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hkcsview: Eric Yeung sheds light on Hong Kong’s IT industry future page 50
Hong Kong’s source of IT insight www.cw.com.hk
March/April 2015 • Price HK$40
Andy Bien,
Airport Authority
Hong Kong
Lilian Wong,
Manulife
Henk ten Bos,
Ageas
Published By
Hong Kong CIO
Awards 2015
PAGE 12
bizpeople
casestudy
fintech
bimodal
Page 10
Page 24
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Page 30
Mossberg: China at
its tipping point
MassMutual cuts opex
with hybrid cloud storage
Exploring HK’s
fintech potential
Are you ready for
bimodal IT?
contents
MARCH/APRIL 2015
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coverstory
Hong Kong CIO Awards 2015
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24
22
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page 14
An appetite for change
From ground to sky: HK Airport sees
no limit to IT innovation
page 20
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industryprofile
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personalsupplychain
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chinawatch
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techreview
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hkcsview
casestudy
Meeting BCP needs with
hybrid cloud storage
28
fintech
Is Hong Kong ready for
fintech development?
bimodal
futureworkplace
Future workplace
transformation:
A tug of war
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Building a workplace for
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upfront
The flower power in IT
page 12
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34
IT heads at Manulife, Ageas and AAHK named CIOs of the year
Unleash the power in Manulife’s DNA
w
Openness in IT architecture
to drive customer loyalty
It’s all about data
Redefining customer
relationships with personal
supply chain
Alibaba enters US cloud
market with global ambitions
First look: VMware vSphere 6
keeps its edge
Hong Kong’s IT industry—
where to go?
UPFRONT SHEILA LAM
The flower power in IT
M
arch is a special month for
women. With
the International Woman’s
Day held in the month, women tend to get
more attention. This is particularly true
among the local women in IT this March.
The Hong Kong Computer Society in
March launched FACE Club, a womenoriented organization to support females
in the IT industry. It aims to encourage
more female talents to enter and re-join
the IT workforce.
But this is not the only group in Hong
Kong encouraging women in IT. In the
past few months, we’ve seen different
initiatives dedicated to support female
talents in the local IT industry.
Earlier this year, Microsoft with The
Women’s Foundation organized its second GirlSpark Camp to inspire talented
female students to join the IT industry.
The program offers leadership training
and an internship program for selected
female students. Meanwhile, the Women
Who Code Hong Kong—founded by
French developer Karen Farzam about a
year ago—is a professional community
that supports female developers by organizing training, networking and mentoring events.
All these initiatives offer great support for women in the male-oriented tech
world. But it also appears contradictory
by seemingly depicting women as inferior in the tech industry. Do local educated
women really need to be inspired to build
a career in IT?
My recent conversation with a female
CIO sheds some light on the current
situation.
She said among her team of about 60
IT staff, only one-third are women. The
male dominated team manages the data
center, where the entire team of 12 are all
men. She herself, with a background in
ERP development, shook her head when
4 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
asked about interest and experience in
data center management.
It appears that even within the IT industry, certain areas like software development and business leadership are more
women-friendly than others.
Gender diversity for innovation
Despite the general impression that
women have better communication and
interpersonal skills, women are still often
outnumbered by their male counterparts
at the business executive table. According
to recruitment agency Hays’ 2015 Asia
Salary Guide, only 31% of management
positions in Hong Kong are held by women. It is higher than the Asian average of
29%, but still lags behind in terms of gender diversity.
Being a woman, I don’t see the local
IT industry is limiting opportunities for
women IT professionals and executives.
But a more gender diverse workforce
will definitely benefit local industries and
businesses in promoting innovation and
encouraging leadership.
As the first female winner of the
Computerworld Hong Kong CIO
Awards, Lilian Wong CIO at Manulife
stated, “It takes personal discipline and
management to balance family and career
development.” (p.14)
Apart from discipline, support from
family and employers also makes a difference in creating a gender diverse professional environment. Offering flexible
working practices is one of the measures
that the local industry can uphold.
