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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 aidthe participants,we have developedfour unique learningtools 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 reallife 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?
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 connectedto 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.
 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?

Case Studies:
IT & Systems
© 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 v
2 Microsoft‟s Operating System for Organizational Productivity vi
3 Medicity Technology Platform enables Transfer of Information vii
4 Organizing Spread sheets for Business Benefits viii
5 Health Information Exchange: New Workflow at
WinchesterHighland Management ix
6 The National Highways Authority of India - Modernized MIS x
7 Validus Re‟ Successfully Tries Revolution Analytic s for Risk Management xi
8 Data Smart Culture at Seven-Eleven, Japan xiii
9 Balluff GmbH Gains Benefits through Gigabit Network xiv
10 NTT Docomo Accelerates M-Commerce in Japan xv
11 Indian Railway Redesigns MIS to Achieve Bi-directional Facilities xvii
12 Strategic Approach to Implement MIS in SoCtronics Technologies xviii
13 E-Governance - Government of India initiatives for Income Tax Services xix
14 Amazon Web Services‟ Strategies for Managing IT Globally xx
15 The Case of FAO (Finance & Accounting Outsourcing)Industry xxi
16 Facebook Innovates its Business Model xxiii
17 Deployment of ERP based SCM Solution at TVS Logistics Services Ltd xxiv
18 Effective Tracking of Core Operations using ERP by Brigg Equipment xxv
19 Myntra.com Strategizes Brand Building through Social Media xxvi
20 Amazon Extends Cloud Computing Features xxvii
21 WhatsApp with Big Data Ethics and Responsibilities xxviii
22 Microsoft Makes Office 365 Product Line Architecture xxix
23 Uber‟s New Mobile App Feature xxxi
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
1 Computer Organization for Flipkart’s Big Billion Sale
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 teamto continue the service offering and another teamto 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
1. Discuss what IT infrastructure supported the Flipkart‟s big billion sale.
(Hints: internalcloud with servers-digitalsecurity expectingCyber-attacks-have newmobile 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 Systemfor 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 t he
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 systemand security applications which are easy to install and s upport.
- 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 systemwhich 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 systememployees can start an application from anywhere and connect to other employees.
DiscussionQuestions:-
1. Discuss the additional features Microsoft Window 8 Pro operating systemhas over the other
Microsoft operating systems.
(Hints: enterprise wide capabilities-no separate training-remote connectivity including Wi-Fi)
2. Do you thinkMicrosoft OScontributes to organizationalproductivity?Discuss.
(Hints: increased security-increased accessibility-advantage ofmobility)
Course Reference: Concept-MicrosoftWindows/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‟sRevitalization of US Manufacturing: Buys First Cruise Bikes
Madein Detroit”, www.mobilitytechzone.com, January 29, 2013.
6
3
Medicity Technology Platform enables Transfer of
Information
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 Insurance Hospital Clinic Insurance Patient
Company Company
Health Information Exchange
Patient
Patient
Nurse Doctor NurseDoctor Doctor
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

 InformedPatients

 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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, “CliniSyncBenefitswith Clinical Data Exchange Capabilities”, www.medicity.com, 2014.
ii. Medicity, “Ohio‟sCliniSyncHealth Information Exchange Connecting More than 100 Hospitals”,
www.medicity.com, 2013.
7
4 Organizing Spread sheets for Business Benefits
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‟sfinancial reportingisdone using spread sheets.Even novice users can use spreadsheets
for accounting,data analysis,mathematical and statistical calculations purposes.
DiscussionQuestions:-
1. What featuresofspread sheetsare usefulforfinancialreporting purpose? Please Discuss.
(Hints: financial modelling-data analysis-mathematicaland statisticalfunctions)
2. How did Dresdner use spread sheets for its organizational benefits?
(Hints: profits and Loss A/Cs-set of test cases-product controland 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 SupplyChain”, Cluster Seven Whitepaper, 2013.
8
5
Health Information Exchange: New Workflow at
Winchester Highland Management
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 andorganizations in the community,region andcountry.It facilitates faster access to patient‟s
clinical data for safe, efficient andeffective treatment to the patient. The implementation of HIE
systemis 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
Benefits:
 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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 WinchesterHospital and IPA?
(Hints: devised governance structure for projects- technology platform-vendor partnership)
Course Reference: Concept- Workflow Systems/Unit 5- EnterpriseCollaboration 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 NationalHighways 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 Computer PIU –
Mobile reporting
MIS Network
through
web or
reports to
Mobile
Ministry /
device
NHAI
(iPad /
officers CPISSERVER Internet Tablet /
Phone)
Desktop or RIS SERVER CENTRAL SERVER
Mobile
Organization’s Gain: NHAI after establishing this E-MIS systemgained 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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/ Mobilebased 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 MatijaVargaPredragOreški, ” An information System Management Model”, ,MIS, Vol. 7,
24 January 2012
10
7 Validus Re’ Successfully Tries Revolution Analytics for Risk
Management
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 succes sfully
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 customcorrelation 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 usingR
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 customcorrelation models.
2. Simulation models could be designed that included any magnitude of data required for analys is.
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
DiscussionQuestions:
1. Discuss the challenges faced by Validus Reinsurance Ltd.
(Hints: financial volatility-managing risk-reduced return on equity)
2. Discuss the complexities of business ofthe 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
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.
Key Benefits
Key Practices  Improved Supply–
 Use Scorecards

