Computerworld, 4/29/02: Baylor picks EDS for $200 million outsourcing deal
By JUAN CARLOS PEREZ, IDG NEWS SERVICE
Baylor Health Care System will outsource billing and collection tasks to Electronic Data Systems Corp., a move the health care provider said will shave between 10% to 15% off its administrative costs and allow it to focus more on its core business.
The 10-year contract, valued at about $200 million, is of the business process outsourcing (BPO) type, the companies said today in a joint announcement. BPO contracts go beyond traditional IT outsourcing deals because the client entrusts the outsourcer with taking over an entire business function or functions -- in this case billing and collection -- instead of just an IT task, such as network management or database management.
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Computerworld, 4/29/02: IT managers say downturn offers silver lining
By PATRICK THIBODEAU
SAN DIEGO - Continued economic uncertainty is bringing IT managers some benefits, including lower prices from vendors and more success in filling critical positions.
But the bad news for corporate bottom lines, according to Michael Fleisher, chairman and CEO of Gartner Inc., is that many top corporate chiefs "do not believe that we are anywhere close to being in a recovery."
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ZDNet, 4/29/02: Gartner CEO preaches pragmatism to CIOs
Dan Farber
SAN DIEGO--The opening remarks by Gartner Chairman and CEO Michael Fleisher at the company's Symposium/ITxpo 2002 set a refreshingly realistic tone for the event. Rather than paint a pretty picture of an economy rising from the ashes, he told the audience to expect this year to remain a tough environment globally for technology, and not to make the mistake of thinking we can cheerlead our way to an economic recovery.
Given that Gartner's research is predicting flat growth in IT spending for the 2002 that was a safe prediction. The course of action he recommended for IT executives is continued focus on aligning the business and technology goals, cost cutting, and finding ways to innovate on a small scale--"planting seeds for the future."
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Gartner: 4/26/02: Gartner Survey Indicates Wireless Data Revolution Growing
Gartner has released a survey on wireless and mobile spending in North America. The findings show important changes starting to build, such as the emphasis shifting away from voice services and cell phones.
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Gartner, 4/25/02: Positioning IT Operations as the Preferred Service Provider
The internal IT operations group can solidify its position as the preferred service provider by defining current services, developing granular cost information and leveraging its potential for customer intimacy.
To those who are unfamiliar with the IT operations group and unaware of its potential cost and service benefits, the IT operations group is frequently viewed as nothing more than a cost center that provides a commodity function. Many assume that internal IT operations and support costs are too high, and that they can find better service elsewhere. As a consequence, IT operations is frequently under scrutiny as a candidate for outsourcing. Good business decisions can only be made with a clear understanding of current services and costs, the impact of change, and the risk associated with IT services that do not meet business requirements. The internal IT operations group can solidify its position as the preferred service provider by clarifying these points to the business units.
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Strategy+Business, Q2, 2002: Core Group Therapy
By Art Kleiner
In every company, an insider set of managers influences decision making. In some cases, that’s healthy, in others (witness Enron), it’s a nightmare.
Midway through 2001, a passionate young vice president at an oil company showed me a chart of energy-company stock prices making the rounds in his office. Most of the companies showed nearly horizontal performance over the past few years, tottering gloomily toward stasis or decline. Only one line ascended, dizzyingly, from a market capitalization below the others to a peak high above them. “How can we ever get our top management,” asked the VP, “to think more like Enron’s?”
That same question was being asked in at least two other energy companies that I know of — and at the Harvard Business School, where researcher David Lane and Professor Pankaj Ghemawat had just published a glowing case study of the company, titled “Enron: Entrepreneurial Energy.” Why, Professor Ghemawat asked from his lectern, weren’t the established oil companies emulating the Enron Corporation? They were all beefing up their commodities and derivatives trading operations and trying to recruit brilliant, aggressive MBAs to run them, but they still couldn’t match Enron’s stock price growth or its competitive edginess. Nor — fortunately for them — its stunning collapse.
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