This is also one of the goals at FACE,
according to chairlady Cally Chan, “We
hope to help our members contribute
back to society through some sort of jobmatching, while helping them to retain
the work flexibility they need.” 3
Sheila Lam
Editor-in-Chief
[email protected]
http://www.cw.com.hk
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EDITORIAL
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PRESIDENT & CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
Kerry C. Gumas
EXECUTIVE V.P. & CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICERTom Caridi
EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENTTony D’Avino
NEWS
hong kong/china
HK enterprises prefer to buy from a
single cloud broker
hong kong
IT budgets in HK grow 10.3% in 2015
Among the 95 Hong Kong IT decision
makers being interviewed in a recent survey,
76% of them stated they prefer to purchase
different cloud services from a single
provider or broker. According to Telstra—
the firm that commissioned the study—it is
likely due to the complex cloud environment
created by working with different vendors
are making cloud services harder to
manage, integrate and control.
HKCS launches FACE
Hong Kong Computer Society launched
FACE Club—a women-oriented club in Hong
Kong’s IT industry. FACE is an acronym for
Female, Attract, Connect, and Engage. The
Club plans to organize outreach activities to
offer job-matching opportunities and flexible
working arrangements to encourage more
women in IT to contribute in the workforce.
CSL launches mobile Office 365 plan
Microsoft has teamed up with CSL Mobile to
offer a new Office 365 service with bundled
mobile data for Hong Kong enterprises.
The service includes the full suite of Office
applications and 1TB of cloud storage on
OneDrive. The bundles also come with
between 6GB and 20GB of mobile data
usage from CSL’s 1O1O mobile brand
and a free coffee machine with an RRP of
HK$990.
Insight Robotics wins global
entrepreneur award
Hong Kong automation and threat
detection startup Insight Robotics has
been named Entrepreneur of the Year at
the IBM SmartCamp Global Finals. Insight
Robotics concentrates on safeguarding
natural resources and infrastructure through
automation and early warning threat
detection. The company was incubated by
the Hong Kong Science and Technology
Park.
6 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
Hong Kong’s IT budget growth is significantly ahead of the APAC average of 3%
IT budgets in Hong Kong have increased
by an average of 10.3% in 2015,
according to Gartner.
Hong Kong’s IT budget growth is
significantly ahead of the APAC average
of 3%, the research firm said, and on par
with fellow north Asian countries Taiwan
and South Korea.
The results come from an annual
survey of more than 2,810 CIOs
worldwide. The survey shows that APAC
CIOs recognize the need to adapt their
leadership role in the next three years to
succeed in digital business
IT leaders embrace digital
opportunities
APAC CIOs feel the need to change
from a “control” to a “visionary”
leadership styles to grasp the digital
opportunity.
“Incrementally
improving
IT
performance isn’t enough to grasp
the digital opportunity,” Gartner vice
president Andy Rowsell-Jones said.
“CIOs need to ‘flip’ from legacy to digital
in terms of information and technology
leadership, value leadership and people
leadership.”
The survey indicates that 87% of CIOs
in APAC agree that the digital world is
creating different and higher levels of risk
as well as new opportunities, and 69%
feel the discipline of risk management is
not keeping up.
Gartner said the results show that
CIOs need to review with enterprise and
IT risk leaders whether risk management
is adapting fast enough in a digital world.
3
www.cw.com.hk
GLOBAL
Most Internet attacks in Q4 originated in China
A plurality of the Internet attack traffic in
2014’s fourth quarter originated in China,
followed by the US, according to cloud
service provider Akamai.
China and the US were the only countries where more than 10% of attack traffic originated, Akamai said in its quarterly
state of the Internet report. The other top
10 nations each had less than 5% of the
world’s attack traffic. Taiwan, for instance, came in third with 4.4% of the
traffic.
Still, the attack traffic coming from
China was down compared to the third
quarter, falling from 49% from 41%. Attack traffic coming from the US also fell,
decreasing to 13% from 17%.
Akamai monitors attacks aimed at its
customers, which include Yahoo, IBM,
NBC Sports and ESPN.
The number of DDoS attacks in
the quarter was up more than 20%
sequentially. Akamai counted 327 attacks
compared to 270 attacks in the third
quarter. The overall number of DDoS
attacks for 2014 was 1,150, almost the
same as in 2013, when there were 1,153.
