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Avanade urges companies to sweat IT out

IT consultancy launches three-point plan to help CIOs enhance their assets

January 31, 2008

The threat of a recession may be the topic on everyone’s minds, but Avanade is urging CIOs not to panic about IT budgets. Instead, companies need to get smarter about using IT to support the business.

Richard Hall, chief technology officer at Avanade, the global IT consultancy, believes that the uncertainty of recent weeks shouldn’t lead to a slowdown in decision-making. Businesses may well be wary of making decisions to spend money on new technology, but this doesn’t mean CIOs should stand still. According to Hall, they should use this opportunity to rationalise existing infrastructure and make strategic investments in projects that will impact the bottom line – in weeks, not years.

Hall has put together a three-step plan to help IT directors ‘sweat their assets’, combating any spending cuts by extracting maximum value from existing systems and understanding the needs of the business.

The Avanade three-point plan to ‘sweat IT out’ in 2008

1. IT is a strategic asset – not a cost centre
IT will improve productivity within an organisation – so shouldn’t be dismissed as a cost within the business. However, in a time of economic uncertainty, budgets will be slashed unless CIOs work closely with CFOs to assess the real value of technology to the business.

Rationalising the IT infrastructure and using grid computing principles to make the most of your current IT investment shows a sceptical CFO that IT is tightening its belt. As 2008 progresses, virtualisation will take this a stage further, helping CIOs sweat their infrastructure assets with server, network and desktop virtualisation, reducing the computing power needed to keep the business running. Software licensing support and maintenance costs could also be cut substantially, by using now-mature Microsoft versions of costly ERP, BI and CRM systems. Migration can be cheaper than maintenance when the new tools integrate easily with the existing infrastructure and have a familiar look and feel for users.

2008 is also likely to be a year of heavy M&A activity. Technology plays an important part in integrating the two companies’ systems faster, enabling the business to gain the benefits promised by the acquisition quickly.

2. Use IT to sweat the human assets
If technology is to make a tangible difference to a company, staff need to be educated on how to use the tools available.

Step two is to equip them with business intelligence tools that help them work more effectively and efficiently. Business intelligence and business performance management software are no longer elite systems for a select few. Tools that are inexpensive to roll out across the company, such as PerformancePoint Server from Microsoft, make it easier to take informed decision about the business. Within months, this could make a tangible difference to productivity, adding considerable value to the business – analysts put the figure at five per cent extra revenue. We have seen customers using BI data to change their sales model and improve efficiency, all within months of rolling out the solution.

3. Unify communications for improved collaboration
IT can wipe out unnecessary telephony and travel costs with unified communications systems that utilise the IP network for phonecalls and enable meetings to be held online at the touch of a button. As well as reducing costs, IT will also help companies achieve green ambitions, as carbon emissions from car and air travel are canned.

Introducing unified communications can be achieved quickly, and the savings will be immediate. In the longer term, benefits will continue to roll in as tools for instant messaging and collaboration enable employees to work together more effectively, wherever they are, to improve workplace productivity.

(650 words)

About the company

Avanade is a global IT consultancy dedicated to using the Microsoft platform to help enterprises achieve profitable growth. Through proven solutions that extend Microsoft technologies, Avanade helps enterprises increase revenue, reduce costs and reinvest in innovation to gain competition advantage. Avanade consultants deliver value according to each customer’s requirements, timeline and budget by combining insight, innovation and the talent of our global workforce. Founded in 2000 by Accenture and Microsoft Corp., Avanade has more than 6,500 professionals serving customers in 22 countries worldwide.

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For further information, please contact Gemma Rowlan or Suzy Ferguson at LEWIS, the PR agency:
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7802 2626 Fax: +44 (0) 20 7802 2627
Email: avanadeuk@lewispr.com Web: http://www.lewispr.com

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