Chain Management
 Single Source Data Smart Improved Inventory

of Truth Culture

Levels
Owning of
Distributed Decision

Business Rules
Employee

Making
Engagement Effective Operational
Decisions
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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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”, MITSloan 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
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,duringits implementation phase,specialattentionwas 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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 AcceleratesM-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 TermEvolution) Windows 8 tablets to
businesses in Japan. It collaboratedwith 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 partneredwith Google to
provide Gmail, Google Maps and in developing mobile apps.
Microsoft China Mobile Communications
LTE Windows 8 Tablets 
Corporation KT Corporation, S.Korea
International Roaming Common Platforms, Enterprise Services,

Network Technologies, Smartphones, LTE
NTT Docomo

IBM Intel Google
Trusted MobilePlatform Specification  Gmail, Google Maps, Mobile Apps
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
DiscussionQuestions:
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-MobileCommerce 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, April15, 2013.
ii. “About Docomo”, www.nttdocomo.co.jp, March 16, 2015.
16
11 Indian Railway Redesigns MIS to Achieve Bi-directional
Facilities
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 systemso
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.
Problem:
- Delay in ticketing
Railway - Delay in information.Railway
Information Facilities Advantages Gained:
- Faster ticketing
- Faster Cancellation / return
Passenger of cancellation amount
- Faster availability of
facilities
- Faster information
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 systemwas
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 systemgained the
following advantages:
1. Reduced PassengerService 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. .
DiscussionQuestions:
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–MISRedesigning /Unit-11 MISPlanning & 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 RailwayTicketing”, Business Standard, August 14, 2014.
iii ”Next Generation e-Ticketing”, www.cris.org.in, August 2014.
17
12 Strategic Approach to Implement MIS in SoCtronics
Technologies
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 & petroleumindustry.
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.
2. Organizing
1. Problem 3. Submission
Problem:
Groups to study and
Lack of inter-departmental
Identification suggest solution of Reports coordination.
4. Approval of Reports
5. Designing Advantages Gained:
Action Plan - Proper and quick
coordination
- Accuracy in operations
6. Implementation
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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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-12MISImplementation & 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., ”Earlydiagnosis of MIS implementation failures”, , Management Science, Vol. 27, No. 4,
2012.
18
13 E-Governance - Government of India initiatives for Income
Tax Services
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, taxprofessionals 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.
e-tax Portal
Challenges
Income Tax
- Setting up system to
respect taxpayer
Filing - Fast receiving &
Refund
disposalof service
requests
Claim Achievements
Tax Payee Income Tax - Faster customer
(Customer) Dept. (ITD)Aykar Seva service
-Kendra (ASK) Ease to taxpayer
- Good GovernanceResponse
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.
DiscussionQuestions:
1. Explain the challenges faced by income Tax Department in course of improving their services.
(Hints: delays service requests-customerexperience-processing refunds)
2. Discuss the advantages gained by applying e-Governance services through e-tax portal and ASKs.
(Hints: good project governance-bettercustomer 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 PublicGrievances, 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’StrategiesforManaging IT Globally
Changing business modelsand strategiesformanaging 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 fromone point to other point.
AWS Business Model
Users paid for what they used
No long term contracts
No minimum usage requirements
Concentrated on customer retention
Concentrated on revenue growth
AWS Advantages of Having Servers at Edge
Avoided long delivery routes
Optimized Routes
Avoided trouble spots
Compressed content
Replicated the data packets
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:
BusinessModel
Technological
Change /
Upgradation
CustomerRetention
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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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)
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 FAOproviders had
signed 800multi-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 for60%-
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
 Providermaturity
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
 overallCash flow
Reduced Complexity and
 Transition Times Can
have access to
predefined and
preconfiguredindustry
 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 frombeginning, 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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, July2013
ii. Gupta, S., Khandelwal, V., and Menghvani, V.,“Finance and Accounting Outsourcing (FAO) – Annual
Report 2013: Increasing Market Maturity DrivingCost+ 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 WhatsA pp 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
1. How did Facebook innovate its business model?
(Hints: no subscription based model-do not exploit userdata-innovate into WhatsApp business
model)
2. How did Facebook increase its userbase? 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 EnterpriseApplication
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
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 Logis tics 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 systemwas 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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 ofRamcoSystems, 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 themin 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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-trackcore 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-18EnterpriseResource 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, April2014.
iii. “Radio Flyer Equipment Manufacturer”, Ultra Consultants, USA, June2014.
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 ofthe 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
DiscussionQuestions:
1. Explain the effect of organizing events by e-Business companies using social media.
(Hints: valuable business inputs-increased customerbase-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 Networkingin E-Commerce WebDevelopment”,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.
 Goal:
Amazon tryingto become an
important technology
provider to other
 organizations,
Its aspirations were just as
big as those of Microsoft,
IBM and Google.
 Solution:-
Hundreds of thousands of customers
have joined theAmazon Web Services
community and use AWS solutions to
 build their businesses

