CIO Briefings (7): What are the business benefits of unified communications?

14:00 – And so the afternoon sessions continue. Now we have Mario Devargas of Bolton borough council to talk about the business benefits of UC. Personally I’m looking forward to this – after all, if there are no business benefits, then there’s little point in doing this stuff is there?

14:01 – Mario has been asked by Microsoft and Nortel to give this business-focused talk based on his own experiences. The local authority employs around 14,000 staff who serve a population of 261,000. The biggest challenge it faces is the changing nature of public expectations – people want more for their money (in this case, their council tax).

14:04 – He also explains how local authorities are increasingly having to justify what they do in the same ways as other businesses in the private sector. That’s something that’s emerged over the past 10 years.

14:05 – Change is the one constant factor for the council, Mario says. He always asks himself this question: ‘Does technology help my organisation deal with change?’ If it doesn’t, he’ll say no to it.

 14:07 – He also stresses how important it is to ask your suppliers similar questions – and keep asking them. He needs to know if they can help the authority serve its customers better. Delivering efficiencies is also part of the equation of course, but the bottom line for Mario when it comes to selecting business partners seems to be the needs of his employers’ customers – i.e. the population of Bolton. Trust in his suppliers is also crucial to Mario. He trusts Nortel and Microsoft at the moment – and he stresses the words at the moment. This suggests he’s constantly reviewing his supplier relationships.

14:11 – The biggest asset of the authority is not its people, contends IT director Mario, but its knowledge, or information. A lot of it tends to be stored in silos – he is using UC to break down those barriers.

14:13 – Mario hates interactive voice response (IVR). That doesn’t mean the council doesn’t use it – it does, but only when it’s appropriate. For example if someone rings at mid-night. It’s part of the delivery programme, but only a part. He knows that people like talking to people whenever possible.

14:15 – All IT directors should listen to Mario – he has just admitted that he has no idea how his network works. That’s the job of the techies who work for him. All Mario cares about is whether it works or not, whether it provides a service or not. That’s a good insight into the mindset of a business-focused IT chief.

14:17 – He explains how mobile working is putting additional demands on his business – something many companies will be familiar with. The council has a lot of field workers, as you’d expect. How can technology help them deliver services more effectively? Unified comms play a big role in that. Up to now, he’s eschewed videoconferencing, but now he’s seeing that there are potential uses for it within his organisation, including out in the field. IP is the enabler of all of this, Mario says. One of the things it enables is collaboration, internally and externally.

14:22 – Interestingly, for such a diverse organisation with so many departments, he contends that IP has made it think as one company across multiple cultures. That’s a huge business benefit.

14:23 - He also advises other organisations not to choose the technology. Work out what the need is first, then choose the technology. That way you’ll deploy the right solution in the right place. Prioritisation is inevitable.

14:25 – He warns people not to expect rapid ROI from UC. These projects take a while to pay back – but he’s sure his will. Indeed, Mario admits he doesn’t know what the ROI is at the moment. It’s not just about money, it’s about culture and efficiency, he says, which are things you can’t always quantify. He ends what was an energetic and informative presentation there.   

CIO Briefings (6): IT, convergence and the millennial workforce

10:19 – Nortel’s Peter Kelly takes the stage to talk about IT, convergence and the millennial workforce. He will be talking about the impact of ‘hyperconnectivity’ on CIOs and the IT/telecoms industry. Nortel believes that in the near future every device that can be connected to a network and wants to be connected will be. Just think about what happens when every mobile is connected, he says, every iPod/iPhone… Nike has produced trainers with a sensor pocket in them. Then there’s the intelligent fridge, the intelligent dustbin… even cars could be ‘online’ soon. Breathless stuff. Is the network as it stands robust enough to cope? Peter thinks not.

