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As and when you get 5 to 10 minutes you can read
one of these and absorb and comprehend. Spending more time is your choice. |
You can use the time in travel,
waiting for meetings, lunch time, small breaks or at home usefully. |
Through these tools, the
learning bytes are right sized for ease of learning for time challenged
participants. |
The content starts from
practice and connect to precept making it easy to connect to industry and
retain. |
They can be connected to
continuous assessment process of the academic program. |
Practitioners can use their
real life knowledge and skill to enhance learning skills. |
Immediate visualization of the
practical dimension of the concept will offer a rich learning experience. |
AN INTRODUCTION TO DIFFERENTIATED LEARNING TOOLS
Participants in flexible learning programs have
limitations on the nature of the time they can spend on learning. Typically
they are employed fully or partially, pursuing higher studies or have other
social and familial responsibilities. Availability of time is a great
constraint to these students.
To aid
the participants, we have developed four unique learning tools as below:
·
Bullet Notes : Helps in
introducing the important concepts in
each unit
of curriculum, equip
the student during preparation of examinations and
·
Case Studies : Illustrate the concepts through real life experiences
·
Workbook : Helps absorption of learning through questions based on real life
nuggets
·
PEP Notes : Sharing notes of practices and experiences in the Industry
will help the student to rightly perceive
and get inspired to learn concepts at the cutting edge application level.placementinterviews
Why are these needed? |
·
Adults learn differently
from B. School
or college going |
|
|
|
students who spend long hours at campus. |
|
·
Enhancing analytical skills through application related learning |
|
kits trigger experiential learning |
|
·
Availability of time is a challenge. |
|
·
Career success increasingly depends on continuous learning |
|
and success |
What· makes it relevant?
·
How· is it useful?
·
·
Where· does this lead to?
·
Easier to move ahead in the learning process.
·
Will
facilitate the student to complete the program earlier than otherwise.Helpsstay
motivated and connected.
When· is it useful?
·
© The ICFAI Foundation for Higher Education (IFHE),
Hyderabad, April, 2015. All rights reserved
No part
of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, used in a
spread sheet, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise – without prior permission in writing
from The ICFAI Foundation for Higher Education (IFHE), Hyderabad.
Ref. No.
IT-CS-IFHE – 042015
For any clarification regarding
this book, the students may please write to The ICFAI Foundation for Higher
Education (IFHE), Hyderabad giving the above reference number of this book
specifying chapter and page number.
While every possible care has
been taken in type-setting and printing this book, The ICFAI Foundation for
Higher Education (IFHE), Hyderabad welcomes suggestions from students for
improvement in future editions.
ii
CONTENTS
1 |
Computer
Organization for Flipkart‟s Big Billion Sale |
|
2 |
Microsoft‟s
Operating System for
Organizational Productivity |
|
3 |
Medicity Technology Platform enables Transfer of
Information |
|
4 |
Organizing Spread sheets for Business Benefits |
viii |
5
Health
Information Exchange: New Workflow at
|
Winchester Highland Management |
|
6 |
The National Highways Authority of India -
Modernized MIS |
|
7 |
Validus Re‟ Successfully Tries Revolution Analytics for Risk Management |
|
8 |
Data Smart Culture at Seven-Eleven, Japan |
|
9 |
Balluff GmbH Gains Benefits through Gigabit
Network |
|
10 |
NTT Docomo Accelerates M-Commerce in Japan |
|
11 |
Indian Railway Redesigns MIS to Achieve
Bi-directional Facilities |
|
12 |
Strategic Approach to Implement MIS in SoCtronics
Technologies |
|
13 |
E-Governance - Government of India initiatives
for Income Tax Services |
|
14 |
Amazon
Web Services‟ Strategies for Managing IT Globally |
|
15 |
The Case of FAO (Finance & Accounting
Outsourcing) Industry |
|
16 |
Facebook Innovates its Business Model |
|
17 |
Deployment of ERP based SCM Solution at TVS
Logistics Services Ltd |
|
18 |
Effective Tracking of Core Operations using ERP
by Brigg Equipment |
|
19 |
Myntra.com Strategizes Brand Building through
Social Media |
|
20 |
Amazon Extends Cloud Computing Features |
xxvii |
21 |
WhatsApp with Big Data Ethics and
Responsibilities |
xxviii |
22 |
Microsoft Makes Office 365 Product Line
Architecture |
|
23 |
Uber‟s
New Mobile App Feature |
|
24 |
Accomplishing Outcomes through Business Process
Design: Maruti Model |
xxxii |
iii
Introduction to the Case Study
Participants in ICFAI University
Programs are eager to apply theory into practice. They realize that application
orientation can enhance their learning and subsequent usage of management
precepts and practices. Picking out the principle behind real world events is
critical to this learning.
To fulfil this objective the
institution has introduced the Case Study methodology as a learning tool. A one
page case is developed for learning a concept/topic from an illustration of a
real world occurrence. The case illustrates a situation pertinent to an
individual/a company/an industry or an economy in relation to a concept or
issue covered in the curriculum. The illustration is specific to the point
being discussed.
The case depicts the knowledge
which can be applied as illustrated in the practice of the real world. These experiences
can be distilled to look at a core principle at play by the participant. While
there could be multiple principles at play, the illustration of each case helps
in its better understanding of the concept at a very fundamental level.
The
learning outcomes expected are:
1.
Real
world is illustrated and connected back to one concept/topic for better
theoretical understanding.
2.
Application
based approach, which significantly enhances absorption and retention.
3.
Exposure
to specific business situations and developments improves perspective.
It may be used for Assessment.
iv
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1 |
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Computer Organization for
Flipkart’s Big Billion Sale |
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Flipkart, an Indian online
e-tailing company experienced over 1 billion hits during the flash sales of
Xiomi phones in March 2014. Flipkart planned big billion sale on October 6,
2014. With this sale, on a single day they could make $100 million. However,
there were setbacks to this story as well. On the day of big billion sale, in
just minutes Flipkart received more than 1 billion hits over the Internet which
led to trouble with a new software service developed and used by it. Customers
started discussing about error messages on social media forums. The following
diagram explains how the technology team at Flipkart planned, executed and
learned their lessons from the problems it faced.
Plan for D-Day:-
- 2 Months ago
- Plan for Failure
-
Have Contingency Plan
-
Scale up IT Infrastructure
-
4500 Servers Internal Cloud
-
Service Oriented Architecture
-
Develop New Services
·Flipkart Strengths:-
· 26 Million Customers
20
Million Products
How They Made IT
-
500 IT engineers worked round the
clock on D-Day
-
One Team Keeping Live the
application and other team finding root cause of failures
-
Separate team for digital
security expecting Cyber attacks
Benefits:-
-
Rolled out new mobile
applications on same day
- Brand
popularity went up
-
Permanently increased IT
Infrastructure
Lessons Learned:-
- Plan for failure
-
Software services are to be
thoroughly tested
- Have
contingency plan
- Provide
better transparency
-
Manage customer expectations
Flipkart handled the situation by
dedicating one team to continue the service offering and another team to do the
bug fixes. The challenges faced include high speed, more than expected customer
response, controlling mobile applications remotely and wrong estimation of
increase in traffic.
„Organization of Computer
Systems‟ in the form of internal cloud, increased storage
(memory) capacity, database, service oriented architecture for applications and
strong digital security can handle the sudden increase in e-tailing.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Discuss
what IT infrastructure supported the
Flipkart‟s big billion sale.
(Hints: internal cloud with
servers-digital security expecting Cyber-attacks-have new mobile apps)
2.
How did
Flipkart plan for its D-Day?
(Hints:
one team for keeping apps live-backup team for troubleshooting-contingency
plan)
Course Reference: Concept-Organization of Computer Systems/Unit 1-Computer Systems-An
Overview/Subject-IT & Systems
Sources:
i. Jayadevan,
P.K.,”How Flipkart‟s back room boys are powering the e-tailing
behemoth‟s rapid growth”, The Economic Times, October 25, 2014.
ii. Shukla,
A., “The Tech Story Behind Flipkart‟s Big Billion Sale”, Economic Times CIO,
October 13, 2014.
5
2 Microsoft’s Operating System for
Organizational Productivity
Shinola, a Detroit, Michigan, USA
based consumer goods manufacturing start-up had 30 employees in 2012. Shinola‟s objective was to bring
manufacturing expertise back to US. The company manufactured watches,
bicycles, bikes, leather goods
and journals. Majority of Shinola employees worked on product assembly and very
few required computers. However, the existing IT infrastructure included 3
Desktop PCs, and 1 portable computer with Windows 7 operating system. They also
have 10 thin clients connecting to Windows Server 2008 R2, Microsoft Access
database for order maintenance, and Microsoft Excel 2010 for inventory
tracking. By 2012, the organizational requirements had grown. The organization
was looking to connect the business with customers and employees.
Application
Requirements:-
-
A
technology solution which supports mobility, point-of-sale presentations, and
to demonstrate product line to potential customers.
-
Provide
choice of products to customers using technology.
-
Start any
organizational software application from anywhere using technology.
- Top management should be able to connect to plant
cameras from anywhere to monitor the work.
-
An
operating system and security applications which are easy to install and support.
- The organization should be able to send the
component photographs to suppliers for procurement
-
Connect
to an external drive for video or PPT presentations slides.
- The management should provide automatic key access
for the visitors at the entrance without going there.
Solution:-
- Use Tablets with Windows 8 Pro operating system
which has mobility and start applications from anywhere capabilities for
organizational business purposes.
- Windows 8 automatically connects to the wireless
networks via domain join
Benefits:-
- Windows 8 Pro provided enterprise wide capabilities
with competitive advantage to organization.
- Top Management used Tablets 60% of their work time
with Windows 8 Pro Operating System.