Cloud computing platform provides the
client flexibility to build its application,
their way, regardless of their situation or
 industry
It can save time, money, and manage
the client‟s infrastructure, without
compromising scalability, security.

Objectives:-
AWS Cloud Computing would like to pro
simple way to access servers, storage, dat
 and application services over theInternet.
Would like to maintain the network-
conne hardware required for these
application se via a web application.
 Benefits:-
Trade capital expense for variable
 expense

Benefit from massive economies
 of scale

 Stop guessing capacity

 Increase speed and agility

Stop spending money on running
 andmaintainingdatacenters 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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: July15, 2014”, www.eucalyptus.com, July15, 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:
 Collection of big data and
 processing Share
data with
 confidence and safety
 Speedy processing ofdata

 Accuracy ofdata

 Overcome ethical issues

 Save data fromhackers

Increase the activeusers
Financialdata sharing
issues
Challenges:

 Handling Ethical issues 
Privacy
 confidentiality
 Transparency
 Identity
 Data hackers
 Processingcomplexdata
Implementing new
functions
Solution:
 WhatsApp does not retain
 delivered messages

The only records of those
messages are stored in the
sender and the recipient‟s
mobile devices Data
has neverbeen
collected and stored by
 WhatsApp

WhatsApp is not
recording the exact usage
 WhatsApp’s Approach
 Made individual customer‟s phonenumber as an identification code
 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, 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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:-BigData/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 MicrosoftMakesOffice 365 ProductLine 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 ofa
 number of products and services.

ll of Office 365's components can be
managed and configured through an
 online portal

sers can be addedmanually,imported
 from a CSV file

usiness and enterprise-oriented
plans for Office 365 offer access to
cloud-hosted versions ofOffice'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 subscriptionbased
with different subscription levels,
 depending on need ofcustomers
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 planningroadmap
Encouraged user adoption 
 Functionality
Office 365 Includes access to Word,
Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook,
Publisher, and Access for home/non-
 commercial

Aimed at mainstreamconsumers and
families; same as Personal,but foruse on
 up to five devices by up to five users
Offers access to hosted Exchange,
 SharePoint, services only
Offers desktopapps forbothMac andPCs
 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 fromexisting 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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 LineArchitecture /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. “Office365”, www..wikipedia.org, February 1, 2015.
iii. Bradley, T., “Why Office365 is a better deal than Office2013”, 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
 „SendStatus‟ feature addedto 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 newfeatures „SendStatus „where passengers could share details about
driverand the vehicle and its location withtheir 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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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: „SendStatus‟-shares information with friends andrelatives-increasedsafety andsecurity)
Course Reference:-Advantages of MobileTechnologies/Unit 23-Mobileand Social Technologies/ Subject- IT &
Systems Source:
i.,“Uber introduces India-specificsafety features in taxi app”, Live Mint, February 11, 2015.
ii. BS Reporter, “Uber introduces India-specificsafety 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 ProcessDesign:
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 themare shown below:

Goals
Technological Innovation
Sensitivity to Customer Needs
New Products entering into New Customer Segments
Increasing R&D Initiatives
Target to sell 2 million cars in a globally competitive market
Enhanced customer expectations

Action Plan

Product Design
Raw Materials Developed design centre
Technology Expansion of plant over
  Funds
600 acres
Infrastructure Training to engineers
 Assembling
Annual capacity of 800,000 units
 at Manesar

Diesel engine plant in Gurgaon,
with an annual capacity of 900,000

Warehouse and supply
No of Sales outlets:1310
No of Marutitruevalue outlets:600
Over 1,000Maruti Mobile Support (MMS) vehicles were operating across the country
Over 3000 service stations across India

Outcomes
Technology improved
New products lunched
R & D process enhanced
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.
DiscussionQuestions:
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-customercentred 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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ICFAI IT and Systems - Solved assignments and case study help

  • 1. Dear students, get ICFAI latest Solved assignments and case study help by professionals. Mail us at : help.mbaassignments@gmail.com Call us at : 08263069601
  • 2. 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 aidthe participants,we have developedfour unique learningtools 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 reallife 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? 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 connectedto 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.
  • 3.  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? 
  • 5. © 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
  • 6. CONTENTS 1 Computer Organization for Flipkart‟s Big Billion Sale v 2 Microsoft‟s Operating System for Organizational Productivity vi 3 Medicity Technology Platform enables Transfer of Information vii 4 Organizing Spread sheets for Business Benefits viii 5 Health Information Exchange: New Workflow at WinchesterHighland Management ix 6 The National Highways Authority of India - Modernized MIS x 7 Validus Re‟ Successfully Tries Revolution Analytic s for Risk Management xi 8 Data Smart Culture at Seven-Eleven, Japan xiii 9 Balluff GmbH Gains Benefits through Gigabit Network xiv 10 NTT Docomo Accelerates M-Commerce in Japan xv 11 Indian Railway Redesigns MIS to Achieve Bi-directional Facilities xvii 12 Strategic Approach to Implement MIS in SoCtronics Technologies xviii 13 E-Governance - Government of India initiatives for Income Tax Services xix 14 Amazon Web Services‟ Strategies for Managing IT Globally xx 15 The Case of FAO (Finance & Accounting Outsourcing)Industry xxi 16 Facebook Innovates its Business Model xxiii 17 Deployment of ERP based SCM Solution at TVS Logistics Services Ltd xxiv 18 Effective Tracking of Core Operations using ERP by Brigg Equipment xxv 19 Myntra.com Strategizes Brand Building through Social Media xxvi 20 Amazon Extends Cloud Computing Features xxvii 21 WhatsApp with Big Data Ethics and Responsibilities xxviii 22 Microsoft Makes Office 365 Product Line Architecture xxix 23 Uber‟s New Mobile App Feature xxxi 24 Accomplishing Outcomes through Business Process Design: Maruti Model xxxii iii
  • 7. 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
  • 8. 1 Computer Organization for Flipkart’s Big Billion Sale 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 teamto continue the service offering and another teamto 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. DiscussionQuestions: 1. Discuss what IT infrastructure supported the Flipkart‟s big billion sale. (Hints: internalcloud with servers-digitalsecurity expectingCyber-attacks-have newmobile 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
  • 9. 2 Microsoft’s Operating Systemfor 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 t he 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 systemand security applications which are easy to install and s upport. - 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 systemwhich 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 systememployees can start an application from anywhere and connect to other employees. DiscussionQuestions:- 1. Discuss the additional features Microsoft Window 8 Pro operating systemhas over the other Microsoft operating systems. (Hints: enterprise wide capabilities-no separate training-remote connectivity including Wi-Fi) 2. Do you thinkMicrosoft OScontributes to organizationalproductivity?Discuss. (Hints: increased security-increased accessibility-advantage ofmobility) Course Reference: Concept-MicrosoftWindows/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‟sRevitalization of US Manufacturing: Buys First Cruise Bikes Madein Detroit”, www.mobilitytechzone.com, January 29, 2013. 6
  • 10. 3 Medicity Technology Platform enables Transfer of Information 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 Insurance Hospital Clinic Insurance Patient Company Company Health Information Exchange Patient Patient Nurse Doctor NurseDoctor Doctor 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   InformedPatients   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. DiscussionQuestions: 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, “CliniSyncBenefitswith Clinical Data Exchange Capabilities”, www.medicity.com, 2014. ii. Medicity, “Ohio‟sCliniSyncHealth Information Exchange Connecting More than 100 Hospitals”, www.medicity.com, 2013. 7