10:23 – To add to this challenge is the changing nature of the workforce. The so-called ‘millennials’ act in a different way to the traditional knowledge worker. They are self-sufficient and build short-term teams. They always want to be connected, they tend not to use desk phones, they introduce their own IT. They do not hoard information – they share it. Peter calls them ‘agile innovators’ and are replacing the knowledge workers of the previous generation. Peter thinks companies need to embrace them and their ways of working if they are to succeed in the future.

10:29 – Peter talks about web 2.0 for a while, and then explains the risks and rewards for CIOs of working in these new ways. One message he has is ‘virtualise or die’. Companies that do it first will gain competitive advantage. He advises collaborating with partners so you can focus on what you’re good at, as well as engaging the new breed of employees. That will lead to increased productivity. But there are risks – security, business continuity (Skype being an example here – some companies are using it, but it went down for two days recently). Then there’s fraud, control of brand (for example the problems some companies have had with Wikipedia) and the rapid pace of change companies are facing today. That’s difficult for a CIO to manage.

10:36 – Peter talks about some more future challenges from the industry’s perspective. He reckons that, if only 5 to 10% of mobile phone users got serious about using their mobiles for video today, the mobile networks would collapse. That means 4G will be required, and there are battles being raged there at the moment which need resolving. In the fixed line world, carrier ethernet/PBT is where the focus will be. Unified communications will be the third key component of what he calls ‘next generation technology’. Communications-enabled applications will be a key part of that. And so ends another well-delivered agenda-setting presentation.

CIO Briefings (5): How Schenker optimised its WAN performance

It’s day two of IP’07. Fortunately the weather is a little better today than yesterday (indeed it’s bright and sunny outside right now). That should mean the extremely orange carpets in Earls Court 2 retain their sparkle until the event wraps up this evening. And I’m very glad to report that all the inflatable meeting rooms/bouncy castles are looking positively tumescent.

We will be bringing you some of the highlights of today’s CIO Briefings live on the blog, starting with a presentation from logistics company Schenker on how it optimised its WAN performance.

10:00 – Stuart Eikins takes to the stage and outlines some of the challenges faced by the network team. The top one is changing business requirements. For example, new apps are demanded by the business with no detail of the additional bandwidth required. File sizes are increasing. The company is also rolling out a VoIP project. Another issue is the relatively high cost of bandwidth in the UK compared with the other markets Schenker operates in – you can’t just buy in extra capacity.

10:03 – The spur for the optimisation project was when a new app was introduced and had a major detrimental impact on the network. Traffic slowed considerably, which had a knock-on effect in the business, whose opinion of the IT team was damaged. The possible solutions were to add more bandwidth, but that’s not the only answer (cost being one issue). QoS/CoS in the WAN was another option. That too was dismissed – it too can be expensive and can take time to implement. Then there was customisation at the customer edge. Stuart wasn’t keen on that either.

10:06 – In the end they spoke to Exinda, which provided a loan unit for on-site evaluation. It worked. The reporting functions were crucial – it revealed that the new app had a greater footprint than originally anticipated. It helped Stuart fine tune policies to further improve the user experience, and identified other significant traffic patterns. The Exinda solution also provides real-time (as well as historical) reporting on WAN performance and monitors the service from the WAN provider (in this case, BT).

10:10 – But perhaps the key thing was optimisation, says Stuart. He can now guarantee service standards for users, reserve bandwidth for some business applications and compress certain protocols to ‘free up’ bandwidth.

10:13 – Stuart also used acceleration as well as compression on the WAN. That alone delivered on average 40% more capacity.

10:14 – Another key feature is that the company can now limit or block undesirable protocols and apps – including peer to peer. It also ensures roaming users cannot disrupt performance in branch when they visit. And that’s it – Stuart’s a happy network manager.

CIO Briefings (4): Rolling out Europe’s largest converged voice and data network

16:15 – Fancy rolling out a converged voice and data network to 120,000 users? That’s what Lee Ayling is in the process of doing with the Department of Work and Pensions (he’s a consultant at Deloitte). There aren’t many companies with 22 million customers (as the DwP has), but there will no doubt be a lot to learn from Lee’s presentation. (Curiously, the lighting in the CIO Briefing room is now blue, a change from this morning’s red. Fortunately, the ‘bouncy castle’ is still inflated.)

