Using IT for growth

Peter Williams	Jaideep Sahney

It is important to tailor IT for growth rather than just focusing on its deployment said the speakers at seminars on “New World Solutions–Exploiting IT for growth”, organised by Datacraft in Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. The events had speakers from Cisco, EMC and Datacraft.

Peter Williams, head-Solutions Development Group, Datacraft Asia said that an IT strategy is required to generate business. This was interesting considering the fact that most IT managers seem to be grappling with issues relating to implementation. He further said that evolving a strategic game-plan that revolves around IT should be an organisation’s goal.”

Another aspect that was highlighted by speakers was related to security concerns. For reducing complexities and addressing security needs, companies can look at services from suppliers who offer expertise to integrate and manage these diverse challenges.

Cisco pitched for ‘intelligent information networks’ that can help a company improve its profitability. Jaideep Sahney of Cisco spoke about the company’s evolution from a product-centric business to an integrated service provider. With the business climate changing and economic growth occurring in different countries (which opens up their vulnerability to risks), information security gains importance. It is at this juncture that an intelligent information network strategy comes into existence, whereby companies can strategise and mitigate risks. Sahney also said that the ‘integrated security strategy’ that Cisco offers improves a network’s ability to identify, prohibit and adapt to various threats. He also spoke about the offerings in its IP communications portfolio such as video telephony, IP telephony and Information Communications Management solutions among others.

Information Communications Management (ICM) as a topic generated some interest amongst participants. Datacraft has built an ICM, which is a messenger that lets people communicate with colleagues at the click of a button. One can communicate with colleagues (through phone, chat or email using the same IP phone) and this extends to a wireless environment as well. The company reckons that ICM improves productivity and makes for quicker decision-making.

Abhijit Potnis, solutions consultant at EMC spoke about the necessity of managing information and touched upon some aspects of ILM. Managing the lifecycle of data, which is mostly unstructured, is a challenge. It is here that Content Addressed Storage (CAS) and KVS, an email archiving tool from EMC have a role to play.

An interesting case study on how SBI had networked its branches all over India was presented by Ananth P, banking projects, Datacraft India.

In the final analysis, as one speaker remarked, “It is all about show me the money, rather than the WOW factor.”