- A 30% increase in organizational productivity
- The Windows 8 Pro interface did not require
separate training for employees.
- Mobility was the huge benefit. Applications were
accessible from anywhere.
- Using the Windows 8 Pro operating system, employees
could connect to available Wi-Fi hot spot.
- Organizational access doors could be
locked/unlocked for vendors and new employees remotely.
„Microsoft Windows 8 Pro‟ operating
system for Tablets has features such as mobility, Wi-Fi, rich easy to
use interface, easy installation, efficient support and increases productivity.
Using this type of operating system employees can start an application from
anywhere and connect to other employees.
Discussion
Questions:-
1.
Discuss
the additional features Microsoft Window 8 Pro operating system has over the
other Microsoft operating systems.
(Hints:
enterprise wide capabilities-no separate training-remote connectivity including
Wi-Fi)
2.
Do you think Microsoft OS
contributes to organizational productivity? Discuss. (Hints: increased security-increased accessibility-advantage of
mobility)
Course Reference: Concept-Microsoft
Windows/Unit 2 -Operating Systems/Subject-IT &Systems
Sources: |
Microsoft, “Shinola: Manufacturing Company
Upgrades Operating System and Improves Productivity”, |
i. |
|
|
Microsoft Case Study, www.microsoft.com, 2014. |
ii. |
PRWeb, “eMazzanti
Supports Shinola‟s Revitalization of US Manufacturing: Buys First Cruise
Bikes |
|
Made in
Detroit”, www.mobilitytechzone.com, January 29, 2013. |
|
6 |
Medicity
Technology platform enables Ohio‟s 141 hospitals under Ohio Health Information
Partnership (OHIP)
spread across 77 counties of Ohio, to exchange patient health records online.
With this, over 2,000 physicians were able to search and access patient
records. Traditionally availability of lab records to physicians used to take
somewhere between 24 hours to 30 days. The HIE (Health Information Exchange) at
OHIP, known as CliniSync, was based on Medicity technology platform. The
service providers started exchanging information with long term care facilities
through e-mail technology. Hospitals, nurses, patients, physicians and others
could exchange patient records electronically with one another using this
platform.
Hospital |
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Insurance |
Hospital |
Clinic |
Insurance |
Patient |
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Company |
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Company |
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Health Information Exchange
Patient
Patient
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Nurse |
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Doctor |
Nurse |
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Doctor |
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Doctor |
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·Benefits:-
Improved healthcare
outcomes
and reduced
·
healthcare costs Reduced
individual customization and user
·
interface costs
·
Faster and Accurate Availability
of Lab
·
Reports
·
Rural Awareness Availability of
important
·
information
·
Timely follow ups Encouraging
one-on-one outreach and education of
·
healthcare
·
Informed Patients
·
Doctor Communication Transfer of
care
·
summaries
Increased efficiency of service providers
In future over 6,000 physicians
would be able to exchange patient records online. The challenges in this
transition included development of technology infrastructure to support
different workflows, information exchange strategies, physician buy-in,
coordination and improving the awareness of service offerings.
Medicity technology platform enabled
stakeholders of OHIP to „transfer information‟
related to patient lab reports, clinical data and critical medication
details. Through IT technology, networking and e-mail, information can be
exchanged in seconds who used to take days earlier.
Discussion
Questions:
1. Discuss
how information exchange is possible between different service providers over
the networks.
(Hints:
technology platform-e-mail technology-information exchange thru workflows)
2.
Discuss
the benefits of health information exchange.
(Hints:
reduced health services costs-availability of information-transfer of critical
data)
Course Reference: Concept-Transfer of Information/Unit 3-Fundamentals of Information
Systems/Subject-IT & Systems
Sources:
i. Medicity,
“CliniSync Benefits with Clinical Data Exchange Capabilities”,
www.medicity.com, 2014.
ii.
Medicity, “Ohio‟s CliniSync Health
Information Exchange Connecting More than 100 Hospitals”,
www.medicity.com, 2013.
7
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4 |
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Organizing Spread sheets for
Business Benefits |
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Dresdner Kleinwort, an investment
bank with 3,000 investment bankers had benefited by organizing its spread
sheets using technology platform known as Clusters even. Dresdner Kleinwort was
an investment banking branch of Dresdner Bank AG. It had thousands of
independent spread sheets. The applications of spread sheets at Dresdner include
financial modelling, data analysis, financial reporting, results presentation,
product control and financial accounting. The bank wanted to reduce its
operational risk by organizing its spread sheets.
DresdnerRequirement:with-
Dresdner would like to have
control at cell
level. Without opening each
spread sheet they would like to extract the business details, figures and
history. Have central control of spread sheet applications.
Business Context:-
Dresdner would like
to control the processes. The spread sheet
applications are user built having the traditional application risks.
Applications do not allow executing
certain analysis exercises directly.
Approach:-
They selected a pilot set of spread sheets and
prepared P&L
accounts. They executed a set of test
cases. They prioritized the spread sheets. They
installed Clusters even on rest of the systems.
Solution:-
The systems are fully auditable
now. They
comply to SOX
regulations. Each spread sheet
has a fully auditable view. The systems are used in product control and
financial reporting
areas. Organizing
spread sheets provided control
over
processes and
compliance to regulations.
Challenge:-
- Change control process in spreadsheets.
- They are prone to errors and can be corrupt.
- They should adhere to Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) act
- They should maintain version control
- Maintain user developed applications
Benefits:-
-The benefits of spread sheets
include adaptability, flexibility and sophistication.
- Change control process is organized.
- More time for profit oriented decision making
- Business Control and Agility
the help of technology platform organized spread
sheets to gain business benefits. They could now see the business history
without opening the spread sheets.
„Spread sheets‟ are the personal productivity software. According to Forrester‟s
research, 55% of the world‟s financial reporting is done
using spread sheets. Even novice users can use spread sheets
for accounting, data analysis, mathematical and
statistical calculations purposes.
Discussion
Questions:-
1.
What features of spread sheets
are useful for financial reporting purpose? Please Discuss. (Hints: financial modelling-data
analysis-mathematical and statistical functions)
2.
How did
Dresdner use spread sheets for its organizational benefits?
(Hints:
profits and Loss A/Cs-set of test cases-product control and financial control
areas)
Course Reference: Concept-Spread
sheet Software/Unit 4-Personal Productivity Software/Subject-IT &Systems
Sources:
i.
ClusterSeven, “Dresdner Kleinwort
Increases Spread sheet Control and Boosts
Best Practices with ClusterSeven Technology”, www.clusterseven.com,
2013.
ii. ClusterSeven,
“Integrity for your Information Supply Chain”, Cluster Seven Whitepaper, 2013.
8
Patient safety and reducing costs
are top priorities for healthcare organizations. Health Information Exchange
(HIE) between different hospitals related to patient‟s medical history can help the healthcare
organizations in this direction.
Health Information Exchange (HIE) is mobility of health related information
between hospitals and organizations in the
community, region and country. It facilitates faster access to patient‟s clinical data for safe, efficient
and effective treatment to the patient. The implementation of HIE
system is 80% relationships and 20% technology.
Winchester Hospital, located at
Winchester, Massachusetts, USA had capacity of 229 beds with acute care
inpatient and integrated homecare services. Winchester Highland Management was
a joint venture between Winchester hospital and IPA (Independent Practice
Association) having more than 380 physicians as of 2012. Its objective was to
implement programs and projects which provide cost effective and quality
healthcare services to the community. Health information exchange
implementation involves the workflow system; in this case, involving healthcare
organizations, hospitals, physicians, government, patients and community. The
needed electronic documents were to be transferred between the concerned
departments using networks with necessary approvals. Winchester Highland
implemented a private HIE with workflows as shown below:
Winchester
Hospital Objective:
Interoperability
between
Winchester and
IPA IPA
Technology
Implementation
Governance
Structure of
project
|
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|
Improved patient safety, experience |
· |
Improved provider productivity and |
· |
engagement |
Improved effectiveness of care |
|
· |
Exchange of information
between primary |
· |
care physicians and the
specialists |
Increase in growth of services |
Winchester
Highland Management‟s Private HIE exchanged
information between its practices, hospitals and affiliated IPA. Vendor partnership was also the part of workflow
in this project. The challenges included managing care contracts, maintaining
relationship between major stakeholders, leaders and participating
organizations. There were signoffs at each level in the workflow. Workflow
systems were traditionally used for organizational internal operational
processes.
Workflow systems‟ are the
early systems used for enterprise collaboration. The workflow systems in
Winchester‟s Health Information Exchange (HIE) helped in developing
cost effective solutions for
hospital stakeholders.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
What is
workflow in an organization?
(Hints:
electronic transfer of documents-using networks-approvals at each end point)
2.
What did
the company do to achieve interoperability between Winchester Hospital and IPA?
(Hints:
devised governance structure for projects- technology platform-vendor
partnership)
Course Reference: Concept-
Workflow Systems/Unit 5- Enterprise Collaboration Systems/Subject-IT
&Systems
Sources:
i.
Walizer, D. and Puls, D., “Health
Information Exchange (HIE): Connectivity Considerations Move to the Forefront”,
Beacon Partners, www.beaconpartners.com, 2012.
ii.
“Winchester Hospital and Highland Management”,
www.zurickdavis.com, 2015
9
6 The National Highways Authority of India -
Modernized MIS
The National Highways Authority
of India (NHAI), a constituent body of Government of India, was established by
an Act of Parliament, in 1988. It was responsible for the development,
maintenance and management of National Highways in the country.
It had always been an impossible
task for NHAI to monitor its road projects and to maintain its project
management right on time due to communication delay. In 2013, NHAI planned to
deploy a software solution for faster MIS using iPad/ tablet/ mobile phones
such that requisite information / photos / videos from work site could be
captured and disseminated to the right authority on time having a centralized
control.