The largest share of DDoS attacks in
Quote of the Month
China is at a tipping
point of being a copycat
country for tech… I expect in
a couple of years, there will
be Chinese brands, invention
or innovation in the
market
—Walt Mossberg, founder of re/code
talked about China’s technology and startup scene
www.cw.com.hk the fourth quarter was aimed at the Americas, which was targeted 177 times. The
Asia-Pacific region was targeted 98 times,
followed by the Europe, the Middle East
and Africa with 52 attacks. 3
Number Crunch
10
US$
million
A proposed settlement from Target for
individual victims from its massive 2013 data
breach, as many as 110 million people were
affected by the attack
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 7
Conference will examine opportunities and
challenges of social, mobile, analytics, cloud
and security, and how to successfully digitalize
your enterprise.
Ramez Younan, Managing
Director, PCCW Solutions, sees
enterprises ready to embrace
digitalization with a trusted
digital transformation partner.
PCCW Solutions to unveil
Smarter Enterprise blueprint at
Annual Technology Forum 2015
Over a decade, the world of business has changed dramatically. In 2005, the Internet was maturing as an information tool
and business platform, and mobile was just taking off the air.
Social media was an individual pursuit shunned in corporations,
and analytics was focused on crunching ex-post data. Meanwhile,
having layers of firewall backed by strong security policies inside
a corporation felt sufficient.
In 2015, the world has changed dramatically. Social media
is driving revenues and shaping perceptions on the Internet.
Smarter and faster mobile access has brought enterprises and
their wares to consumers’ hands. Predictive analytics is the new
game changer, while the traditional approach to security has
been found ever wanting.
“In the present digital world, IT personalization, big data,
social media and mobile applications have changed the development of the economy and society,” said ramez Younan, Managing director, PccW Solutions. “The rapid growth of data has
created many new business opportunities. enterprises are experiencing a rapid digitalization of their own businesses enabled by
integrated software, technology and services.”
Succeeding in the digital era
Mobility and connected devices are increasingly bringing consumers and enterprises closer together than ever before. These
interactions are happening rapidly and often in real-time. as customers become increasingly mobile centric, they expect businesses
to be agile and deliver exceptional experience.
In such a complex and rapidly changing technology landscape,
getting digitalization right is vital for business success. But it is
no easy feat. The reason: Going digital challenges traditional
concepts and introduces new business models. It is a journey a
business needs to commit for the long term.
“cloud applications and mobile services can help companies
more quickly and flexibly respond to market needs, enhance
customer service quality and experience, and have greater access
to their potential customers,” said Younan.
cloud offers a good example. By delivering enterprise-grade
applications on a subscription basis through the Internet, it widens potential customer base. For cloud adopters, it means easy
access to enterprise-grade applications almost immediately when
needed, and they only need to pay for what they used.
asia, especially Hong Kong and mainland china, is primed for
succeeding in the new digital era. With less legacy infrastructure
and higher adoption rate of mobile and new tools, the region is
poised to be a digital leader.
“Hong Kong and mainland china can have a great leap over
other regions in the world in digitalization because the people’s
familiarity with digital tools is much superior than in many regions around the world,” said Younan.
However, digitalization requires rethinking of how we view
IT. as in the cloud example above, it can improve operational
efficiency and agility. But it also changes how IT is procured and
managed across the organizations, and decision makers may no
longer be part of IT departments.
With so much sensitive data in mobile airwaves and communication networks across the Internet, the traditional approach to
fencing in information will also be infeasible. Instead, companies
need to rethink security and make it more proactive and their
main priority, especially in a business climate where a single
breach can tarnish long-held reputations and affect bottom lines.
To succeed in digitalization requires a digital transformation
partner, who is able to offer the right approach, knowledge and
solutions to make your enterprise smarter.
The PCCW Solutions’ advantage
So why do many enterprises bank on PccW Solutions for
digitalization?
“Many enterprises don’t know where to start. This is where
PccW Solutions’ experience in the multiple domains can help. We
aim to digitalize enterprises’ businesses through providing endto-end solutions,” said Younan.
