Communications Cost Reduction: Leading Global
Information Company
Abstract
The client is a leading global information company serving the
financial, media, and corporate markets. They provide information
via communications links that include dedicated connectivity,
satellite, and Internet links. The client was leaking profits
due to over-priced historical contracts, poor internal processes,
and inefficient use of communications facilities.
Problem—ThruPoint was engaged to run a project office, find
savings opportunities, and return profits to the business. ThruPoint
and the client’s staff worked as a cohesive team to carry
out a number of initiatives that achieved the objectives.
The Business Challenge
The client was undergoing significant change after the global downturn
in the major financial markets from 2000 to 2004. Engaging ThruPoint’s
consulting services was part of a strategy that included the
sale of the client’s communications business, internal
reorganizations, and a major focus on improving profitability.
The client had been focusing on declining revenue in an ever
more competitive market. It was only when they considered our
proposed savings initiatives that they recognized a more strategic
direction. An initial savings estimate in excess of $4 million
was revised upwards by $3 million part way through our project.
The final savings was nearly $8 million for that financial year—savings
that went directly to the bottom line.
How We Helped
ThruPoint initially helped to identify potential costs savings
and divided them into a set of sub-project initiatives. We identified
savings targets for each initiative and mapped the specific methodologies,
reporting structures, and program tracking mechanisms to be employed.
ThruPoint’s project managers were responsible for the delivery
of savings from their specific initiatives. Adjustments were made
as necessary to ensure that the staff was used optimally. In some
cases this meant significant periods overseas for staff in order
to ensure the maximum efficiency in the delivery of some initiatives.
ThruPoint carried out ten savings initiatives. As is not uncommon
with our large projects, we found that individual initiatives often
spawned more savings opportunities as our experience with the client
grew.
Our final report described specific areas where we had saved the
client money and, more importantly, identified the root causes
for the previous problems, providing recommendations for prevention
in the future.
Lessons Learned
ThruPoint demonstrated to the client that there is significant
opportunity to improve profitability by reducing costs. ThruPoint’s
well planned, well controlled, and well executed programs not
only maximize savings, but deliver savings well in excess of
the cost of the program
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Integrated Network Strategy: Leading Global Information Company
Abstract
A leading provider of information to the education, business-information,
and financial services markets had an IT infrastructure that
was unable to support their overall corporate strategies. The
company’s business units could not achieve their growth
targets because the existing infrastructure was not agile enough
to incorporate new technologies. The IT budget was being spent
inefficiently to support individual silos without an integrated
strategy. The lack of a unified policy lead to a governance and
infrastructure that was inadequate to support effective cross-business-unit
collaboration. Their content delivery solution was outdated and
did not effectively support their media units. They needed to
develop a consolidation strategy around Centers of Excellence.
Problem—ThruPoint was engaged to help this diversified media
company (annual revenues exceeding $5 billion and over 16,000 employees)
to
- improve technological efficiency and business objectives;
- improve new-market targeting and enable new services, and;
- improve network infrastructure.
How We Helped
ThruPoint’s multi-phase engagement created a global network
strategy for the client. We identified action items and near-term
objectives to fully exploit existing and emerging network, communication,
and systems technologies. We addressed each technology area and
aligned those areas with defined capability categories, ensuring
alignment with overall corporate strategies.
ThruPoint defined near-term objectives (6-24 months) for immediate
implementation. We defined long-term strategies (2-5 years) to
streamline processes and procedures, consolidate vendors and contract
negotiations, and create a standardized technology infrastructure.
ThruPoint documented the telecommunications impact of anticipated
demands by the client’s main business units and Corporate
Services. We also assessed global telecommunications and determined
which enterprise network service providers, equipment suppliers,
and system integrators would offer the greatest value, taking into
account our client’s current and future technology requirements.
Results
During the 12 week engagement, ThruPoint addressed the business
and technical requirements for:
- LAN/WAN
- Wireless
- Security
- Voice/Video
- Storage
- Remote Access
- Telecommunications
Our comprehensive Global Network Strategy aligned the client’s
IT infrastructure with their corporate strategy. We identified
all of the business and technical factors, the strategic roadmap
requirements, and categorized all the potential initiatives, prioritizing
them by effort (cost and time) and value to the organization.
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