16:17 – Some more stats. The DwP has 26,000 call centre seats. That’s a lot… So far, there are 75,000 users on the new voice platform.

16:19 – Just as a bit of background, DwP’s legacy network was a mish-mash of technologies. The network transformation programme overseen by Deloitte has moved the organisation onto the new infrastructure. The voice solution is hosted and managed by BT; the network infrastructure is Cisco-based; the voice platform and phones are from Nortel; Genesys provides the call centre and workforce management platform. BT oversees all of this.

16:22 – The contract is ‘an active unit based service’. In other words, you pay for what you use.

16:22 – The new network isn’t just about increased bandwidth; it’s also enabled new applications such as presence management, and will be able to do more in the future, Lee says.

16:23 – In the grand scheme of things, this has been a rapid IT project, given the scale. Deloitte got involved in 2005.

16:24 – Lee stresses the need for a project of this size to have a “robust platform and service acceptance process”. The latter is crucial - he advises any project like this to go beyond asking the techie guys and girls if they accept the technology. Get out into the business and talk to the users, seems to be his message.

16:26 – ‘Leave your suppliers to do what they do best’ is another piece of advice from Lee. Again, more wise words – for example he let BT do the rollout out of the new pipes; Deloitte handled the executive communications at the highest level within the DwP. Indeed, communications strategy is absolutely crucial in any outsourcing or managed service programme.

16:31 – Lee admitted that the network didn’t always work as expected during the pilot stage of the project. But hey – that’s the point of a pilot, as Lee says. You learn from it and don’t make the same mistakes when you roll it out in anger. 62 out of 1,400 sites took part in that pilot. Deloitte’s approach was to go from ’simple to complex to volume’ – and the project’s on track to hit its contract deadline, so that clearly worked.

16:33 – There are always ‘issues’ in any project. Lee stresses (again) the need for good communication. This includes when things go wrong – let the business know (and that includes end users). It paid dividends for Deloitte, as it built trust during the pilot phase. He also referred to the perception that voice quality is a problem with IP. Many users said (and I paraphrase) ‘my mate uses Skype, and it’s rubbish’. This isn’t Skype, Lee says. Some users did complain about the change in the sound, but crucially not the quality. It may sound different, but voice over IP is not worse than voice in the anologue world.

16:38 – Lee gives a quick ‘where are we now’ overview. The call centre solution is finishing the pilot stage, and will be rolled out soon. The voice platform is in use by 75,000 users.

16:40 – He concludes with four key learnings. “Have the right commercial mechanisms [in place] but balance them with a pragmatic partnership. Communicate, communicate, communicate. Understand the supply chain [of the suppliers you're working with - that may be particularly relevant for consultants like Lee but will enable every link in the chain to understand each other better and ensure the success of the project]. Not everything can be cookie cut, but most of it can.”

16:42 – One last word from Lee. Around 5,500 users are being added to the platform every week. Which is rapid.

CIO Briefings (3): IP on the Desktop

12:05 - Microsoft’s Warren Barkley is here to discuss IP on the Desktop. Given that Microsoft is announcing the general availability of Office Communications Server this afternoon at 3pm, it’s undoubtedly going to be one of the hot topics of the conference.

12:05 – Workers are suffering from communication overload, says Warren. Emails, phone calls… it all mounts up. Add to that the problems enterprises have with globally distributed customers and teams, the high cost of comms (especially when you’re roaming around the world) and disconnected comms systems and you have a headache, for business and IT managers alike.

12:12 – At the moment, telecoms is vertically integrated, Warren argues. Microsoft thinks that model needs to transform into a more horizontal one, just as the IT side of the industry has done. Interoperability is the watchword.