PccW Solutions has helped hundreds of businesses and
government departments with its vast array of IT Solutions and
Services in many areas, such as enterprise applications, cloud
Brought to you by PCCW Solutions
Solutions & Infrastructure, Mobility and analytics, application
development & Maintenance, Technical Services and Business
Process Outsourcing.
digitalization is a means to achieving business goals, not an
end in itself. PccW Solutions understands this precept very well.
Hence, every digital solution is designed to solve a specific business problem.
The company offers three key advantages for enterprises
looking to digitalize:
• Keenunderstandingofthebusinessdirectionandmarket
imperatives to digitalize
• Provideastructuredroadmaptoachievedigitalizationseamlessly across business functions
• Designanddeliveryofsolutionsleveragingthebestavailable
technology and tools via an innovative digital Platform
With its deep commitment to building innovative solutions,
investment in people and their skill development, and a solid heritage in successfully delivering superior technology solutions, PccW
Solutions is able to support enterprises in their long digital journey.
Industry focus and future outlook
PccW Solutions understands that different industries require
different strengths. It is the reason why it continually looks to
strengthen its solution offerings in various vertical industries. and
where it needs to boost its strengths, it looks to its vast network
of partners.
“We are looking to sustain and further build strategic alliances with great companies in Hong Kong and mainland china in
every single domain and industry for the benefit of our customers,” said Younan.
The company is staking its future success by building on these
three key advantages in the coming years. It is optimistic about
development opportunities in mainland china and overseas
markets, and is looking to expand its IT services business to china,
europe and U.S. markets.
“We are looking to expand our business in overseas markets
through investing in IT services companies in the coming 3 to 5
years, while actively looking for partnerships in India, europe and
U.S.,” said Younan, adding that the company is helping chinese
state-owned enterprises to set up IT platforms for their financial
services and microfinance businesses.
Experience these benefits first hand
The upcoming annual Technology Forum offers an ideal platform to experience and learn about these advantages that PccW
Solutions offers. It also builds on the success of last year’s inaugural
Forum that saw over 300 delegates attending the one-day event.
“Last year’s annual Technology Forum offered a very unique
opportunity for gathering so many high profile business leaders, cIOs, IT experts and our long-term customers to share their
industry insights and experience through keynotes sessions and
panel discussion. In addition, PccW Solutions, together with 15
partners, demonstrated wide-ranging technology solutions during the exhibition,” said Younan.
This year, the conference will focus on digitalization—what
it means, what enterprises need to do, and how PccW Solutions
and its network of partners can help. The theme “embracing digital Transformation to be Smarter enterprises” will bring together
industry experts to discuss the latest trends of digitalization and
how to tackle the challenges and opportunities presented by
social, security, mobile, analytics and cloud.
a key highlight of the conference will be the strong focus
on experience and real-time case studies. “We will share cases to
help delegates draw practical lessons from the Hong Kong and
the world’s leading businesses and technologies,” said Younan.
For more information about the PCCW
Solutions Annual Technology Forum,
please visit:
http://www.pccwsolutions.com/atf2015
or scan the QR code.
BIZPEOPLE
Don’t wait around for the government
The creator of the prestigious technology conference AllThingsDigital Walt Mossberg
visited Hong Kong recently to meet with local startups. Aiming to bring his new event
re/code to the city later this year, the legendary journalist talked with Computerworld
Hong Kong about the tech startup scene in Hong Kong and China
By Sheila Lam
Computerworld Hong Kong (CWHK):
Many Asian cities, including Hong
Kong, want to replicate the success of
Silicon Valley. What do you think the
government can do to make it work?
Walt Mossberg (WM): It’s hard to
compare exactly how it works in Silicon
Valley to how it might work in Hong
Kong. One big factor is, the government
had a very indirect role in the success of
Silicon Valley.
A lot of cities try to use public money
to create a tech district, and it never
works! The US tech leaders like Google,
Microsoft or Apple, they had to go to
Washington and lobby for more visas to
get overseas talents. It’s a fight with the
government, it’s not like the government
was out there to help them.
The way to have a similar kind of
success like the Valley is not to wait
around for the government to do stuff
for you. The way to do it is to create a
climate, where people that are young
and smart, with engineering, designs and
marketing skills, would want to live here.