The MIS reporting solution
established a centralized computer and server system, which was used for
collection of various data from field units (PIUs) either using web application
or mobile SMS, GPRS, or 3G.
|
Display
System |
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Computer |
PIU |
– |
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Mobile |
reporting |
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MIS |
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Network |
through |
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web |
or |
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reports |
to |
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Mobile |
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Ministry |
/ |
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device |
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NHAI |
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(iPad |
/ |
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officers |
CPIS
SERVER |
Internet |
||||
Tablet |
/ |
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Phone) |
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Desktop or |
RIS
SERVER |
CENTRAL
SERVER |
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Mobile |
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Organization’s
Gain: NHAI after establishing this
E-MIS system gained the following advantages:
1.
Rapid
dissemination of information
2.
Early
control over the project
3.
Flawless
implementation of the project
4.
Potential
reduction in information cost
This helped NHAI in monitoring
more than one project at a time with much better execution and control. At the
same time, the information flow became multi-dimensional by reporting to more
than one authority at a time using, laptops, mobile, iPad, etc.
MIS is an important process in an
industrial establishment. Adaptation of ‟e-MIS‟
by National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) immensely expedited the
information exchange providing benefits in terms of better control and
reduction in information cost.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Discuss
the problems that led to the use of e-MIS by National Highway Authority of
India.
(Hints:
monitoring road projects-completing projects on time and on budget-lack of
centralized control)
2.
Discuss
the tangible and intangible advantages gained by NHAI by adopting e-MIS.
(Hints: photos
and videos transmission
using
I-pad/tablet/mobiles-project control-reduced
project costs)
Course
Reference: Concept–E-MIS/Unit-6Management Information Systems / Subject –
IT & Systems.
Sources:
i.
“I-Pad/Tablet/ Mobile based MIS
Reporting System for NHAI”, www.cnet-india.com, August 2013.
ii.
Sople, V.V. and Gupta, Dipankar, “MIS
Implementation at Construction Project”, Indore Management
Journal, 2015.
iii.
Simovic, V. and
MatijaVargaPredragOreÅ¡ki, ” An information System Management Model”, ,MIS, Vol. 7, 24 January 2012
10
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7 |
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Validus Re’ Successfully Tries Revolution Analytics for
Risk |
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Management |
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After experiencing various
statistical analysis programming languages, finally the Revolution Analytics
(RA) has emerged as one of the strongest languages for business analytics
applications. The problems it can solve are complex data analysis, big data
management, and obtaining business intelligence.
Validus
Re‟ or Validus
Reinsurance Ltd., USA was a multinational company whose underwriting philosophy was to maximize its return
on equity subject to prudent risk constraints on the amount of capital it
exposed to loss events. Reinsurance was a highly complex business due to the
detailed data analysis needed to underwrite a broad variety of risks, subject
to a broad array of risk perils including weather and other elements, such as -
fire, financial volatility or man-made action such as terrorism. These risk
perils were found to vary in both severity and frequency.
In the year 2012, the company had
a task of designing its risk management strategy but experienced severe
challenges regarding using inputs from multiple applications and third party
data sources. Validus Re‟s Actuarial
Group was required to develop customized economic capital modelling and risk
measurement and management applications to support sound financial and pricing
decisions.
The company evaluated MS Excel
but it was not capable of handling big data. Moreover its simulation was much
slower. SAS was found to be a weaker language in business analytics. The SPSS
programming tool was found to be efficient only in handling small data sets.
Many other tools and languages were not capable of handling all the problems.
Finally, Revolution Analytics (RA) software was evaluated which successfully
passed critical tests. It was found to be faster, capable of handling big data,
and suitable for business analytics.
Revolution
R Enterprise was used to develop open, high-performance custom correlation and
simulation
models that included any and all
data required for the analysis. These were used for ad hoc analysis as well as systematically, driving the decision
logic implemented in the company‟s production system.
Objective:
Seamless analysis
Strategy:
Utilizing
Approach:
of business data
statistical analytics
Analysis using R
Outcome:
Data
Analytics
and
Business
intelligence
The company used Revolution R
Enterprise, based on the open source statistical programming language, to bring
together output from internal sources as well as from third parties such as RMS
to model risk for the entire company.
Results: The Company collected following facts out of
testing Revolution R software under various test conditions:
1.
It was
capable of developing high performance custom correlation models.
2.
Simulation
models could be designed that included any magnitude of data required for
analysis.
3.
The
simulation time was nearly 30 times faster than Excel and other languages.
4.
Best
suited for critical business analytics.
5.
Suitable
to handle big data sets without resulting in any halting situation or erroneous
outcome.
The USA based Validus Reinsurance,
Ltd. used „Revolution R programming language ‟for its Risk
Modelling and management, and succeeded in getting quick satisfactory results
from business analytics.
11
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Discuss
the challenges faced by Validus Reinsurance Ltd.
(Hints:
financial volatility-managing risk-reduced return on equity)
2.
Discuss
the complexities of business of the company for which it adopted the
programming language “R”..
(Hints:
business data analysis-to develop correlation models-handling big data)
Course Reference: Concept–Business modelling using programming language “R”/Unit-7 Program
Design & Programming Languages /
Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i.
“Validus Re Uses Revolution R Enterprise for Risk
Management”, www.rackcdn.com, December 12, 2012.
ii.
Ramanathan , M., “Leading Research Center Speeds up
Analysis and Simplifies Complex Analysis on Very
Large
Data Sets”, Data Intensive Discovery Initiative (DI2), 2012.
iii.
American Century Investments
revolutionizes their investment analytics platform”, www.revolutionanalytics.com, 2013
12
8 |
Data Smart Culture at
Seven-Eleven, Japan |
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Managing large data requires data
smart culture in an organization. Dealing with big data requires data smart
culture at all levels in the organization. With data doubling every two years,
having more data need not be a good thing. It brings in significant baggage and
creates unwise expenses. Large volumes of data create reputation risk and
security concerns for an organization. Seven-Eleven, Japan, a retail store
chain, developed data smart culture. Seven-Eleven had more stores in Japan than
any other country in the world. It had 17,009 (31% of its global) stores
located in Japan with around 2,246 Seven-Eleven stores in Tokyo alone in 2015.
The aesthetics of Seven-Eleven Japan stores were different from other stores
offering large collection of products and services. Seven-Eleven was a profit
making chain in Japan for more than 30 years. Seven-Eleven, Japan, had given
decision making authority to operational level clerks in the retail stores. The
clerks decided what goods and products were to be kept in the shelves of the
store. This was creating huge inventory turns for the organization. There were
70% new products in the stores every year. Seven-Eleven had a data smart
culture with distributed decision making authority and evidence based
management. Organizational key practices resulted into data smart culture,
which in turn derived benefits as shown below.
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Improved |
Supply– |
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Use Scorecards |
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Chain Management |
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Single Source |
Data Smart |
Improved |
Inventory |
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of Truth |
Culture |
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Levels |
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For data smart culture,
Seven-Eleven followed evidence based management and employees intelligently
handled the data. They followed a disciplined culture. However, decision-
making authority was distributed to different levels in the organization. Data
smart culture needs to be inculcated in organization for effective decision
making. The source of data should be trustworthy. There should be process
adherence and compliance to rules and regulations. There should be sensitivity
towards data and data loss. Data security should be the priority in
organization.
Data
Smart Culture: Employees
may provide mediocre data initially. However, over a period of time, they provide useful information. Everyone
in the organization should know, what is expected from each one of them.
Organizations have to take ownership for their business rules. With these
practices, the organizations can begin to have a smart data culture in the
organization. At Seven-Eleven, data decision making process was not centralized.
Instead, it was pushed to the ranks to make the organization smarter.
„Managing large data‟ involves
data oriented culture in the organization related to multiple aspects.
Seven-Eleven managed their large data effectively.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
What are
the benefits of data based decision making at Seven-Eleven?
(Hints:
improved supply-chain management-distributed decision-making-improved inventory
levels)
2.
What
practices can make an organization smarter? Discuss.
(Hints:
timely availability of information-follow business rules-sensitivity to data)
Course Reference: Concept-
Managing Data/Unit 8- Database Management/Subject-IT &Systems
Sources:
i.
Fitzgerald, M., “Turning Big Data into Smart Data”,
MIT Sloan Management Review, December 2, 2013.
ii.
Nadig, A., ”The Case for Smart Data: When Big Data
isn‟t Enough”, October 7, 2014.
13
9 |
Balluff GmbH Gains Benefits
through Gigabit Network |
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Managing and transacting huge
data through a network needs sufficient transaction speed. As the amount of
data doubled every year in many big companies, it needed sufficient network
speed for data transaction from one to another site. Slower transaction rate
caused delay and involved a high cost of transaction. The German company,
Balluff GmbH based near Stuttgart, installed Gigabit (40 Gbit) fiber optic
network in the year 2013. This was done to improve network speed and
availability, lower its operational cost, and allow more flexibility in
configuration and management. It replaced its age-old Local Area (LAN) Network
infrastructure – an outdated
Ethernet network.
The company connected all of its
workstations, printers and telephones via 48-port Networks switches. A total of
45 units were networked throughout the campus, enabling connection of the
terminals via Gigabit Ethernet (40 Gbit) while at the same time delivering
power to the individual telephone handsets too.
Benefits:
- Improved network
performance
- Lower operational cost
- Flexibility
in configuration and management
- Better
work load
management
- Network availability
- Flexible routing between the switches
Renewing Ethernet LAN posed a
number of challenges in aspects such as speed, cost, flexibility, configuration
facility, management of the entire affairs including
in providing power to the LAN phones. Normally, replacement of entire Local Area
Network (LAN) in a production environment can be a difficult undertaking. Therefore, during
its implementation phase, special attention was required to achieve Network
Load Balancing (NLB) for the Microsoft Windows servers.
