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ITC Infotech, Heineken and Insight took part in a webinar on the 22nd September 2011 which discussed in detail the issues, risks and processes associated with migration to Windows 7, from each perspective

Although Windows 7 is rolling out quickly to favourable reviews from a consumer perspective, 75% corporate enterprises are yet to complete their migration to Windows 7 and many are in the early stages of planning. This is because, from the enterprise perspective, like any major update or operating system migration, migrating can be challenging, time consuming, and costly. In any case, all enterprises will need to set about migrating to Windows 7 because it promises the productivity, reliability, performance and security enhancements they need, and primarily because Microsoft has scheduled a tight April 2014 deadline to pull out enterprise support for Windows XP.

This webinar hosted by ITC Infotech in association with Heineken International and Insight addressed issues and risks associated with successful on-time migration to Windows 7.

Webinar Highlights

• Issues and risks associated with a federated and distributed enterprise- strategies that hold promise to manage the transformation- A case study of Heineken International

• Typical challenges of planning and migrating to Windows 7

• Challenges of full enterprise rollout-A case study of Insight Enterprises.

Issues and Risks Associated with a Federated and Distributed Enterprise

Heineken International– Windows 7 Migration Case Study

Heineken is one of the world’s leading brewers with a wide international presence through a global network of distributors and breweries. Heineken owns and manages one of the world’s leading portfolios of beer brands.

With a portfolio of globally distributed operating companies, Heineken has a very federated and distributed enterprise IT landscape. The organization has 48,000 workstations running over 2000 windows applications.

Heineken started the Windows 7 upgrade in January 2011 with the support of ITC Infotech at the 2nd and 3rd level to:

• Standardize and globalize the workplace environment

• Attain the flexibility to cope with local diversity

• Improve user experience and decrease TCO

Issues and risks Heineken faces as it migrates to Windows 7

Application compatibility, ensuring applications will install and run predictably on Windows 7, is at the heart of Heineken‘s Windows 7 migration issues. Simplifying the management and deployment of applications during Windows 7 migration poses the most time consuming challenge. Another key issue Heineken faces is managing the change in terms of the time it will really take individuals to adapt to the new features and functions and be able to operate with the same speed and efficiency as they do now. Heineken also battles with the risk of not being able to complete enterprise wide rollout by April 2014(when Microsoft plans to pull out enterprise support for Windows XP).

Issues and Risks Associated with a Full Enterprise Rollout

Insight Enterprises - Windows 7 Enterprise Rollout Case Study

Insight is a global provider of information technology (IT) hardware, software and service solutions to business and public sector organizations with Operations in 21 countries, serving clients in 191 countries worldwide. Evidently, Insight had a very distributed IT landscape with applications portfolio of over 200 applications. Insight was using Windows XP with the latest service place and was quite sceptical about the Windows rollout. Along with the upcoming expiration of enterprise support for Windows XP, the company was motivated by an opportunity to acquire new tools for tightening network security, accelerating PC performance, and improving employee productivity to move forward with a companywide upgrade to Windows7. Also, the company placed an emphasis on minimizing the impact of the upgrade on employees.

Challenges faced by Insight Enterprises in migrating to Windows 7

Ensuring application compatibility and deploying applications for optimal performance and functionality posed the most challenging and time-consuming challenges. The IT team spent months before the deployment performing readiness testing on more than 200 applications. Memory was surprisingly an issue with the OS running extremely slow on less than 2 Gb.

Typical Challenges of Planning and Migrating to Windows 7

• Application compatibility

• Hardware compatibility

• Assessment & remediation of applications and hardware

• Project planning

• Windows 7 deployment

Benefits of Migrating to Windows 7

Windows 7 offers desktop and server optimization, management flexibility faster PC performance, while strengthening its network security capabilities. Deploying Windows 7 offers gains in productivity across the organization as more employees take advantage of enhanced desktop tools and simplified access to network resources. A central benefit of Windows 7 is its extensive cost savings, which can be as much as 20% in direct costs and impressive IT cost savings with MDOP. So even though Windows 7 migration has key benefits for an organization, the risk of failure and the enormity of the project may be intimidating and can have significant impact on an IT organization in terms of time, budget and internal reputation.

The ITC Infotech Approach to Windows 7 Migration

ITC Infotech has a clearly defined process of helping organizations migrate to Windows 7. This involves determining client readiness by checking hardware and application compatibility, ensuring security from a policy and governance perspective, image engineering, migration and deployment, and finally operation of application - end-user acceptance and helpdesk support.

Nokia has launched a free wi-fi trial service across central London, with 26 hotspots available across the capital.

The trial will continue until the end of the year and if deemed a success will rolled out permanently at the start of 2012.

The free wi-fi service is currently concentrated around the West End, with Westminster and Victoria also hosting hotspots. Many of the areas are reportedly based around old phoneboxes owned by Nokia’s partner Spectrum Interactive.