The accessibility to raise funds matters a
lot. All the government can do is to avoid
the wrong policies, or figure out a way
to make housing more affordable. But
those have nothing to do with the tech
industry specifically.
CWHK: What do you think are the
advantages for Hong Kong-based
startups?
WM: I think there are advantages
here. You are part of China, but you
are not really part of China. You have a
separate system; this is the place where
people feel free. You have a much freer
political and economic environment here.
You have close access to the factories in
Shenzhen and a lot of financial activities
here. It’s up to you guys [to make it
successful].
CWHK: You’ve recently visited China,
what do you think about the startup
scene there?
WM: I think that just the sheer scale
of what’s going on in China is mindblowing. I’d say that China is at a tipping
point of being a copycat country for tech.
Right now if you go to any electronic
store, all the products are made in China,
but none of them are invented in China.
But I expect in a couple of years, there
will be Chinese brands, inventions or
innovation in the market.
CWHK: What are the technologies you
find most interesting?
WM: One good example is drones.
It hasn’t become a big deal yet. But a
In a couple of years, there will be Chinese brands,
inventions or innovation in the market
10 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
Mossberg from re/code: The sheer scale of
what’s going on in China is mind-blowing
leader in this area really is a Chinese
company in Shenzhen, called DGI. They
don’t really talk about being Chinese.
It’s not only made in China, but it’s also
being developed and invented in China.
CWHK: What do you think of Chinese
brands and can they compete in the
global technology scene?
WM: I think people will buy a Chinese
brand. Look at Samsung 20 years ago. If
you said ‘let’s buy this brand’, people
think it’s rubbish! But they went and
invested billions of dollars to improve
the quality of the products, spent a lot
in marketing to build its brand. Another
good example is Sony. We fought wars
against the country, but they have
become a well-respected brand. I don’t
see why Chinese brands can’t do the
same.
3
www.cw.com.hk
2015
IT heads at Manulife, Ageas and AAHK
named CIOs of the year
The 2015 winners highlight innovation and excellence of
leadership among IT leaders in Hong Kong
By Sheila Lam
12 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
www.cw.com.hk
2015
H
ong Kong CIO Awards has
reached
its
fourth
year.
Aiming to identify IT leaders
who demonstrate outstanding vision
and execution, the awards program is
organized by Computerworld Hong Kong
and CIO peer network CIO Connect.
Selected by the panel of judges led
by the panel chairperson Nick Kirkland,
chief executive at CIO Connect, this
year’s winners are Manulife’s Lilian
Wong, Ageas’ Henk ten Bos and Andy
Bien from Airport Authority Hong Kong
(AAHK).
Awarded for Large Enterprise CIO
for 2015, Wong at Manulife was awarded
for her “clear vision of understanding
[and] setting up structured IT initiatives
to support the business,” according to the
judges. Wong is also the first female CIO
to receive this Award.
“I am honored to receive the Hong
Kong CIO Award 2015. I would like
to thank the panel judges for their
recognition of the accomplishments of
our work at Manulife,” said Lilian Wong,
Vice President and CIO at Manulife. “This
is also a company and team award. We
could not have achieved so much without
such a committed team, nor strategic
vision from our senior management in
investing in IT.”
Meanwhile, Ageas’s CIO Henk ten
Bos, also from the insurance industry,
scooped the prize of Medium Enterprise
CIO of 2015. He was identified by the
judges for “his commitment in changing
the traditional IT environment to support
the fast changing face of the insurance
industry.”
“It’s good to see two insurance
companies winning this award, proving
it is not really a boring industry. A great
CIO should be a visionary leader seeking
not only operational improvements but
also creation of strategic values so as to
www.cw.com.hk bring real business returns,” said Henk
ten Bos, CIO of Ageas.
New category for pubic sector
Aiming to recognize the different
achievements of CIOs from the private
enterprises and public sector, a new
category—Public Sector CIO—was
introduced. The first winner of this
award goes to Andy Bien, CIO at Airport
Authority Hong Kong.
“I’m very honored to receive this
award. It’s a very warm feeling because
the judges are also ex-CIOs, so they truly
understand our challenges and winning
this award makes me feel deeply moved.
