sp infocomm club

SPIC was invited to the "IBM: Simple Solutions in Tough Times Workshop" on 19th March. The workshop was to showcase IBM Technologies and affiliates to help reduce running costs, improve efficiency and growth of Small and Medium Enterprise (SMEs) during the current economic climate.

The event started off with Mr. Peter Leong, the centre director of SME Infocomm Resource Centre (SIRC) showcasing innovative ways to increase business viability and what centres in Singapore can help, particularly SIRC.

Next up, there was a run through on how the Internet can aid in business and how Web 2.0 had changed the internet experience. Business can take leverage on the power of Web 2.0 to improve growth and attract customers by using IBM Lotus Suites.

After the intresting overview of Web 2.0, we were introduced on moving over a paperless working enviroment to cut cost, increase productibility vis collobration, sharing, searching and e.t.c. using existing technlogies such as a SharePoint(Microsoft) Server and IBM Technlogies. We were also give a run thru of Cognos Software from IBM, and how it can improve growth by pinpointing weak points in your business and can generate reports literally on the fly with the data feeded into it, unlike spreadsheets where employees have to painstakinly enter and compile which may contain calculation or human errors.

After the coffee-break, IBM showcased their Technnlogies on how to cut Data Centre (Servers) cost by using their space effecient server with built in cooling which can be use in any enviroment (not creative Zii). They also showed us another alternative for SMEs with existing server, which may be difficult to replace as these arn't cheap. This was a liquid cooling device attached to the exaust of the servers to almost remove all heat away from the server. These two technologies help reduce hot spots and thus reduce running costs.

Last of all, we were introduced to two softwares, namely SAP and SUGARcrm. SAP can help reduce costs and outperforming competitors by putting the customer in the center and linking all the departments in an enterprise to form a cohesive enviroment which is similar t0 IBM's Cognos Software. SUGARcrm is a opensource (3 editions, onlly community edition is free) Customer Relationship Management  (CRM) software which can improve relation ship between customers and enterprises to improve sales.