Result: The benefits included high performance and
flexibility, lesser space needed along with lesser power consumption. The network became faster and also provided rapid and
flexible routing between the switches and servers along with end-to-end Gbit
connection of all the LAN terminal devices with optional power supply.. In a
nutshell, increase in effective network productivity is a gained advantage.
Gigabit network being fiber
supported provided a „high speed solution of data‟
transaction that potentially downsized the cost by saving time. Balluff GmbH
gained advantages in terms of cost reduction, faster data transaction, and much
more.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Discuss
the common problems associated with Ethernet based Local Area Networks, and how
can it be sorted out by installing Gigabit network.
(Hints:
slower transfer rate-high cost of transaction-benefit with Gigabit lower
operational cost)
2.
Discuss
the problems faced by Balluff GmbH and how it was sorted out.
(Hints:
higher operational costs-inflexible network configurations-sorted with Gigabit
network)
Course Reference: Concept–High
speed transfer of data/Unit-9 Computer Networks/ Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i.
“Balluff GmbH enjoys major benefits through a new
40 Gbit backbone”, IBM,.May, 2013
ii.
“Bonar updates its data centers to
improve business continuity (IBM Business Partner DHDS designs and installs
new network backbone based on IBM technology)”, IBM. February, 2014
iii.
“Sarenet transforms its third-party IT and cloud services (IBM business
partner Antisa SA provides new infrastructure and network solution)”, IBM,
.2013
14
10 NTT Docomo Accelerates M-Commerce in Japan
Modern mobile business
technologies with e-business models and Internet are leading to growth of
m-commerce globally. According to a research carried out by The Boston
Consulting Group, mobile markets were growing in different ways in different
regions with lots of innovation. Mobile impact had grown faster than the speed
of its policy makers. 80% of the world population had mobiles by 2013 in G-20
countries. Internet Economy was expected to be $4.2 trillion by 2016 and its
contribution to GDP at 5.3%. By 2013, 2/3rd of 1 billion users of Facebook were using mobile
phones to access Facebook and 60% of Twitter users watched tweets using mobile
phones.
Collaborative
Model: Collaborative
model was used by NTT Docomo in Japan. It was based on partnerships, acquisitions and alliances with other players in the
industry. NTT Docomo was a mobile phone operator with more than
60 million customers in Japan and provided services such as phone, video phone,
internet, mail, SMS and short mail. Docomo, a cellular operator, was a spun off
from Nippon Telephone and Telegraph in 1991.
NTT Docomo in Japan collaborated with Microsoft to
push LTE (Long Term Evolution) Windows 8 tablets to businesses in Japan. It collaborated with China‟s China Mobile
Communications Corporation and South
Korean KT Corporation in providing international
roaming, enterprise services, common platforms, network technologies, smartphones and LTE. It also collaborated with IBM and
Intel to develop “Trusted Mobile Platform Specification” which enhances the
security of the mobile devices. It partnered with Google to
provide Gmail, Google Maps and in developing mobile
apps.
Microsoft |
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Mobile |
Communications |
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Windows 8 Tablets |
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Corporation |
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In Japan, NTT Docomo created a collaborative model,
which enabled the vertical integration of services to its customers. McDonald‟s delivered coupons on to mobile phones in
Japan. Vertical integration is nothing
but acquiring diversified features and facilities related to the organization‟s
business vertical from partners. Docomo with its “i-mode” ecosystem provided consumers with mobile internet, e-mail,
streaming video and
mobile payment services. KDDI and
Softbank Mobile Corporation are its competitors in mobile payments area in
Japan. Docomo had more than 500,000 customers for its mobile payment services
in 2013. It mastered the technological innovations, understood the market
dynamics and realized the opportunities to reach the masses in Japan.
M-Commerce accounted for 1/5th of the B2C e-commerce in Japan.
„M-Commerce‟ stands
for Mobile Commerce. In m-commerce, consumers make transactions using cell
phones, smartphones, tablets, and other wireless devices. NTT Docomo
contributed to Japanese mobile commerce industry with vertical integration and
collaborative approaches.
15
Discussion
Questions:
1.
What is
M-Commerce? Discuss its features.
(Hints: transactions using smartphones/tabs/wireless -bank
transactions using mobile-anywhere anytime)
2.
In what areas NTT Docomo
collaborated with other players in the industry? (Hints: international roaming-mobile Apps-common technology
platforms)
Course Reference:
Concept-Mobile Commerce Systems/Unit 10-
Telecommunication Networks/Subject-IT & Systems
Sources:
i.
Dean, D., Louison, M., Shoji, H.,
Sowmyanarayanan, S., and Subramanian, A. (2013), “Through the Mobile Looking Glass: The Transformative Potential of Mobile Technologies”, Whitepaper of
The Boston Consulting
Group, April 15, 2013.
ii.
“About Docomo”, www.nttdocomo.co.jp, March 16,
2015.
16
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Railway Redesigns MIS to Achieve Bi-directional |
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Indian Railway (IR) is one of the
largest organizations in the country. In the year 2011 it was the fourth
largest travel network in the world earning $477 million with over 1.4 million
employees. It was the eighth largest employer in the world. Its website IRCTC
was the largest E-Commerce website in India. In 2014–
2015 Indian Railways had revenues
of US$26 billion which consisted of US$17 billion from freight and US$6.3 billion from passenger‟s tickets.
IR wanted to reduce the problems
customers encountered in booking ticket, provide faster ticketing, ticket
cancellation, enquiry of train routes and timings, etc Thus, it established
computerized information system so that the passengers could have flexibility
and either avail these facilities visiting the railway counters or even through
the IRCTC website. But later on it realized that the slowness and
sub-optimal-working of the website was hindering the enhancement of the services.
IR updated its IRCTC portal in
the year 2009 to have ease of ticketing and communication, thereby providing
multiple facilities like - ticket booking, cancellation, return of booking
amount, hotel booking, booking for visiting tourist destinations, etc. After
updating of the information system, the website recorded an average booking of
44 million e-tickets per day.
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facilities |
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It had further improved its ticketing portal by
August 14, 2014, and the new generation e-ticketing system Generated 7,200
tickets a minute compared to earlier capacity of 2,000 tickets. The new system
was expected to handle about 120,000 sessions and 200,000 queries at the same
time compared to the earlier capacity of 40,000.
Organization’s
Gain: The Company after implementation
of management information system gained the
following advantages:
1.
Reduced
Passenger Service time
2.
Faster
information dissemination
3.
Increased
performance
4.
Continuous
increase in revenue
Proper planning and „design
of MIS‟ is necessary to ensure that the information system
works properly. The Indian Railways, by implementing the accurate planning and
design of Public MIS has overcome the problems faced by both the railway and
the customer to a considerable extent. .
Discussion
Questions:
1.
What was
the need of Indian Railway to enhance the information system? Discuss.
(Hints:
problems with ticket booking-slow and sub-optimal website-delay in information)
2. Explain the customer‟s benefits as well as the
benefits to the Indian Railway due to change in
MIS system.
(Hints:
fast ticketing-access to information-quick returns for cancelled tickets)
Course Reference: Concept–MIS
Redesigning /Unit-11 MIS Planning & Design / Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i.
Holman, R.“Management Information
Systems in Indian Railways – A Case Study”,
www.moneynewsnow.com, August 14, 2014.
ii. “Next
Generation Railway Ticketing”, Business Standard, August 14,
2014.
iii ”Next
Generation e-Ticketing”, www.cris.org.in, August 2014.
17
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12 |
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Strategic
Approach to Implement MIS in SoCtronics |
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Technologies |
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M/S SoCtronics Technologies,
India is involved in design & manufacturing of process equipment such as
Pressure Vessels, Heat Exchangers, Agitators, Boilers, Dryers, Storage Tanks
& Reactors etc. for large scale chemical, power plants, food processing,
biotechnology & petroleum industry.
The company started exploring
computerization in the late eighties and early nineties mainly for design of
process equipment. Their design teams looked for some commercial applications
and also explored development of computer applications using various languages.
The executive team realized that quicker design solutions and most optimized designs
could save efforts and cost of overall project.
With the view to expedite
internal departmental information exchange and coordination for seamless
operation, the company realized that faster dissemination of information was
the only way to play vital role in the same. However, the biggest challenge
before the organization was lack of proper coordination among various
departments for faster and accurate operations. Thus, the company identified a
core team of eight members, one being at a very senior level who could study
the problems and recommend proper action to the management.
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coordination |
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The group studied flaws in inter-departmental coordination
and came out with an inference that due to improper implementation of
information exchange the coordination problem was prevailing. Thus, the study
groups unanimously recommended the implementation of Management Information
System (MIS) across all the groups in the organization in favour of taking
decisions quickly.
Organization’s
Gain: The company after implementation
of management information system gained the
following advantages:
1.
Proper
and on-time coordination among various groups
2.
Accuracy
at work
3.
Increased
performance
4.
Reduction
in product rejection
Implementation of „MIS‟
is mandatory in industrial ambience for faster operations and performance.
SoCtronic was suffering from the same problem which it overcame by implementing
strategic MIS for proper coordination among various groups in the organization,
and overall performance.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Explain
the problems of SoCtronic Company that caused delay in coordination among
various groups.
(Hints:
slower dissemination of information-slower and inaccurate operations-slow
designs)
2.
Discuss
the gains of SoCtronic after implementation of MIS in the organization.