12:13 – Microsoft is now talking about providing ’software-powered communications’, which will open up more choice to users – they can choose a wide range of devices to run on top of the software ‘layer’, which sits between the existing IT infrastructure and the hardware devices. This will also lower the costs for companies (indeed, BT has found just that - it’s a Microsoft case study).

 12:16 – Microsoft did some research recently and found that people typically spend 18mins trying to set up a videoconference session. Warren claims his company’s RoundTable product dramatically reduces this. One click, and you’re away. It also records the videoconference, and can be easily accessed afterwards.

12:19 – Presence and identity is at the core of Microsoft’s UC solutions, Warren says. For example, with identity, most people’s business cards have a phone number, fax number, mobile number and email address. Really, you should have only one ‘identity’. People only care about the person they’re communicating with, not the method. You should be able to transfer a mobile call to your fixed phone. This is a ‘person centric’ world view, not number centric.

12:21 – So what does Microsoft have to do with all of this? With its Unified Communications offering, it has a lot to do with it. For example its software helps streamline communication. Warren’s PC is his phone, thanks to OCS (Office Communications Server). Microsoft is also embedding ’click to communicate’ functionality in applications and delivering “anywhere access”, with mobile and enhanced conferencing.

12:25 – Warren outlines some of the key benefits of OCS. The slide reads: ‘Extend active directory investments; improve administrator functionality; reduce infrastructure costs’.

12:26 – The “future-ready software foundation” is another key phrase you’ll be hearing from Microsoft in the coming weeks and months. Warren stresses his company’s commitment to open technologies, and how in the UC (unified communications) field it will continue to deliver an ‘extensible development platform’. Integration is key for users. Eg. Virgin (another Microsoft customer) found it could integrate Microsoft’s UC technology with its existing PBX. 

12:29 – Microsoft is targeting the client, server and services space these days.

12:31 – Over 100 companies used OCS before its official launch. They were all global and very large (average size = 97,000 employees).

12:31 – Microsoft is launching something called the Open Interoperability Program today. This is designed to deliver interoperability between PBXs and OCS – breaking down that vertical alignment Warren referred to earlier (and as Virgin has seen). There are a huge number of partner companies from both IT and telecoms ‘camps’ that Microsoft is working with here.

12:34 – ‘You have to move to UC if you want your business to grow and expand,’ claims Warren. So it’s not just about saving money and operational efficiency. Also, you need to remember that new entrants to the workforce will expect to communicate in the way that OCS enables.

12:36 – So what’s next? For Microsoft, there are three areas it’s focusing on: cross-boundary collaboration, speech-enabled applications and intelligent agents. Interesting stuff.

CIO Briefings (2): Business 2.0 – taking collaboration to the next level

10:15 – Steve Masters from BT is next up, and will use his own company as a ‘business 2.0′ case study. They are using converged networks and the like internally. This isn’t theoretical, and has (he claims) boosted productivity.

10:20 – Steve talks about ’shadow IT’ departments, where people try to fix their own IT issues and also come to the IT department and demand access to things like Skype and MSN and – in some companies – actually introduce them to the network. BT’s focus is how to introduce the collaboration tools people are using at home and demanding at work in a structured, office environment.

10:22 – Why? Whether you like it or not, this sort of thing is happening. Some companies are planning it, others are simply seeing it happen piecemeal. They’re on a ’serendipitous journey’.

10:24 - Unified comms is therefore coming into businesses. Not many are cost-justifying it, but it can be done. Indeed, BT has done just that.

10:26 – Steve says that breaking down the silos within organisations is a major way of improving business processes. Collaboration is key, and unified comms can help achieve this. There are three barriers to it, according to Steve – building the business case, accessing the skills, and the complexity of the IT infrastructure. I’m sure many people in the audience will identify with those barriers.

10:27 – In BT, collaboration is about PEOPLE, which is synonymous with effective communications (obviously). A lot of the applications BT is introducing internally today combine collaboration with communication. These goes outside BT as well. Eg. they use this sort of technology to ‘talk’ to one of its business partners, HP.