  • 11. 4 Organizing Spread sheets for Business Benefits 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‟sfinancial reportingisdone using spread sheets.Even novice users can use spreadsheets for accounting,data analysis,mathematical and statistical calculations purposes. DiscussionQuestions:- 1. What featuresofspread sheetsare usefulforfinancialreporting purpose? Please Discuss. (Hints: financial modelling-data analysis-mathematicaland statisticalfunctions) 2. How did Dresdner use spread sheets for its organizational benefits? (Hints: profits and Loss A/Cs-set of test cases-product controland 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 SupplyChain”, Cluster Seven Whitepaper, 2013. 8
  • 12. 5 Health Information Exchange: New Workflow at Winchester Highland Management 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 andorganizations in the community,region andcountry.It facilitates faster access to patient‟s clinical data for safe, efficient andeffective treatment to the patient. The implementation of HIE systemis 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 Benefits:  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. DiscussionQuestions: 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 WinchesterHospital and IPA? (Hints: devised governance structure for projects- technology platform-vendor partnership) Course Reference: Concept- Workflow Systems/Unit 5- EnterpriseCollaboration 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
  • 13. 6 The NationalHighways 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 Computer PIU – Mobile reporting MIS Network through web or reports to Mobile Ministry / device NHAI (iPad / officers CPISSERVER Internet Tablet / Phone) Desktop or RIS SERVER CENTRAL SERVER Mobile Organization’s Gain: NHAI after establishing this E-MIS systemgained 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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/ Mobilebased 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 MatijaVargaPredragOreški, ” An information System Management Model”, ,MIS, Vol. 7, 24 January 2012 10
  • 14. 7 Validus Re’ Successfully Tries Revolution Analytics for Risk Management 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 succes sfully 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 customcorrelation 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 usingR 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 customcorrelation models. 2. Simulation models could be designed that included any magnitude of data required for analys is. 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
  • 15. DiscussionQuestions: 1. Discuss the challenges faced by Validus Reinsurance Ltd. (Hints: financial volatility-managing risk-reduced return on equity) 2. Discuss the complexities of business ofthe 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
  • 16. 8 Data Smart Culture at Seven-Eleven, Japan 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. Key Benefits Key Practices  Improved Supply–  Use Scorecards  Chain Management  Single Source Data Smart Improved Inventory  of Truth Culture  Levels Owning of Distributed Decision  Business Rules Employee  Making Engagement Effective Operational Decisions 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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”, MITSloan Management Review, December 2, 2013. ii. Nadig, A., ”The Case for Smart Data: When Big Data isn‟t Enough”, October 7, 2014. 13
  • 17. 9 Balluff GmbH Gains Benefits through Gigabit Network 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,duringits implementation phase,specialattentionwas 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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
  • 18. 10 NTT Docomo AcceleratesM-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 TermEvolution) Windows 8 tablets to businesses in Japan. It collaboratedwith 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 partneredwith Google to provide Gmail, Google Maps and in developing mobile apps. Microsoft China Mobile Communications LTE Windows 8 Tablets  Corporation KT Corporation, S.Korea International Roaming Common Platforms, Enterprise Services,  Network Technologies, Smartphones, LTE NTT Docomo  IBM Intel Google Trusted MobilePlatform Specification  Gmail, Google Maps, Mobile Apps 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
  • 19. DiscussionQuestions: 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-MobileCommerce 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, April15, 2013. ii. “About Docomo”, www.nttdocomo.co.jp, March 16, 2015. 16
  • 20. 11 Indian Railway Redesigns MIS to Achieve Bi-directional Facilities 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 systemso 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. Problem: - Delay in ticketing Railway - Delay in information.Railway Information Facilities Advantages Gained: - Faster ticketing - Faster Cancellation / return Passenger of cancellation amount - Faster availability of facilities - Faster information 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 systemwas 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 systemgained the following advantages: 1. Reduced PassengerService 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. . DiscussionQuestions: 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–MISRedesigning /Unit-11 MISPlanning & 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 RailwayTicketing”, Business Standard, August 14, 2014. iii ”Next Generation e-Ticketing”, www.cris.org.in, August 2014. 17