This award also goes to my team, because
the CIO is also part of the team and without
their support, I can’t achieve anything. I
thank you for the encouragement and will
continue to work harder to make IT a more
impactful profession,” said Andy Bien,
CIO at Airport Authority Hong Kong.
Judging process and criteria
These awards were created specifically
to put the spotlight on IT leaders in Hong
Kong and Macau with submissions
accepted only if the nominating CIO is
based in these two cities. Past winners
have come from Cathay Pacific, Hong
Kong Broadband and MTRC.
CIOs who led companies with an IT
budget of USD10 million and above were
considered in the Large Enterprise CIO
category. IT leaders from government
departments, statutory bodies and nonprofit organizations were eligible for the
Public Sector category.
Award nominees had to provide
testimonial from their supervisors, and
complete a detailed submission form to
demonstrate their achievement. Judges
evaluated the submission based on the
following key areas:
• Technology-led
or
technologyenabled innovation
• Creation of significant business value
• Delivery of business/technology
transformation
• Development of IT organization and
staff
Winners of the award are truly IT
leader that deserve recognition and served
as an inspiration to our CIO community in
Hong Kong.
3
Judging Committee
Nick Kirkland, CEO CIO Connect (Judging Committee Chairman)
Ted Suen, Head of IT at MTR (2013 winner – large enterprise CIO)
Eric Ho, CIO Hong Kong Broadband (2013 winner – medium enterprise CIO)
Andy Chun, CIO, City University HK (2012 winner – medium enterprise CIO)
Po-Chi Wu, Adjunct Professor at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
YB Yeung, formerly at HSBC
Raymond Wong, formerly at Immigration Department, HKSAR Government
Tom Sheppard, formerly at Cable and Wireless HKT
Steve Ungs, former Field CIO, PepsiCo Asia Middle East and Africa (AMEA)
Reza Bahrami, former CIO Asia Pacific, HanesBrands
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 13
2015
Unleash the power in
Manulife’s DNA
Lilian Wong embraces the spirit of customer centricity and
collaboration to bring business success via technology
By Sheila Lam
T
he vibrant insurance industry in
Hong Kong has made tremendous
strides in the past decade. Competition has also become intense with a
lot more new players entering the fray,
as compared to more than 115 years ago,
when Manulife first operated in Hong
Kong. As the market become more competitive, Manulife has turned to technology to uphold its leading position in the
market.
Led by the company’s CIO Lilian
Wong, Manulife Hong Kong has introduced different IT initiatives in the past
18 months. These initiatives enabled the
company to offer more personalized services for its customers, streamline operations internally and allowed her to win
the title of Hong Kong CIO of the Year.
Wong is also the first female CIO to win
this award.
“She has demonstrated a clear strategic vision. Lilian presents herself as a
partner in the business and focuses on
building IT/IS as a resource for the company, not just a set of tools,” said the judging panel.
Working at Manulife for more than
20 years, with experience at the company’s Asia and North America operations,
Wong understands the company’s culture
and operations inside out, which she finds
is critical when introducing change.
“A thorough understanding of the
industry and organization allows me to
identify tactics required to introduce
change that enables the company to
evolve into a highly customer-centric and
effective organization,” said Wong.
14 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
way to create an engaging and effective
journey for our customers across different
customer touch points,” said Wong.
“Our previous website focused on
providing content and functions to our
customers,” she said. “The new version
focuses on designing a digital journey and
providing information according to customers’ needs. Information can be provided with minimal number of clicks,” she
said. “This is critical for user experience.”
Composing a user experience
journey
Manulife’s Wong is the first female CIO
to receive the Hong Kong CIO of the
Year Award
IT and marketing collaboration
Part of Manulife’s DNA, according to
Wong, is the focus on customer centricity
and spirit of togetherness. It was this rooted corporate culture that inspired Wong to
introduce Manulife’s e-Business Council,
a collaborative effort with the chief customer officer (CCO), who oversees the
company’s corporate communications,
customer service, customer relationship
management and marketing functions.
Developed about four years ago, the
e-Business Council is a cross functional
team, with members mainly from both
the CIO and CCO offices and other key
business units. Its goal is to develop the
company’s digital strategy and to identify
projects to enable customer centricity.
