New Sum Total solution       
June 03 ,2008
Source: Business Line

SumTotal Systems today announced the release of the SumTotal Talent Development Suite that brings a unified approach to the components needed to address Talent Development challenges for enterprises. 

The Chief Executive of SumTotal, Mr. Don Fowler, said "SumTotal has brought together a powerful, yet simple solution so that organisations can now focus on developing their talent and employees at all levels without having to cobble together point solutions." 

SumTotal 8.0 will introduce a number of new features including self-service user portals, a unified dashboard, with better ease of use.

 Global delivery model will ensure orders keep flowing    
June 03, 2008
 SOURCE: Business Line

‘Investment in technology imperative for business growth’ 
Temporarily, there may be a lull or a slowdown. But growth should pick up.    Mr S. Gopalakrishnan, CEO, Infosys 

Bangalore, June 2 With the global delivery model gaining strength for its cost-effectiveness, Infosys does not see the spectre of US slowdown and reduced spending on IT having any major impact on software companies. 

With the IT companies trying to leverage cost arbitrage, particularly when the economies are facing serious pressures of growth impinging on investment prospects, Indian technology companies would have ample opportunities to tap the global delivery route to offset the impact of slowdown.

Also, technology spend is a long-term perspective and compulsions of business, innovation and requirement of industries to adopt new strategies would provide vast opportunities to the IT industry, says Mr S. Gopalakrishnan, CEO and Managing Director, Infosys Technologies Ltd. 

In an interview to Business Line, he said Infosys, as a services company, would continue to invest based on indications from its clients, and that the company was also looking at India as a good market to grow its business. Excerpts from the interview:

The rupee is depreciating. How would it impact the prospects of the IT sector? 

Our position has been that the rupee will be volatile in this market. So it will be very difficult to predict. Yes, the rupee is actually depreciating now. We will have to wait and see how it would react in the next 45 days.

In the light of depreciating rupee, is there any change in Infosys’s strategy on hedging? How much have you hedged for this quarter? 

We have always maintained that our hedging has to be on a very short-term basis. We hedged $760 million at the beginning of the quarter, at Rs 40.02. We have brought it down from more than a billion during the last year. We actively manage this.

Will US companies spend less on software because of the slowdown? 

When we did a survey of major clients in the last quarter, 76 per cent of our clients said their budget would be flat or slightly down.

But all of them here said that their allocation towards the global delivery model would increase and so we expect that companies like Infosys would benefit. 

Even though there is a slowdown today, the global delivery model with its lower costs, higher efficiency and direct policy is beneficial to companies even when they see their budgets going down. And, that is the reason we think the Indian companies will benefit from it. 

But in the short-term, we have to assess the impact of the environment, the impact of the slowdown. 

Customers may have to rework their priorities, they may have to look where they want to invest, which products they want to supply. The process is going on. That is why we have said that temporarily, there may be a lull or a slowdown. But growth should pick up.

Early this year, analysts said the second half of the year would be good. But now some industry experts are saying the lean season would continue. What is your opinion? 

That’s very difficult to say. It will be specific to companies. You cannot delay too much. You have to continue your investments if you want to come out of it, if you have to run your operations. 

I don’t fully subscribe to the view. Our clients are also saying the second half would be better. But there is definitely uncertainty, I think. We will have to wait and see.

So you expect clients to continue investments in technology? 

The clients see that they are sure to gain if they shift more work to the Global Delivery Model. 

It is estimated that only 10 per cent of the low-end of the entire IT work that can be done offshore is currently outsourced. There is still a lot of opportunity. 

You have to invest in technology. You cannot afford to stop investing in technology for many reasons. New versions of softwares are coming in; new business opportunities are emerging because of technology. Financial services companies need to redo their risk model using technology. 

Technology is constantly evolving. We see a short-term slowdown. But as long as economies are growing, investment in technology will continue. Opportunities are in markets such as India and China. If you have to enter these markets, you have to change your business model according to the market.

Do you think the pricing environment is stable? 

We expect pricing to remain stable. Not too much pressure. The reason for that is that the clients realise costs are going up.