  • 21. 12 Strategic Approach to Implement MIS in SoCtronics Technologies 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 & petroleumindustry. 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. 2. Organizing 1. Problem 3. Submission Problem: Groups to study and Lack of inter-departmental Identification suggest solution of Reports coordination. 4. Approval of Reports 5. Designing Advantages Gained: Action Plan - Proper and quick coordination - Accuracy in operations 6. Implementation 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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-12MISImplementation & 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., ”Earlydiagnosis of MIS implementation failures”, , Management Science, Vol. 27, No. 4, 2012. 18
  • 22. 13 E-Governance - Government of India initiatives for Income Tax Services 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, taxprofessionals 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. e-tax Portal Challenges Income Tax - Setting up system to respect taxpayer Filing - Fast receiving & Refund disposalof service requests Claim Achievements Tax Payee Income Tax - Faster customer (Customer) Dept. (ITD)Aykar Seva service -Kendra (ASK) Ease to taxpayer - Good GovernanceResponse 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. DiscussionQuestions: 1. Explain the challenges faced by income Tax Department in course of improving their services. (Hints: delays service requests-customerexperience-processing refunds) 2. Discuss the advantages gained by applying e-Governance services through e-tax portal and ASKs. (Hints: good project governance-bettercustomer 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 PublicGrievances, 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
  • 23. 14 Amazon Web Services’StrategiesforManaging IT Globally Changing business modelsand strategiesformanaging 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 fromone point to other point. AWS Business Model Users paid for what they used No long term contracts No minimum usage requirements Concentrated on customer retention Concentrated on revenue growth AWS Advantages of Having Servers at Edge Avoided long delivery routes Optimized Routes Avoided trouble spots Compressed content Replicated the data packets 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: BusinessModel Technological Change / Upgradation CustomerRetention 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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
  • 24. 15 The Case of FAO (Finance & Accounting Outsourcing) 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 FAOproviders had signed 800multi-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 for60%- 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  Providermaturity 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  overallCash flow Reduced Complexity and  Transition Times Can have access to predefined and preconfiguredindustry  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
  • 25. Best practices in implementing industry specific FAO include: observe industry specificity required, build a cost plus business case, involve business heads right frombeginning, 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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, July2013 ii. Gupta, S., Khandelwal, V., and Menghvani, V.,“Finance and Accounting Outsourcing (FAO) – Annual Report 2013: Increasing Market Maturity DrivingCost+ Value Proposition, Everest Group Research, April 20, 2013. 22
  • 26. 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 WhatsA pp 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. DiscussionQuestions: 1. How did Facebook innovate its business model? (Hints: no subscription based model-do not exploit userdata-innovate into WhatsApp business model) 2. How did Facebook increase its userbase? 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 EnterpriseApplication 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
  • 27. 17 Deployment of ERP based SCM Solution at TVS Logistics Services Ltd 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 Logis tics 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 systemwas 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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 ofRamcoSystems, 2015. ii.TVS, “TVS Logistics Services Ltd: About Us”,www.tvslsl.com, March 2015. 24
  • 28. 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 themin 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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-trackcore 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-18EnterpriseResource 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, April2014. iii. “Radio Flyer Equipment Manufacturer”, Ultra Consultants, USA, June2014. 25
  • 29. 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 ofthe 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 DiscussionQuestions: 1. Explain the effect of organizing events by e-Business companies using social media. (Hints: valuable business inputs-increased customerbase-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 Networkingin E-Commerce WebDevelopment”,www.vendorseek.com,2014 26
