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Doing Your Sums on . . . Build, Buy or Rent 05/11/2007 13:32:30
You’re trying to build a world-class IT team, but everyone’s going after the same talent pool. What mix works best? Should you grow your own, draft your players or barter your way to the line-up you want to field?CIOs should never forget that while new technologies have a maturity cycle, the maturity cycle for human beings in IT is even longer - +
Process Trip 04/02/2008 13:07:03
Why Maritz Travel revamped key business processes — and how business and IT came together to make it workWhen Rich Phillips became COO OF Maritz Travel about two and-a-half years ago, he sat down and took a hard look at the big industry picture - +
9 Paths to Higher Performance 10/12/2007 14:09:23
When an organization brings together talented people in a creative, collaborative environment it fosters a culture of high performance, which in turn leads to superior business resultsLike high-achieving individuals, some organizations seem to have the Midas touch. Virtually every initiative they touch earns them gold and even those that fail never seem to cost them much of anything at all - +
Kimberly-Clark's Secrets to RFID Success 29/10/2007 13:24:18
The man in charge of keeping store shelves across the US stocked with Kleenex and Huggies reveals the company’s best practice for making RFID workAs one of Wal-Mart's top suppliers, Kimberly-Clark got onboard the RFID revolution early and has been one of the technology's most ardent supporters. Mark Jamison, vice president of customer supply chain management, talked with CIO about the company's overall supply chain strategy, how RFID fits into the mix and how to make RFID work for the business
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Best of breed software specialists are winning out over mega-vendor application suites in the vital national industry of beer brewing, with beverage giant Lion Nathan toasting smaller brands as proving better value for its manufacturing operations.
According to Lion Nathan CIO, Darryl Warren, when it comes to picking software to run a multinational beverage manufacturer, best of breed remains his preferred drop because it delivers on its promise out of the box, rather than after a lengthy customization process.
Warren said that while he has considered the likes of SAP and Oracle as enterprise resource planning platforms, he will continue to stick with his incumbent QAD-based manufacturing reporting system, because it offers the best pedigree in his industry.
"We did a strategic IT review in 2003 and adopted a build-once, deploy-many approach. Lion Nathan is a best-of-breed organization rather than, say a [large applications stack]-based deployment.
Warren said the approach has enabled his organization to maintain an extremely high granularity in its data holdings with "hundreds of millions" of transactions recorded down to individual customers by stock keeping unit (SKU).
"If you get the underlying data right, then you can multi-purpose that across different parts of the organization," Warren said.
In Lion Nathan's case, this means QAD's ERP and financials running into a Business Objects dashboard via a data warehouse held on Oracle DataStore. Applications are then drawn together using a Tibco architecture offering.
Warren said the adoption of business intelligence software had allowed his organization to reduce data complexity for many of Lion Nathan's brands, because managers now saw an information interface customized to their needs, rather than receiving "massive decks of information".
The approach has also freed up the IT shop to pursue other interests including a 200-strong deployment of O2 wireless pocket computers for sales reps in the field to execute requests into the company's Siebel CRM system.
"It's fantastic. The first sign you see of an activity is when it's logged into the system. There's no need for human intervention."
Warren said the brewer's new daily sales reporting capability has been successfully rolled out to around 400 key management users.
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Computerworld Live Podcast #97: The Future of Enterprise Networking 25/07/2008 09:45:36
This week CW Live chats with Mark Thompson, global sales and marketing manager for HP ProCurve, on the future of the enterprise networking. Mark discusses the trends we can expect to see in the near future and how the right infrastructure can ensure your enterprise network is secure. - +
Computerworld Live Podcast #96: Security at the Edge 11/06/2008 09:22:22
CW Live speaks with Amol Mitra, HP ProCurve Director of Marketing for Asia Pacific and Japan. Today's topic: how enterprises are starting to shift away from simply controlling security via server logins, firewalls and moving to more adaptive security frameworks. - +
Data Management Edition #10: Multi-Petascale Systems 02/05/2008 09:12:33
This week we look at sustainability and the development of multicore technologies to build multi-petascale systems. - +
IT Security Edition #11: How to poison the Storm botnet 01/05/2008 08:51:55
This week CW Live presents a case study on how to poison the notorious Storm botnet . Plus we take a look at Cisco's plans for Ironport. - +
IT Security Edition #10: Cyber-battles fought and won 24/04/2008 11:09:47
Vendors bow to end user pressure to improve product security, and we take a look at the latest concepts shaping the cyber-battlefield of the future.
VeCommerce Launches Top Ten List of Personal Security Breaches In Lead Up to National ID Fraud Awareness Week 2008-10-07 15:10:00+10
Multimedia Technology signs exclusive National distribution agreement with Freecom 2008-10-07 14:30:00+10
Open Text: Upheaval in the Financial Markets Sharpens the Focus on Information Governance and Enterprise 2008-10-07 13:19:00+10
Symantec State of Spam Report - October 2008 2008-10-07 11:58:00+10
AIIA to Reward Sustainability and Green IT Champions at the 2009 iAwards 2008-10-07 11:56:00+10
The Next CIO is You
The revolution is underway. Market dynamics are fanning the flame of change and innovation. Business is ultimately only as good as its IT organization. And an IT organization is only as good as its CIO. Read on to discover the revolution changing the role of the CIO. Are you on board?