One of its major contributions is the
development of user-centered design
(UCD) methodology—“an effective
Wong said the e-Business Council engaged a consultant firm to conduct a competitive analysis of the company’s customer touch points and its effectiveness.
Based on the analysis, the council has
established a methodology for developing
and measuring the efficiency of presenting its service information.
“We are one of the pioneers within
the local insurance industry to introduce
this practice,” said Wong. “Today, every
newly introduced customer touch point at
Manulife has to go through an assessment
process to ensure it is aligned with our
methodology.”
But this is not the end of the journey. With customers’ needs continuously
changing and the company’s products
constantly evolving, the council’s UCD
methodology also incorporated a learning
mechanism. “This is where Web analytics
come in,” said Wong.
With the use of Web analytics, the
council constantly studies customer
behavior over different digital channels,
in order to modify the design and
navigation.
“We constantly look for information
that customers are interested at, ensuring
it is located at more visible position,” she
said.
Driving efficiency
Apart from initiatives to engage
with customers externally, Wong also
introduced initiatives to foster internal
operations efficiency.
www.cw.com.hk
2015
“I am a Leader” is a one-year program to develop IT leadership within Manulife
During 2013-2014, waves of technology refresh were introduced, including the revamping of ManuTouch—a
10-year-old Web-based tool for the company’s distributors to access products
and customer information. Apart from
its 6,500 insurance agents, Manulife also
distributes via banks and brokers. ManuTouch is the foundational digital tool for
these distributors.
“The plan is to enhance the content, functionality and usability of
ManuTouch, so our agents can rely on
ManuTouch, instead of our back office
staff to seek information,” said Wong.
She noted that the revamp started with
a replacement of its content management
system. One of the major enhancements
in the new platform is the advanced
search function, which allows users
to easily access relevant information,
in order to facilitate sales or customer
service. Another major enhancement is
mobility support.
Mobility takes priority
In order to prioritize development and
understand users’ mobility needs, Wong
said the company conducts surveys on device adoption regularly and focus group
studies to design mobile offerings. “The
ManuTouch enhancement was a great
success and with an impressive daily
adoption rate,” she said.
Working hand-in-hand with ManuTouch is the company’s point of sales
(POS) solution, which not only enables
transactions, but also provides personalized financial analysis and product recommendations for customers.
“This is a critical tool for our agents to
provide financial advice,” she said. “Our
company has won the Financial Planning
Award for eight consecutive years, demonstrating the significance of the POS usability to bring a high degree of professionalism in our sales approach.”
Mobility plays a big part in the tool’s
usability, according to Wong. Available
via different types of mobile devices,
Manulife’s POS allow agents to facilitate
the entire sales process—from supporting customer to identify needs, providing
financial analysis, developing a personalized quotation and submitting the applications—all within the same platform.
“We started developing this tool in
Hong Kong in 2011,” said Wong. “The
tool has undergone continuous enhancement to deliver new value. We are now
contributing our experience to benefit
other countries within Asia.”
Coaching and development
In addition to her achievement in business, Wong was also recognized for her
Women tend to be better at naming and addressing
feelings, and are more sensitive towards others,
which are all important qualities for a good leader
– Lilian Wong, Manulife
www.cw.com.hk commitment to team development.
“Lilian has demonstrated thought
leadership in managing her department.
She attends to staff engagement, staff development and leadership development.
She has invested her time in coaching to
uplift the effectiveness of her managers,”
according to Michael Huddart, executive vice president and general manager
Greater China at Manulife.
Wong said staff engagement plays a
big part in the success of these initiatives.
With an IT team of 150, Wong has developed different initiatives over the past 18
months to enhance staff engagement and
career development.
To develop IT leadership, Wong has
established a program called “I am a leader” for 20 managers within her team. This
one-year program offers meetings, focus
group discussions and workshops based
on a theme that’s updated every quarter.
These themes include: conducting effective performance management; managing perceptions; team reflections; performance expectation and gap alignment.
“The program is based on the concept
of the Christian fellowship,” she said.
“The idea is to let the managers realize
they are not a lonely leader and to boost
their people management skills. After all,
a manager plays a critical role in the team
member’s engagement and help staff to
manage work-life balance.”
