolution would be completely based on the ideas and innovations that the customer would suggest. In fact, you can see a number of customers working at our labs 24X7 on the joint innovations. We have an event called SAP Sapphire held on a regular basis

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

Clas Neumann, Sr VP, Global Head-SAP Labs on Customers Inspiring Innovation Pg 44 leaDership | NEXT 100

NEXT 100 | leaDership

DReAMS:

WHAT THEY MEAN TO

next100

SHiJU GeORGe, senior manaGer, shoppers stop ltD

“it has been my dream to lead an it governance project which envelops a whole lot of enterprise risks”

WINNERS

next100 winners have dared to dream about their future roles, projects, education or goals and are making concerted efforts to pursue with conﬁdence

s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2 | itnext

Your Dream Project

Dream Certiﬁcations or Dream Courses

Your Dream Industry

Your Dream Role

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

Dreams: What They Mean to Next100 Winners and how they intend to fulfill them Pg 51 CUBE CHAT | sharat m airani

CUBE CHAT

FACT FIL E na me s h a r at m. a i r a ni Cur r e nt D es i Gnat i on Ch i e F i t ( sYst e ms & s eCur i t Y )

Learning

Cur r e nt r ole ma naGi nG a nD s eCur i nG i t i nF r ast r uCt ur e eX pe rt i s e : Cr e at i nG B us i nes s Va lue s upport e D BY t eCh noloGY; a li Gni nG i t Wi t h B us i nes s i t t r a ns For mat i on, t ur n a r ounD i t or Ga ni sat i on a nD i mpr oV e e F F eCt i V e nes s st r at eGi C outs our Ci nG a nD Cost ma naGe me nt

is Living My deep interest in exploring the it security space prompts me to do research, probably take up a PhD in the subject,” says Sharat M Airani, Chief-It (systems & security), Forbes marshall BY MANU SHARMA

MY SUCESS

MANTRA “Desire to acquire perfect skills ”

itnext | s e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 2

aWa r D s * Wi nne r oF Ci s o 1 0 0 aWa r D 2 0 1 2 * Ci o as i a maGa Z i ne ’ s “ t h e 2 0 1 2 Ci o 1 0 0 h onour e e ”. * aWa r D e D neX t Ge ne r at i on Ci o BY i t neX t 2 0 1 1 * Wi nne r oF t h e “ top 1 0 Gr e e n i t e nt e r pr i s e aWa r D 2 0 1 1 ” s upport e D BY a pC- s Ch ne i D e r * Wi nne r oF t h e Ci s o 1 0 0 aWa r D 2 0 1 1 - r eCoGni t i on oF t h e B est a nD t h e B r i Gh t est i t s eCur i t Y le a D e r s oF toDaY * “ Va lue Ch a mpi on” For t h e Y e a r 2 0 0 9 -1 0 F r om For B es ma r s h a ll * Wor K eX pe r e i nCe 22 Years FaVour i t e Quot e ConCe i V e -- B e li e V e --aCh i e V e ( Wi t h out Compas s i on) FaVour i t e D est i nat i on maur i t i us & a nDa ma nni CoBa r FaVour i t e B ooK D i F F i Cult Y oF B e i nG GooD - BY Gur Ch a r a n Das

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Sharat Airani, Chief-IT (S&S), Forbes Marshall, believes Learning is Living Pg 66

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