10:30 – Steve now presents a case study on how he works these days. Interestingly, all employees have a ‘MyBT’ portal which appears on the screen as soon as they log on. All of Steve’s management tools appear, as well as news feeds (BT and external) and a social bookmarking tool, plus more prosaic things like directions to BT offices, and so on. It’s customisable and is very ‘web 2.0′. It reminds me a bit of NetVibes.

10:35 – He then demos a shared wiki that BT and HP use. The next phase is to integrate that with the portal. BT also has an internal blog, and the questions that are asked by, say, someone in the sales team can be answered by someone who’s read the blog. In the past, the chances are that question wouldn’t have been asked to the right person. The blog is a useful knowledge management tool, and one the sales team really value.

10:38 – BT also uses videoconferencing extensively. Steve likes it. He uses it two or three times a week, and is happy to collaborate and make decisions over it. It’s another tool that enables home working. (BT has 10,000 home workers – Steve himself is a designated home worker on Mondays and Fridays. Suddenly, I want to work for BT…) Wireless web access is a crucial part of this equation too.

10:42 – Steve wraps up his session by stressing the business case. BT has saved £6k per home worker, while the business has saved £220m from rationalising its buildings. It’s hard to argue with numbers like those.

CIO Briefings (1): From switching packets to switching business processes

9:29 - Rob Bamforth from analyst house Quocira will open proceedings this morning in the futuristic inflatable dome that is the home of the CIO Briefings. His talk is entitled ‘From switching packets to switching business processes’. I’ve not been in a space quite like this before – the walls really are inflatable, and are grey on the outside, black on the inside. Some low level red lighting behind the stage adds a certain something to the ambiance. I keep thinking of the movie Silent Running. It’s an appropriately high-tech environment for these discussions – although I have a feeling the focus of Rob’s speech will be business, not IT.

09:36 – A power failure takes out the plasma screens and delays things slightly.

09:40 – Simon Jarvis from a consultancy called PTS chairs the session. He refers to the hype that has surrounded IP in recent years. Indeed there’s been more talk than action. He asks the audience how many people have implemented a fully converged IP network – it’s about 15%. That’s well up from a year ago (it was less than 1%), Simon says.

09:43 – Rob Bamforth takes to the stage. He tells an anecdote about falling off a bouncy castle in his youth…

09:45 – He too stresses that the ’Martini’ concept of anytime, anywhere, any place technology has been around for years and years, and is familiar to techies. And it’s becoming a reality. But what does it (in this case ‘it’ meaning converged services) mean for the business?

09:46 –  For a start, he predicts the continuing decline of proprietary systems, and a move toward social networking.

09:48 – Rob also has some good slides on the pressures facing businesses these days (from a macro-social-economic, business and individual perspective). We have ‘uneven hyperconnectivity’ in the world, he points out - technology is not evenly distributed. That has an impact on the way we do business on a global basis.

09:54 – He also points to changes to come, as the next generation join the workforce having grown up in a digital world. They have overlapping social networks (unlike previous generations). Personalisation and relevance are also crucial. In the 90s, content was king. Today, context is ‘trumps’. I like that summary of where we’re at these days. The Martini model no longer holds - the model has to be more personalised in the early 21st century. The point is that individuals are demanding access to collaboration tools, even IP via Skype etc – this is having an effect on the IT infrastructure (some of it’s not just demand – it’s actually happening, but is coming onto the network via the ‘back door’.)

10:00 – Rob presents some interesting research which shows that most large companies are running all sorts of applications over their networks… computer comms, VPN, external phones, internal phones, video, etc etc. So do we need phones any more, or can we do it all via the desktop? Do we need fixed technology any more? And what sort of supplier to you turn to? Tech or telecoms?

10:02 – This is a convergence of technology, but also a collision of business model, says Rob. No one supplier will have every piece of the jigsaw, so IT bosses need to ask themselves who can supply what, and work out the best way of getting multiple suppliers from different worlds to work together.