(Hints:
improved coordination across departments-accurate operations-reduced
product rejections)
Course Reference: Concept–MIS
/Unit-12MIS Implementation & Maintenance / Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i. Kuppiliand, M.K. and Aryasri, A.R., “Strategic
Approach for Successful Implementation of Management Information System for
Manufacturing Industry”, CPMR-IJT, Vol. 2, No.1, June
2012.
ii. Sople,V.V.
and Gupta, D., “MIS implementation at Construction Project”, Indore Management
Journal, 2015.
iii. Ginzberg,
M..J., ”Early diagnosis of MIS implementation failures”, , Management
Science, Vol. 27, No. 4,
2012.
18
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13 |
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E-Governance - Government of India initiatives for Income |
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Tax
Services |
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The Income Tax Department in
India is the apex authority for collecting direct taxes for the government and
it operates as an enforcement agency for the same. The department had one of
the biggest challenges in setting up systems that respect the loyal taxpayer
since all the way they had to wait in the queue to submit their tax documents
for a longer period of time leaving their other important jobs. Owing to a
large number of tax payees, it was not possible for the IT department to
quickly dispose off all the cases amounting to an average of 250 to 400 tax
form submissions at a counter each day. Therefore, to honour the value of their
time and dignity, the department wanted to provide the tax payee easy facility
that minimized their valuable time and did not interfere with their other
works. Other challenges included difficulties in standardizing office layout to
align it with new technology and new process for receiving the forms and faster
disposals of service requests.
The department could overcome
issues through extensive consultations with taxpayers, tax professionals and
industry associations. The other issue regarding huge number of returns filing
and longer time required to submit the form had also been solved by providing
easy taxpaying using e-filing of the personal tax and establishing
e-Governance. The facility for E-filing of tax returns had not only made it
convenient for tax payers to file tax returns anytime anywhere, it had also
reduced receiving time of refunds if due, and also eliminated the need to get
someone to help moving files by providing a bribe. The technology initiatives
coupled with considering taxpayers as customers who deserve quality services
had made all the difference between automation and e-governance.
It has
worked in both the directions, that is, to process the refund request faster as
well as to get the refund
within shorter period of time
applying standard practices of governance. The key to establish this process was the gap between department‟s request
processing time and applicant‟s waiting time to get the
repayment. The department applied
technology to enhance internal efficiency of the department. by converting the
standard practices of governance into its electronic counterpart, known as
e-Governance practice. The e-Governance initiatives emerged in the form of
e-filing portal and Aykar Seva Kendras (ASK) which contributed in the move
towards non-adversarial tax administration and provided quality services to tax
payers.
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e-tax Portal |
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Income Tax |
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Setting up system to |
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taxpayer |
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receiving & |
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of service |
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Tax |
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customer |
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Organization’s
Achievements: The
overall governance of Income Tax
Department (ITD) improved and the satisfaction
level among the customers increased significantly.
By applying ‘e-Governance‟ Income Tax
department achieved success in satisfying their customer in terms of faster
income tax filing as well as return.
Discussion
Questions:
1. Explain the challenges faced by income Tax
Department in course of improving their services. (Hints: delays service requests-customer experience-processing
refunds)
2.
Discuss
the advantages gained by applying e-Governance services through e-tax portal
and ASKs.
(Hints:
good project governance-better customer experience-faster customer service)
Course Reference: Concept–
E-Governance /Unit-13Management of MIS / Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i.. Bajaj , S. and Dhundia, H., “Transforming
Taxpayer Services through e-filing of Income Tax Returns”, , Case Studies of National
e-Governance Division, 2013.
ii.
“Report on e-Governance” ,Department of Administrative
Reforms and Public Grievances,
Ministry of
Personnel,Public
Grievances and Pensions, Government of India, 2010.
iii. “Report on Business Process Re-engineering
for e-Governance Projects”, Government of India, November 19, 2012.
19
14 Amazon Web Services’ Strategies
for Managing IT Globally
Changing business models and strategies for
managing IT globally helped many firms retain customers and grow business.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) had 8,000 customers. It was one of the world‟s biggest cloud
services providers. It had 42
edge locations across the world. Edge locations are points having servers in
the content delivery network. It launched edge locations in Mumbai and Chennai
in India with physical servers and services. AWS users delivered content faster
to their customers. It reduced the number of nodes the data had to touch when
traversing from one point to other point.
AWS Business Model |
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v |
Users paid for what they used |
v |
No long term contracts |
v |
No minimum usage requirements |
v |
Concentrated
on customer retention |
v |
Concentrated on revenue growth |
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v |
Optimized Routes |
v |
Avoided trouble spots |
v |
Compressed content |
v |
Replicated the data packets |
v |
Frequently used data was kept in Edges |
Following
Organizations used AWS Services in India
1.
Eros
International Media, a motion picture production and distribution company
2.
RedBus,
bus ticket booking platform
3.
Playblazer,
a games company
4.
MPS, a
publishing services company
5.
Vserv.mobi,
Mobile Ads company
6.
Zovi, a
design and manufactures apparel
7.
Classle,
an online social learning platform
Global IT strategies influenced
global product strategy, global product marketing, global product development,
and 24/7 support to customer. Usually these strategies are framed by CEO, CTO
and CIO. The Amazon Web Services business model and strategies impacted its
business growth as shown below:
Business
Model
Technological
Change /
Upgradation
Customer Retention
Business Growth
„Strategies for managing IT globally‟ include global delivery models, onsite-offshore
models, near-shore models and
geographically distributed product design and development. AWS provided IT
systems anywhere anytime, reduced IT investment costs, provided return on
investment of IT and evaluated MIS implementations as part of its global IT
management strategies. AWS also opened the door for Internet of Things.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Discuss the
Amazon Web Services (AWS) business model.
(Hints:
pay for use-concentration on customer retention-no long term contracts)
2.
What are
the different global IT strategies of Amazon Web Services (AWS)?
(Hints:
edge locations across the world-avoid long delivery networks-compressed
content)
Course Reference: Concept-Strategies for managing IT globally/Unit 14-Global IT
Management/Subject-IT & Systems
Sources:
i. John, S.,
“Amazon enables faster content delivery for Indian Customers”, The Times of
India, July 29, 2013.
ii. “AWS
opens door to a wider array of Internet of Things”, www.thinkstrategies.com,
May 17, 2014.
20
|
15 |
|
The
Case of FAO (Finance & Accounting Outsourcing) |
|
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||
|
|
Industry |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Outsourcing of financial and
accounting systems has grown steadily. IT Enabled Services became industry
specific. They enhanced back office systems to lower costs and better
efficiency. FAO (Finance and Accounting Outsourcing) was about outsourcing
transactional F&A activities, operational analytics and industry specific
tools and assets to 3rd party. Goods manufacturing and services
organizations adopted FAO for cost savings and efficiency gains. FAO solutions
became more and more industry specific from horizontal corporate F&A
processes such as accounts payable, accounts receivable and general ledger. For
example, WNS was an FAO provider in India.
Growth of
FAO Industry ·(2012)
25 FAO providers had signed 800 multi-process
·
FAO
contracts as of 2012. FAO growth rate was stabilizing at 10% annually from earlier
·
double digit growth rates Scope
enhancements/extensions/ renewals account for 60%-70% of market
·
growth
US based large goods manufacturers were the biggest
customers of FAO.
Drivers of FAO Industry ·Specificity
Increasing Client,
Market and Service
·
Provider maturity Push – Pull effect in
·
FAO market Increased Client
·
Sophistication Increasing competition among FAO
providers for differentiation
With this
customers were moving towards Procure-to-
Pay (P2P) instead of
standalone payable
capability,
Order-to-Cash (O2C) instead of receivables
Advantages of Industry
·Specific FAO
Operational F&A beyond
·
corporate F&A Improved
Organizational
·
overall Cash flow Reduced
Complexity and
·
Transition Times Can have access
to predefined and preconfigured industry
·
specific
assets
Gives access to industry specific domain expertise
FAO providers were acquiring
People, Process and Technology resources in this direction
1st
Generation FAO Contracts |
|
2ndGeneration
FAO Contracts |
|
|
|
Traditional
FAO |
|
|
Industry
Specific FAO |
|
|
|
|
Horizontal Corporate
Finance & Accounting |
|
|
In
addition to Corporate
F&A processes, |
processes |
|
|
operational F&A processes |
|
|
|
|
CFO/Finance Controller involved |
|
|
In addition to CFO/Finance Controller, Business |
|
|
|
Unit heads are also involved |
|
|
|
|
Main value
Addition: Centralization and
Process |
|
|
InadditiontoProcessefficiencyand |
Efficiency |
|
|
centralization,
analytics, domain
expertise, tools |
|
|
|
and technologies |
|
|
|
|
Same across industries |
|
|
Specific
to goods manufactures (P2P)
and |
|
|
|
Specific to Services provider (O2C) |
|
|
|
|
Overall Objective was reducing
direct costs |
|
|
Here
overall objective was
creating business |
|
|
|
impact |
|
|
|
|
|
21 |
|
Best practices in implementing
industry specific FAO include: observe industry specificity required, build a
cost plus business case, involve business heads right from beginning, select
FAO provider based on industry expertise, implement outcome based pricing model
and have phased adaptation process instead of all at one go.
„Financial accounting systems‟ maintain
the books of accounts on costs, investments, purchases, sales, commissions,
taxes, salaries, wages, incentives, and advances of the organization. FAO
industry has moved its value chain from horizontal F & A services to
vertical industry specific services.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Distinguish
between traditional FAO and industry specific FAO.
(Hints:
Horizontal vs. Vertical F&A services-CFO vs. CFO+SBU-reduce direct costs
vs. create business impact)
2.
Discuss
the drivers of industry specific FAO.
