Outsourcing
Giga, 12/16/02: Use Caution With Price Benchmarking Clauses in Outsourcing
Julie Giera
The pressure on CIOs to reduce the cost of IT has prompted many to look toward outsourcing as a way to accomplish that goal. The very best outsourcing terms are usually found in longer, broader contracts since outsourcers will trade a lower price for a longer contract every time. Although customers are signing longer, broader outsourcing contracts, there is a fear that if they sign a seven-year deal, the customer will not get the best pricing in latter years of the contract. To mitigate these concerns, customers are increasingly turning to price benchmarking clauses that force the company and the outsourcer to do a benchmark, usually halfway through the contract term. Although benchmarking can be a useful exercise if the results are placed into context of that particular outsourcing arrangement, we are finding that many of these benchmarking situations are leading to disastrous outcomes for the customers that use this strategy poorly.
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Giga, 12/16/02: Managing Outsourcers Based on the Business Value They Enable
Dan Merriman
CIOs are under increasing pressure to derive explicit business value from IT. Since the resources and skills of outsourcers are often very useful potential assets for creating value, CIOs should strive to select and manage outsourcers so as to optimize the value enabled by them. At present this is rarely the case since most companies focus on driving down the price charged by outsourcers rather than working with them to maximize value.
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Gartner, 12/16/02: Lowest Fee Rates for IT Services Don't Equal Lowest Cost
Charge rates for IT services engagements in Europe vary by country and by the type of skills required. Overall, rates have risen only slightly from 1998 and discounting is more prevalent than ever.
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Security
Wired, 12/18/02: Beware the Latest MP3 Worms
By Michelle Delio
Music file swappers may unknowingly be sharing their computers as well as their favorite tunes.
Two new security vulnerabilities, disclosed late Wednesday, allow an attacker to completely take over a computer system by using malicious music files.
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Wireless
Infoworld, 12/18/02: Intel to ease into WLAN with 802.11b chip set
By Stephen Lawson
INTEL WILL NOT release a dual-band 802.11a/b wireless LAN (WLAN) chip set for its notebook processor until late in the first half of 2003, the company said this week.
The company will release a single-band 802.11b chip set for the Banias microprocessor early in the first half of 2003, company executives said.
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Computerworld, 12/18/02: Intel invests in Wi-Fi VOIP and hotel access companies
By Bob Brewin
Intel Corp. announced today that it continues to pump investments into Wi-Fi, including initial funding for one company that has developed voice over IP (VOIP) for wireless LANs, and a second round of financing for a company that provides broadband wireless access for the hospitality industry.
Intel also said that although it will still meet its target plan for delivering its Banias mobile processor with dual-band wireless LAN capabilities in the first half of 2003, initial models will work only on the 802.11b standard. The 802.11b standard operates in the 2.4-GHz band, while the 802.11a standard operates in the 5-Ghz band.
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The Wall Street Journal, 12/19/02: Wi-Fi Gets Some Street Cred From Big-Name Tech Firms
By JOHNATHAN BURNS
NEW YORK -- As a general partner at venture-capital firm 3i, Robin Murray had passed on "hundreds" of business proposals aimed at attacking the burgeoning wireless market known as Wi-Fi.
"We saw hundreds and hundreds of these come along," he said. "We fundamentally believed in the market opportunity, but we struggled to find a business opportunity that made sense."
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Desktop Computing
ZDNet, 12/18/02: Is $200 the magic number for PCs?
By John G. Spooner
Welcome to the dawning of the age of the $200 personal computer.
While big-name PC makers like Hewlett-Packard and Gateway offer desktops priced as low as $399, without a monitor, smaller manufacturers are finding an audience by offering less-expensive machines, starting as low as $199.
The PCs don't have Windows preinstalled but rely on software from several companies, including Lindows, that use the open-source Linux operating system, which can be used as an alternative to Microsoft's Windows. Dropping Windows is part of the reason why manufacturers can sell the PCs so cheaply.
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