10:07 – He predicts that, as more people work from home, social networking tools will be used to retain an element of ’social cohesion’ within the workplace.

10:10 – Rob again stresses the way in which the next generation’s communications demands will have an impact on IT infrastructure. Eg. with Skype, young people don’t make discrete calls; they open a connection, and keep it open. What happens if that sort of thing happens on the corporate network?

10:11 – He advises we forget the Martini ‘any’s’ of the techies, and focus on the realities – look for more ‘definite articles’, as he puts it. We need something that helps the business NOW and over the next few months… And that’s it from Rob. A very nice scene-setting talk. It’s always a pleasure to hear IT put into context like that.

IP’07 – open for business

08:40am: IP’07 is now open for business…

Many of the exhibitors (and the organisers) were here at Earls Court 2 late into the night to make sure everything was ready for this morning. And I’m pleased to report that everything is indeed ready. There may be the occasional clanging sound echoing round the exhibition hall at the moment as the technicians do last-minute adjustments to their stands, but that will all be done come 9.45am when the exhibition begins.

If you happen to be reading this over breakfast (well, it’ s possible…) and are attending the CIO Briefings programme (highlights of which will appear on this blog throughout the day) then please note that the briefings begin at 9.25am.

If you’re coming to the show, you might like to try out our Twitter feed for size – www.twitter.com/IP07. There’s too much going on for us to text you the entire timetable, but we will keep you abreast of some selected highlights to make sure you don’t miss out on a key presentation.

Stay tuned for more throughout the day… 

IP’07: Directions, opening times and other admin for delegates

IP’07 opens for business next Tuesday (16 October) at Earls Court 2. If you’ve not yet registered, please visit the site now to avoid missing out on what promises to be a hugely interesting and informative event.

If you are coming along, please see www.ipexpo.co.uk/travel for directions.

The nearest tube station is West Brompton, NOT Earls Court.

Don’t forget that we’ll be issuing updates throughout the duration of the show on www.twitter.com/IP07. If you sign up to the SMS feed you’ll know what’s happening when, and won’t miss out on any of the key seminars and briefings (more details of which will be posted on the blog later).

Please note the following opening times:

* Exhibition Open Hours:
Tuesday 16 October – 09.45 to 16.30
Wednesday 17 October – 09.45 to 16.00

* Education Seminars Open Hours:
Tuesday 16 October – 10.30 to 16.30
Wednesday 17 October – 10.30 to 15.40

* CIO Briefings Open Hours:
Tuesday 16 October – 09.25 to 17.15
Wednesday 17 October – 09.45 to 16.00

CTO of Sophos joins network access control debate

We’re delighted that Richard Jacobs, the CTO of Sophos, will join the debate on network access control (NAC) scheduled for noon on 17 October (day two of the show).

The debate is part of the CIO briefings programme taking place at IP’07.

Jacobs will be joined by Trent Fitz, director of product management, Mirage Networks; Tim Brown, senior director, architecture and strategy, Symantec Corporation; Brett Helsel, CEO, Lockdown Networks; Niall El-Assaad, senior product manager, Cisco; Karthik Krishnan, senior product line manager, UAC Juniper Networks; and Gord Boyce, president, Forescourt.

NAC is just one of the key issues under discussion in the CIO Briefings. Other topics (and the people discussing them) include:

IP on the Desktop
Warren Berkley, Group Program Manager, Real Time Media Group, Information Worker Division, Microsoft

Why go Virtual?
Richard Garsthagen, Product Marketing Director, VMWare

Summit Discussion: Future of the Enterprise Desktop
Panelists from Avaya, Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Nortel, Microsoft,

Web 2.0 – What will it mean for you?
David Asprey, VP of Technology Strategy, Zeus Technology

Protecting your VoIP investment
Rob Forde, Security Architect, Internet Security Systems, an IBM company

More information on the seminar programme as a whole can be found here.