(Hints:
increase market and client maturity-Push-Pull Effect-increased competition
among FAO
providers)
Course Reference: Concept-Financial Accounting Systems / Unit 15-MIS in Specialized Areas
/ Subject-IT & Systems Sources:
i. Gupta,
S., “The Rise of Industry-Specific F&A Outsourcing
(FAO) Solutions: Focus on FAO in Retail and
Airlines”,
Everest Group Research, July 2013
ii.
Gupta, S., Khandelwal, V., and
Menghvani, V.,“Finance and Accounting Outsourcing (FAO) – Annual Report
2013: Increasing Market Maturity Driving Cost+ Value Proposition, Everest Group
Research, April 20, 2013.
22
16 Facebook Innovates its Business Model
Facebook acquired Whatsapp in
2014 for $19 billion. It could have purchased Sony for this money. Facebook gained
many benefits with this acquisition. Earlier in 2012, it had acquired Instagram
for $1 billion to get into mobile photographers market.
One of the important aspects of
the Facebook business model was that everybody could become a friend with
everybody else over the social networking site. The objective of Facebook was
to become the leader in social networking domain. Facebook found that teens
were shifting from Facebook to Twitter to Whatsapp. It innovated its e-business
model with these acquisitions to cater better to the teenage segment apart from
using big data and increasing global reach.
WhatsApp, in the past five years,
had acquired ten times the number of users that Twitter and Skype had acquired
in their 10 years of operations. 70% of WhatsApp users were online every day in
2014 exchanging messages on their platform. WhatsApp had zero advertising
commitment. It charged yearly $0.99 after first year of usage. Facebook
Messenger was then widely used in US for sending messages. Whereas, WhatsApp was
more popular in India and South America. To capture more market, Facebook
innovated its business model. The benefits for Facebook with the acquisitions
were as follows:
Facebook
Business Model and Benefits:
Captured
Shifting Teens |
|
Innovated
Business Models: |
|
Reached
Global Users: |
||
· Facebook was worried |
|
· |
Facebook did not have |
|
· |
Mobile usage picked |
|
|
subscription based |
|
|
up in Asia, Africa and |
|
about losing Teens |
|
|
business model, which |
|
· |
South America. |
|
|
· |
WhatsApp had. |
|
Facebook wanted to |
|
|
|
Facebook wanted to |
|
|
capture both global and |
|
|
|
|
innovate into WhatsApp |
|
· |
mobile users. |
|
|
· |
business model; |
|
The shift was towards |
|
|
|
WhatsApp did not exploit |
|
|
mobility across the |
|
|
|
|
user data |
|
|
world |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Benefits: |
|
· |
Facebook got advantage over
Google and other competitors with WhatsApp acquisition. |
· |
With this acquisition the
global telecom industry in which SMS services were estimated |
at $100 billion was at stake.
Organizations need to innovate
their business models to pre-empt competitors. The governments also used
electronic channels to communicate with consumers and businesses. These
increased the access, customer support and sales for organizations. They
transformed traditional business models with continuous customer and user interaction.
„E-business models‟ are the business models which use media such as
Internet, e-mail, Fax, telephone and web conferencing. These models
operate in areas such as business-to-consumer, consumer-to-business,
business-to-business and consumer-to-consumer. Facebook innovated its
e-business model with acquisition while aiming for the emerging markets.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
How did
Facebook innovate its business model?
(Hints:
no subscription based model-do not exploit user data-innovate into WhatsApp
business model)
2.
How did
Facebook increase its user base? Discuss.
(Hints:
captured shifting teens-revised business models-shift to emerging markets)
Course Reference: Concept- E-Business Models /Unit
16- Basics of E-Business and Enterprise Application Integration/Subject-IT & Systems
Sources:
i. Girotra,
K. and Netessine, S. (2014), “What‟s Facebook up to?”, INSEAD Blog,
www.insead.edu, February 21,
2014.
ii. “What‟s
Wrong with Facebook Business Model and Innovation Strategy”, Forbes, February
23, 2014.
23
|
17 |
|
Deployment
of ERP based SCM Solution at TVS Logistics |
|
|
||
|
|
Services Ltd |
|
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|
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|
|
Supply Chain Management (SCM)
deals with the flow of products and information between supply chain members'
and the organization concerned. Information Technology based SCM helps to
restructure the entire distribution set up to achieve higher service levels
with lower inventory, thereby improving overall efficiency.
Implementing a successful Supply
Chain Management solution takes an integrated effort of both IT enabled
Solution provider and Corporate Business house. TVS Logistics Services Ltd.
(TVSLSL) an ISO Certified company which specialized in providing Warehousing,
Distribution, Transportation, Managing services to
automobile manufacturing sector,
and Ramco Systems a software solution provider developed and deployed ERP based
SCM Solutions to overcome operation problems at TVS Logistics.
At TVSLSL due to requirement of
large volume of spares, handling logistics was very complex at each
manufacturing facility. Some of the major problems were due to improper
maintenance of stock and lack of ability to monitor transit delays. The
following diagram illustrates how implementing state of art intergraded ERP
based SCM solution helped overcome some of the major hurdles at TVS Logistics
Services Ltd.
Need of Integrated IT Solution:-
*
Stock-outs
leading to disruption of production
*
Multiple suppliers‟ management at point of service was difficult to
manage
* Achieving
transparency and
efficiency in SCM operation with
in - house application not viable
*
Volume of
spares required was large and dynamically changing
TVSLSL
Size of Operations:-*140
locations
*Global Joint Ventures
in US,
UK, Thailand, Spain and
Germany
Ramco Systems Contribution
*Implementation of
Transportation Management,
Warehousing Operations, Procurement, Sales &
Financials Services
*Providing integrated SCM tools for domestic
transportation,
international transport,
warehousing and material handling
*Process Re-Engineering, Customization and Employee
Training
Benefits
Achieved:-*Improved
accessibility and reduced transit delays *Reduced
overall costs *Timely follow ups
*Real-time information access to stake holders
*Integration of processes under one platform for better accuracy and
transparency
Value added Services:-
*Integrated with GPRS, Biometrics, PDAs & Mobile Solutions
*Web Portal availability
for
Customers with 24*7 availability
of information
TVS Logistics Services Ltd.
(TVSLSL) shifted to IT enabled customized solutions to enhance its logistic
operational capabilities with high transparency, scalability and scope of
accessibility. To make things better the new system was GRS enabled with Mobile
applications which was not possible with the earlier system.
When an ERP based „Supply Chain Management‟ solution is implemented across the organization
as in TVSLSL,
it gives high degree of transparency, accessibility and accuracy. It becomes
efficient, secure and easy to manage when integrated with a centralized
database , improving the overall operations.
Discussion
Questions:
1. Discuss any five major technologies to implement
above discussed SCM System.
(Hints:
SAP/Ramco/Oracle/Siebel/PeopleSoft-automate business processes-automate SCM
processes)
2.
How did
ERP help TVS in their supply chain management? Discuss.
(Hints:
multiple supplier management-reduced operational costs-information accessibility)
Course Reference: Concept-Supply
Chain Management/Unit 17- Supply Chain Management and E- Bussiness/Course-IT
& Systems
Sources: i. Ramco
, “TVS Logistics: IT enables three-fold expansion in five years”,
Whitepaper of Ramco Systems, 2015.
ii. TVS, “TVS
Logistics Services Ltd: About Us”, www.tvslsl.com, March 2015.
24
|
18 |
|
Effective Tracking of Core Operations using ERP by Brigg |
|
|
||
|
|
Equipment |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Brigg Equipment Inc. and its
subsidiaries were known to be the leading providers and renters of material
handling equipments at various locations like USA, UK, and Mexico.
Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, the company was the largest dealer of Yale and
Hyster fork lifters in North America.
Brigg Equipment Inc. relied on
its basic business model “legacy dealer
business system” for a stretch of 25 years. Later on it realized that while
tracking the core operations the solution had limitations with its technology
platform. Having rounds of discussions at length the management decided to
implement ERP solution in the year November 2013 to find a way out of their
problems. Finally they teamed up with Ultra Consultants to help them in
selecting the right ERP system.
ERP
Selection Process of Ultra Consultant
Documentation
of Brigg‟s |
Isolation
of initial |
Planning
future state |
|
current state of business |
|
targeted areas for |
of the business |
processes |
|
improvements |
processes |
Solution Designing |
Prototyping
– long-term test of |
||
|
|
required ERP modules |
|
|
Implementing
ERP |
|
|
|
(Project
management, Quality |
|
|
assurance,
and Process redesign) |
|
By implementing the right modules
of ERP, the company was able to streamline their problems and to find
appropriate solutions in terms of much better operation management, and
efficient tracking of the core operations. By implementation of better
management solution, the company was able to effectively reduce its operational
costs without unwanted limitations getting imposed on its technology platform.
Conclusion:
The Company gained better control
over tracking the core operations. Thereby, the entire business system of the organization came to the main stream and
the companies were able to enhance its profitability by potentially reducing
the losses caused by the limitations of its technology platform while tracking
the core operation.
„ERP (Enterprise Resource
Planning)‟ provided a holistic solution to the Brigg Equipment
Inc. in terms of efficient core operation tracking. Selection of right
ERP modules as done by Ultra Consultants resulted in further cost efficient control
over entire management of the operations.
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Explain
the effect of ERP module selection and solution design as done in the case of
Brigg Equipment Inc.
(Hints:
Prototyping-enabled business process redesign-track core operations)
2.
Discuss
the problems of Brigg Equipment Inc. and how the solution was found.
(Hints:
unable to track core operations-limited technology platform capabilities-ERP is
the solution)
Course Reference: Concept–Implementation
of ERP/Unit-18Enterprise Resource Planning / Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i. “Brigg
Equipments”, Ultra Consultants, USA, September, 2013.
ii. Bergmann
and Hillebrand, “Industry Engineered to Order precision perforated plates”,
Ultra Consultants,
USA, April 2014.
iii. “Radio
Flyer Equipment Manufacturer”, Ultra Consultants, USA, June 2014.