  • 30. 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.  Goal: Amazon tryingto become an important technology provider to other  organizations, Its aspirations were just as big as those of Microsoft, IBM and Google.  Solution:- Hundreds of thousands of customers have joined theAmazon Web Services community and use AWS solutions to  build their businesses  Cloud computing platform provides the client flexibility to build its application, their way, regardless of their situation or  industry It can save time, money, and manage the client‟s infrastructure, without compromising scalability, security.  Objectives:- AWS Cloud Computing would like to pro simple way to access servers, storage, dat  and application services over theInternet. Would like to maintain the network- conne hardware required for these application se via a web application.  Benefits:- Trade capital expense for variable  expense  Benefit from massive economies  of scale   Stop guessing capacity   Increase speed and agility  Stop spending money on running  andmaintainingdatacenters 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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: July15, 2014”, www.eucalyptus.com, July15, 2014. 27
  • 31. 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:  Collection of big data and  processing Share data with  confidence and safety  Speedy processing ofdata   Accuracy ofdata   Overcome ethical issues   Save data fromhackers  Increase the activeusers Financialdata sharing issues Challenges:   Handling Ethical issues  Privacy  confidentiality  Transparency  Identity  Data hackers  Processingcomplexdata Implementing new functions Solution:  WhatsApp does not retain  delivered messages  The only records of those messages are stored in the sender and the recipient‟s mobile devices Data has neverbeen collected and stored by  WhatsApp  WhatsApp is not recording the exact usage  WhatsApp’s Approach  Made individual customer‟s phonenumber as an identification code  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, 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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:-BigData/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
  • 32. 22 MicrosoftMakesOffice 365 ProductLine 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 ofa  number of products and services.  ll of Office 365's components can be managed and configured through an  online portal  sers can be addedmanually,imported  from a CSV file  usiness and enterprise-oriented plans for Office 365 offer access to cloud-hosted versions ofOffice'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 subscriptionbased with different subscription levels,  depending on need ofcustomers 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 planningroadmap Encouraged user adoption   Functionality Office 365 Includes access to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher, and Access for home/non-  commercial  Aimed at mainstreamconsumers and families; same as Personal,but foruse on  up to five devices by up to five users Offers access to hosted Exchange,  SharePoint, services only Offers desktopapps forbothMac andPCs  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 fromexisting 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
  • 33. 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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 LineArchitecture /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. “Office365”, www..wikipedia.org, February 1, 2015. iii. Bradley, T., “Why Office365 is a better deal than Office2013”, PC World, January 31, 2013. 30
  • 34. 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  „SendStatus‟ feature addedto 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 newfeatures „SendStatus „where passengers could share details about driverand the vehicle and its location withtheir 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. DiscussionQuestions: 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: „SendStatus‟-shares information with friends andrelatives-increasedsafety andsecurity) Course Reference:-Advantages of MobileTechnologies/Unit 23-Mobileand Social Technologies/ Subject- IT & Systems Source: i.,“Uber introduces India-specificsafety features in taxi app”, Live Mint, February 11, 2015. ii. BS Reporter, “Uber introduces India-specificsafety 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
  • 35. Accomplishing Outcomes through Business ProcessDesign: 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 themare shown below:  Goals Technological Innovation Sensitivity to Customer Needs New Products entering into New Customer Segments Increasing R&D Initiatives Target to sell 2 million cars in a globally competitive market Enhanced customer expectations  Action Plan  Product Design Raw Materials Developed design centre Technology Expansion of plant over   Funds 600 acres Infrastructure Training to engineers  Assembling Annual capacity of 800,000 units  at Manesar  Diesel engine plant in Gurgaon, with an annual capacity of 900,000  Warehouse and supply No of Sales outlets:1310 No of Marutitruevalue outlets:600 Over 1,000Maruti Mobile Support (MMS) vehicles were operating across the country Over 3000 service stations across India  Outcomes Technology improved New products lunched R & D process enhanced 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. DiscussionQuestions: 1) What is Business process design? Explain (Hints: identifying sequence of activities-customer service processes design-using workflows among SBUs) 32
  • 36. 2) How did Maruti Suzuki implement business process design? (Hints: increased infrastructure-used technology-customercentred 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
  • 37. Dear students, get ICFAI latest Solved assignments and case study help by professionals. Mail us at : help.mbaassignments@gmail.com Call us at : 08263069601