London Underground (LU) has invited technology suppliers to discussions aimed at helping it understand how to develop a communications infrastructure for its next generation of tube railway systems.

The organisation says it wants to talk about trends and innovation, particularly in communications and networking technology, such as switching and routing, network processors and wireless technologies. The technology will be used in an environment that requires high levels of security across a range of sites and by mobile users.

In a notice in the Official Journal of the European Union, LU says that the new railway system is not expected to be fully operational before 2018 at the earliest.

Yahoo has announced that it is buying data-driven advertising network Interclick for around $270 million.

Interclick is a technology company providing data targeted solutions and optimization technologies.

"This investment underscores our focus on enhancing the performance of both our guaranteed and non-guaranteed display business across Yahoo and our partner sites and, combined with Yahoo's reach and advertising leadership, will deliver a powerful solution for marketers," said Ross Levinsohn, Yahoo's executive vice president for the Americas region.

Accenture has signed five-year outsourcing agreements with both Banco Popolare Group and Alba Leasing under which Accenture will provide application management and infrastructure services to support the two companies’ leasing operations. Banco Popolare is Italy's fourth largest bank by assets and Alba Leasing is among the country's top 10 leasing companies by new contracts.

“Banco Popolare and Alba are valued clients of Accenture and we look forward to working even more closely with them”

.In addition, under a separate agreement, Accenture will acquire Itaca Service from Banco Popolare Group’s subsidiary, Banca Italease. Itaca Service provides IT services to the Group’s leasing companies and to Alba Leasing. Thirty-three employees are expected to transfer to Accenture and will continue to provide IT services to Banco Popolare’s leasing companies and to Alba. Financial details were not disclosed.

Accenture will develop, maintain and support Banco Popolare’s and Alba’s entire leasing applications portfolio, including leasing products management and regulatory reporting applications. Accenture will also manage the IT infrastructure for these companies’ leasing operations, including remote management and support, data center operations, network and deskside support services.

As part of the Government's commitment to delivering world-class digital products, the Minister for Cabinet Office Francis Maude has announced the Identity Assurance programme would be receiving an extra £10 million in funding.

The Identity Assurance programme deals with the way a service provider can be assured that the customer or user is who they say they are as they access Government services.

CSC and Educational Testing Service Announce Five-and-a-half Year, $200+ Million Contract Renewal and Expansion for IT Services

ETS to Leverage CSC’s Industry-Leading Cloud Services Including CloudCompute Infrastructure as a Service

CSC has announced that it has signed a five-and-a-half year information technology (IT) operations outsourcing contract renewal and expansion with Educational Testing Service (ETS), the leader in advancing quality and equity in education for people worldwide. The agreement was signed in the second quarter of CSC fiscal year 2012, and has an estimated value of more than $200 million assuming all options are exercised.

As part of the agreement, CSC will continue to bring new and innovative approaches to the way ETS leverages IT. CSC will provide its industry-leading cloud services to ETS including CloudCompute, the new infrastructure as a service (IaaS) architecture deployed in the CSC Trusted Cloud Datacenters. CloudCompute, a VMware vCloud Datacenter Service, delivers compute, storage and network resources “as a service” to support any application and is especially suited for hosting mission-critical and business-critical workloads.

“CSC has provided IT solutions for ETS since 2001. We are pleased to continue our long time relationship with CSC and are confident their IT solutions will have a positive effect on ETS business,” said Daniel Wakeman, Vice President and Chief Information Officer at ETS.

IT Services provider Plan-Net plc have agreed a 5-year IT outsourcing contract with the west end law firm Davenport Lyons.

Plan-Net will provide Davenport Lyons with a new virtual infrastructure and 24/7 support delivered from an onsite team and dedicated legal IT support centre based in central London.

Plan-Net Director Adrian Polley commented: ‘We are extremely pleased to be adding Davenport Lyons to our growing list of legal clients and look forward to delivering the high levels service required in this sector’

A Government investment of £950 million will help create and safeguard more than 200,000 jobs across England, the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has annouced.

The second round of the Government’s £1.4 billion Regional Growth Fund (RGF) will support 119 bids from businesses and local partnerships with projects to expand their operations, create new jobs and attract private investment. Discussions are ongoing with a further 10 bidders about their projects.

Of the 201,000 jobs created or protected, around 37,000 will be directly created jobs, and more than 164,000 will be in the supply chain. The Government investment will support nearly £6 billion of private investment secured by the successful projects.

Expressions of interest are sought for commercial partner/s to provide a managed wide-area network referred to as the LINK, for a range of public sector organisations in East Sussex, Brighton and Hove, West Sussex and the immediate proximity.

The contract is worth up to £100m and should last up to 10 years.

"The provider will maintain and implement operational procedures and standards to fulfil and satisfy the demands of the public sector and in response to public-sector policy demands," reads the tender.