25
|
19 |
|
Myntra.com Strategizes Brand Building through Social |
|
|
||
|
|
Media |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Myntra.com, one of the leading
Indian e-commerce platforms, dealt with fashion and lifestyle products. It was
started by a group of IIT / IIM graduates in 2007 and was headquartered in
Bangalore. The company was funded by top tier Venture Capital funds, e.g.,
Tiger Global, Indo US, IDG & Accel Partners. Indian online retail companies
earned revenues of around $2.24 billion in the financial year that ended on
March 31, 2013. It was expected to triple by 2016.
In the year 2014, Myntra
strategized to collect valuable inputs to restructure its business along with
potentially enhancing the client base within a shorter period of time. They
started online contests using social media in two different phases. The contest
series garnered a lot of interest among youngsters and the client list tripled
within a very short period.
The first phase was organized on
March 26, 2014. To participate in this phase of contest people had to follow
Myntra.com on Twitter and then answer all the questions with the hashtag
#MyntraTreasureHunt. The second phase commenced on March 27, 2014 at midnight
on Twitter account @myntra and closed on the next day. The participants were
asked to first become a registered member of Myntra.com, then only were they
allowed to participate in the contest.
Objective: Brand Promotion & increasing client base
Strategy:
Social Media
Utilizing
Approach:
Contest
Online
Outcome: Brand
promoted
and
client
base enhanced
Benefits:
The Company gathered a lot of
valuable business inputs out of the contest to further restructure their business.
1.
Freebies and Discounts worked on Social Media - Giveaway (discounts) motivated audience to participate
2.
Collaboration worked for Brand Building - Due to collaboration with brands, not only were
the campaigns trending on Twitter
but the brands were trending as well. The brand establishing exercise was found
to be most effective for the following three brands –Myntra Treasure Hunt, Arrow Winter, and Being Human. The other
brands also received a boost.
3.
Plan in-advance - Always plan even the smallest detail, and whenever a campaign is
launched on real-time there must be
a contingency plan.
4.
Increase your customer base - Myntra increased its effective customer base,
with their contest guidelines.
Audiences happily obliged. For the First Phase of contest the participants had
to follow them on Twitter to be a part of the contest. And for the Second Phase
of contest, users were asked to register themselves on Myntra.com and then be
part of the contest. This helped Myntra in pushing their future campaigns
seamlessly.
5.
Audiences Attention - It has always been every marketer‟s concern to
grab their audience‟s attention and make them notice the brand. Myntra did
it successfully within two days of its campaign. Myntra presented the audience
with unique content and surprise which caught their attention.
„e-Business‟ has begun to exploit social media as strategic tool
to establish their brand as well as to attract the future customer.
Myntra.com was successful in getting both their objectives fulfilled, that is,
branding itself and gaining potential customers at faster pace
Discussion
Questions:
1.
Explain
the effect of organizing events by e-Business companies using social media.
(Hints:
valuable business inputs-increased customer base-collaborative brand building)
2.
Discuss
the campaign strategized by Myntra.com and the end benefits gained.
(Hints:
online contests-brand building-increased customer base)
Course Reference: Concept–E-Business
and social media/Unit-19CRM and E-Business / Subject – IT & Systems.
Sources:
i. “5 Social Media lessons to learn from
@Myntra‟s Treasure Hunt Campaign”, www.digitalinsights.in, March. 2014.
ii. Adams,
A., “Five ways-social-media-will-increase-your-ecommerce-business”
, www.toptenreviews.com, 2015.
iii. ” The Role
of Social Media Networking in E-Commerce Web Development”, www.vendorseek.com,
2014
26
|
20 |
|
Amazon Extends Cloud Computing Features |
||
|
|
|
|
|
|
Amazon.com, |
Inc. wasanAmerican electroniccommerce companywithheadquartersin |
||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
Seattle, Washington. It was
the largest Internet-based retailer in the US. Amazon had separate retail
websites for US, UK & Ireland, France, Canada, Germany, The Netherlands,
Italy, Spain, Australia, Brazil, Japan, China, India and Mexico. Amazon.com
started as an online bookstore, but soon diversified, selling DVDs, VHSs, CDs,
video and MP3 downloads/streaming, software, video games, electronics, apparel,
furniture, food, toys, and jewelry. It was also a major provider of cloud computing services.
Amazon.com with the help of AWS
cloud computing become an important technology provider to other organizations.
Amazon provided cloud services at competitive prices. Amazon Web Services
already provided cloud computing services for customers including the Central
Intelligence Agency and Netflix.
F Goal:
Amazon trying to become an
important technology
provider to other
F organizations,
Its aspirations
were just as
big as those of Microsoft,
IBM and Google.
F Solution:-
Hundreds of thousands of customers
have joined the Amazon Web Services
community and use AWS solutions to
F build their businesses
Cloud computing platform provides the client flexibility
to build its application,
their way, regardless of their
situation or F industry
It can save time, money, and manage the client‟s infrastructure, without
compromising scalability, security.
F |
Objectives:- |
AWS Cloud
Computing would like to pro |
|
|
simple way to access servers,
storage, dat |
F and application services over the Internet. Would like to
maintain the network-conne hardware required for these application se via a web
application.
F Benefits:-
Trade capital expense for variable
F expense
Benefit from massive economies
F of scale
F
Stop guessing capacity
F
Increase speed and agility
Stop spending money on running
F and maintaining data centers Go global in minutes
The challenges they faced include logging
challenges, quality of service guarantees, and attraction to hackers, data
ownership issues and dependence on secure hypervisors.
„Cloud Computing‟, by definition, refers to an on-demand delivery of
IT resources and applications via the Internet with pay-as-you-go
pricing model.
Discussion
Questions:
1)
What are
the features and functionality of cloud computing?
(Hints:
application services over Internet-Hardware services over Web-Work anytime
anywhere)
2)
What are
the benefits of Amazon web services cloud?
(Hints:
capital expense vs. variable expense-economy of scale-increased speed and
agility)
Course Reference:-Cloud features and functionality/unit 20-cloud computing/ Subject- IT
& Systems Source:
i. Hardy,
Q., “Amazon Moves to Extend Cloud-Computing Dominance”, Live Mint, November
18, 2014.
ii. “What is
Cloud Computing?”,www.amazon.com , 2015.
iii Dyess,
C., “Cloud News Recap: July 15, 2014”, www.eucalyptus.com, July 15, 2014.
27
21 WhatsApp with Big Data Ethics and Responsibilities
WhatsApp, Inc. was founded in
2009 by Brian Acton and Jan Koum. It was taken over by Facebook for US$19
billion. WhatsApp was the most globally popular messaging app with more than
700 million active users till January 2015. WhatsApp Messenger was an instant
messaging app for Smartphone that operated under a subscription business model.
In addition to text messaging, WhatsApp could be used to send images, video,
and audio media messages. WhatsApp had also started rolling out the much
awaited voice calling feature. Locations could also be shared through the use
of integrated mapping features.
Issues:
F
Collection
of big data and
F processing Share data with
F confidence and safety
F Speedy processing of data
F Accuracy of data
F Overcome ethical issues
F Save data from hackers
F Increase the active users Financial data sharing issues
Challenges:
F
F Handling Ethical issues F Privacy
F confidentiality
F Transparency
F Identity
F Data hackers
F Processing complex data
Implementing new functions
Solution:
F
WhatsApp
does not retain
F delivered messages
The only records of those messages are stored in
the sender and the recipient‟s
F mobile devices Data has never been collected and stored by
F WhatsApp
WhatsApp is not recording the exact usage
F WhatsApp’s Approach
F Made individual customer‟s phone
number as an identification code
F Implemented end-to-end
encryption, an upgrade to its privacy protections
Integrated the open-source
software Text secure, into the most popular messaging app in the world, F where
people exchange billions of messages a day
Messages will now travel all the way to the recipients‟ device before being decrypted,
rather than merely being encrypted
between the user‟s device and WhatsApp server
WhatsApp had 30 billion messages
being sent every day and 833,000 active users per day. It added about 25
million new users every month. With the help of big
data, it stored more than 700 million active users‟ data and process data with speed, confidentiality, accuracy and transparency of data. WhatsApp followed legal and ethical guidelines. It gained benefits by
implementing big data such as increased speed of delivery, increased accuracy
and increased new user registrations.
„Big Data‟ is nothing but the huge volume of
complex, structured and unstructured data
collected over time. Big data is analyzed for organizational business and
market intelligence. WhatsApp used big data in an ethical and responsible way.
Discussion
Questions:
1)
What is big
data in relation to WhatsApp?
(Hints:
millions of active users-instant messaging-confidentiality of data)
2)
What are
challenges faced by WhatsApp in implementing big data?
(Hints:
data hackers-privacy, identity and transparency-processing complex data)
Course Reference:-Big Data/Unit 21-Business Intelligence and Big data/ Subject- IT &
Systems Source:
i.
King, J.H., “What's Up With Big
Data Ethics?”, Forbes, March 28, 2014.
ii.
“WhatsApp”, www..wikipedia.org,
February 11, 2015.
iii.
Pentland, A.S., “With Big Data Comes Big
Responsibility”, Harvard Business Review, November, 2014.
28
22 Microsoft Makes Office 365 Product Line
Architecture
Microsoft
Corporation was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975. It was an
American multinational
corporation headquartered in
Redmond, Washington, that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports and sells
computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers and services. Microsoft‟s best known
software products were the
Microsoft Windows line of operating systems, Microsoft Office suite, Internet
Explorer web browser, Windows Azure cloud product and
Office365. The product line architecture of Microsoft
Office 365 is shown below:
@ Features:
he Office 365 service consists of a
@
number of products
and services.
ll of Office 365's components can be
managed and configured through an
@
online portal
sers can be added manually, imported
@
from a CSV file
usiness and enterprise-oriented plans
for Office 365 offer access to cloud-hosted versions of Office's server
platforms on a software as a service basis, including Exchange, SharePoint, and
the browser-based
Office Web Apps suite
@ Approaches:
Office 365 is subscription based with different subscription
levels,
@
depending on need of
customers There are no direct migrating tools. Migration is not a simple
@
process
Successfully introduce new
@
features
Identify and address any causes of
@
resistance
@
Created a planning
roadmap Encouraged user adoption
@ Functionality
Office 365 Includes access to Word,
Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher, and Access for home/non-
@
commercial
Aimed at mainstream consumers and families; same as
Personal, but for use on
@
up to five devices by
up to five users Offers access to hosted Exchange,
@
SharePoint, services
only
Offers desktop apps for both Mac and PCs
@
for up to five
computers per users. Aimed at businesses with 10-300
@
employees.
Use in enterprise environments. Offers
access to all Office applications, Lync services, plus enterprise-specific
legal
compliance features and support
Challenges:
@
@ The Hard
Cost on premises
@ Migrating from existing
content
@ Backup and restore
@ Office 365 security
@ Overcoming low bandwidth
Limitations of Exchange Online
Product Line Architecture of
Microsoft office suite of products was based on Windows platform. It is on top
of its core components such as COM and OLE. It included packages such as MS
Office, MS Excel, MS Projects etc. Office 365 was the brand name used by
Microsoft for a group of software plus services subscriptions that provided
productivity software and related services to its subscribers. Facing growing
competition from Google's similar service Google Apps, Microsoft designed the
Office 365 platform to "together" its existing online Exchange
Server, SharePoint and Lync Plans. Microsoft expanded the Office
29
365 service with new plans, such as Small Business
Premium, Midsize Premium, and Pro Plus. Microsoft announced that Office 365
subscribers would receive "unlimited" OneDrive storage.
„Product Line architecture‟: Product line is a series of related products with
common components. Product line can be developed in many ways: revolutionary
development of products line from scratch, evolutionary development of product
line from scratch and evolving existing products into a product line. Microsoft
office 365 integrated a
group of software plus services subscriptions that
provides productivity software and related services to its subscribers.
Discussion
Questions:
1)
What is
Product line architecture? Explain
(Hints:
Base technology platform-common components-Revolutionary vs. Evolutionary)
2)
How is
Microsoft implementing product line architecture in Office 365?
(Hints: component
management thru online-number
of products and
services-increased
automation)
Course Reference:-Product Line Architecture /Unit 22-Current Trends in Software Design And
Architecture/ Subject-IT & Systems
Source:
i.
Keizer, G., “Microsoft unveils de-cluttering option for Office 365 mailboxes”,
Computer World, November
18, 2014.
ii.
“Office 365”, www..wikipedia.org, February 1, 2015.
iii.
Bradley, T., “Why Office 365 is a better deal than Office 2013”, PC World,
January 31, 2013.
30
23 Uber’s New Mobile App
Feature
Uber was founded as
"UberCab" by Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp in 2009. Uber was an
app-based transportation network and taxi company. The service was available in
53 countries and more than 200 cities worldwide. It was valued at more than
US$40 billion in 2014. The company used a smart phone application to receive
ride requests and then sent these trip requests to their drivers.
§ |
|
Features |
||
Operated
in 200 cities |
||||
§ |
Low
price service |
|||
§ |
Send
Status |
|||
§ |
Mobile
app based booking |
|||
§ |
Safety
of customers |
|||
§ |
All
luxury cars available on hire |
|||
§ |
All Vehicles are connected with GPRS system |
|||
§ |
|
|
|
|
Punctual
and comfortable |
|
|
||
§ |
|
|
|
|
Pay
direct to company not to drivers by using |
|
|||
|
cards |
|
Approaches
§ |
Challenges |
||||
Low price
service operations |
|||||
§ |
Tracking
and ensuring customer safety |
||||
§ |
Huge
fund needed for app maintenance |
||||
§ |
High funding for maintaining luxury cars like |
||||
§ |
BMW,
Audi etc |
||||
Local
transport authority regulation |
|||||
§ |
Licensed
driver and back ground verification |
||||
§ |
of
drivers |
||||
Fighting against ban in some |
countries |
|
|
||
§ |
|
|
|
|
|
Allegation
of rape cases by drivers in India |
|
||||
|
and
other countries |
|
|||
§ „Send Status‟ feature added to Uber app
§
§
Urgently break down pick up
§
In Uber app „SOS‟ button introduced to call local police directly
§
Offered discount for regular Uber
users
Payment can be made direct through credit card or debit card without
§
paying to drivers
Pricing may be on speed and distance or speed and time depending on
traffic
Based on the experience, Uber introduced new features „Send Status „where passengers could share details about driver and the vehicle
and its location with their family
members and friends. „SOS‟ button was also
added to call the local police directly. Uber
claimed to have made background verification of all drivers in India after the
allegation against one of its drivers. The app feature was made available in
several cities.
„Mobile technology‟ brings
the advantages such as mobility and flexibility. Many types of mobile operating
systems (OS) are available for smart phones, including: Android, BlackBerry OS,
webOS, iOS,
Symbian, Windows Mobile. Apps are developed for
mobile operating systems. Uber App introduced new feature of „Send Status‟ for
safety and security.
Discussion
Questions:
1)
What are
the advantages of mobile technologies? Explain.
(Hints:
faster information sharing-increased security-accessibility to information)
2)
What is
the feature enabled in Uber App? Explain.
(Hints: „Send Status‟-shares information with friends and
relatives-increased safety and security)
Course Reference:-Advantages of Mobile Technologies/Unit 23-Mobile and Social
Technologies/ Subject- IT & Systems
Source:
i.,“Uber
introduces India-specific safety features in taxi app”, Live
Mint, February 11, 2015.
ii. BS
Reporter, “Uber introduces India-specific safety features”, Business
Standard, February 12,2015.
iii.
“Uber Gets Serious About Passenger Safety In India, Introduces Panic Button”,
Forbes, February 12,2015.
iv.”Uber
enforces comprehensive background check on drivers in India”,
www.thenextweb.com, February 03, 2015.
31
Accomplishing Outcomes through Business Process
Design:
24 |
Maruti Model |
|
Maruti Udyog Limited was
established in February 1981. Actual production commenced only in 1983. It
started with Maruti 800, based on the Suzuki Alto kei car. At the time it was
the only modern car available in India. Originally, 74% of the company was
owned by the Indian government, and 26% by Suzuki of Japan. As of May 2007, the
government of India sold its complete share to Indian financial institutions
and no longer held any stake in Maruti Udyog.
Maruti Suzuki had two
manufacturing facilities in India - Gurgaon and Manesar. Both manufacturing
facilities had a combined production capacity of 17,00,000 vehicles annually.
Models of Maruti were Maruti Alto 800, Alto K10, Ritz, Celerio, A-Star, Swift,
Wagon R, Zen, swift DZire, Ciaz, Kizashi and SX4, Eeco, Omni, Ertiga and Grand
Vitara. As a part of its expansion plan and to design and develop, launch new
models of quality cars, Maruti Suzuki had reengineered many of its business
processes. The goals of Maruti Suzuki and the processes used to achieve them
are shown below:
F |
Goals |
Technological Innovation |
|
F |
Sensitivity
to Customer Needs |
F |
New Products
entering into New Customer Segments |
F |
Increasing
R&D Initiatives |
F |
Target to sell 2 million cars in a globally competitive market |
F |
Enhanced
customer expectations |
F |
Action Plan |
F |
Product Design |
|
Raw Materials |
||||
Developed design centre |
||||
F |
Technology |
F |
Expansion
of plant over |
|
F |
Funds |
|
600
acres |
|
F |
Infrastructure |
F |
||
Training
to engineers |
F Assembling
Annual
capacity of 800,000 units
F at Manesar
Diesel engine plant in Gurgaon, with an annual capacity of 900,000
F |
Warehouse and supply |
No of Sales outlets: 1310 |
|
F |
No of
Maruti true value outlets: 600 |
F |
Over 1,000Maruti Mobile Support (MMS) vehicles were
operating across the country |
F |
Over
3000 service stations across India |
F |
Outcomes |
Technology improved |
|
F |
New
products lunched |
F |
R &
D process enhanced |
F |
Improved services ofMarutiTrue Value |
Initially Maruti Suzuki had only
Hindustan Ambassador and Premier Padmini as rivals in India. But in the new
millennium world class car makers had entered into Indian market. Maruti introduced
more models, low priceed, Alternate fuel technology and improved customer
reliability.
Business „Process design‟ is sequence of activities or tasks executed in
order to deliver value to either internal or external customer.
Maruti Suzuki business process design led to increased production and latest
design.
Discussion
Questions:
1)
What is
Business process design? Explain
(Hints: identifying sequence of activities-customer service
processes design-using workflows among SBUs)
32
2) How did Maruti Suzuki implement business
process design?
(Hints:
increased infrastructure-used technology-customer centred design)
Course Reference:-Process Design /Unit 24-IT and Business Process Management/ Subject- IT
& Systems Source:
i. Mukherjee,S., “Maruti to set up research and development centre at
Rohtak”, Business Standard, August 26, 2013.
ii. Philip,
L.,“Why
global carmakers are moving R&D work to India”, The Economic Times,
September 11,
2014.
iii.
PTI, “Maruti Suzuki to set up R&D centre at Rohtak”, Live Mint, April 12,
2012.
33
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