As the first female winner of the
Award and a mother of two daughters,
Wong said striving for a balanced career
and family life is probably a challenge
shared by many female executives.
“I don’t see major constraints or limited opportunities for female executives,”
she said. “But it takes personal discipline
and management to balance family and
career development.”
Meanwhile, women also have an advantage with stronger inter-personal and
communication skills. “Women tend to
be better at naming and addressing feelings, and are more sensitive towards others, which are all important qualities for a
good leader,” Wong concluded.
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 15
2015
An appetite for change
Sitting still is never an option for Henk ten Bos of Ageas, as he constantly looks
for new ways to improve different areas of the company’s IT organization
By Gigi Onag
F
or a mid-sized company, Ageas
Insurance Company (Asia) has
been in the forefront of using new
technologies to continually enhance its
back-office and front-end operations.
The credit for this goes in no small
measure to company CIO Henk ten
Bos who has been serving as the bridge
between his team and their business
users, ensuring that an open line of
communication allows for the exchange
of information and ideas.
Stuart Fraser, CEO of Ageas Hong
Kong, finds ten Bos’ insights in IT and
its application to the company’s business
invaluable. “He actively engages in
business discussions and strategic projects
and as a result our IT strategies are well
aligned to our business challenges,” he
added.
“Henk continuously challenges the
status-quo and identifies opportunities to
implement the latest technology. Ageas
is therefore recognized as a pioneer and
leader in the use of mobile applications
at all customer touch points. We were
also one of the first insurance companies
to adopt cloud based solutions for our
agents.”
Turning challenge into
opportunity
When new regulatory requirements
started having an impact on Ageas’s
Unit Linked products, the company
saw a chance to add a completely new
proposition by introducing an electronic
trading platform for its customers, agents
and other distribution partners.
Called iInvest, the online wealth
16 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
management platform is envisioned to
compliment the Unit Linked Products
and is considered to be an important
additional new business stream for Ageas.
It has been set up separately from the
company’s traditional insurance business,
with its own organizational unit composed
of new staff.
From the onset, ten Bos and his team
were actively involved in the project from
concept to delivery.
“We needed a lot of external expertise
for this complex project. After technical
evaluation, we decided to build a platform
based on an infrastructure-as-a-service
concept—which has challenges in terms
of security. How do you ensure that the
regulations are properly taken into account
because they are quite stringent? How do
you find the right partners? How do you
ensure that things are done right around
security, availability and performance?”
ten Bos recalled.
The relatively new iInvest platform is
one of Ageas major business milestones
in Hong Kong, and according to ten Bos,
it took a year and half to implement and
roll out.
Building a good foundation
Unlike many of its competitors, Ageas
does not have to worry about running
30-year-old legacy systems. Most of its
systems and infrastructure are only about
a decade old.
“But again, technology changes so fast
that these days legacies are created much
faster than before,” ten Bos observed,
adding that “insurance companies are
struggling with a lot of inefficiencies in
their internal processes, and Ageas is no
exception to this”.
To make IT more efficient so his
team can spend time to work on new
technologies that add business value, ten
Bos sets aside a part of Ageas’s yearly
technology spend on existing systems and
infrastructure upgrade.
“I strongly believe it is crucial to ring
fence a portion of the annual IT budget to
internal process innovation,” he said.
Sales and Operations IT
Strategy
Recognizing that technology is inextricably linked to business requirements,
Ageas has a change management office
which is tasked to oversee all business
projects. As large part of the work in
these projects is IT-related, ten Bos was
asked to head this department last year.
“One and a half years ago, we felt it
was time to relook at the things we need
to put in place to ensure that three to five
years from now our customers and agents
are properly supported,” ten Bos said.
“Last year, we developed a strategy for
this change. It will give us a very good
foundation for the coming two to three
years to develop new capabilities and
to refresh our infrastructure where it is
required.”
ten Bos called this three-to-five year
plan Ageas’ Sales and Operations IT
Strategy. Together with key business
stakeholders, ten Bos and his team
organized a series of workshops “to
define our future state in terms of
business processes to support sales and
operations”.
www.cw.com.hk
2015
Henk continuously challenges the
status-quo and identifies opportunities
to implement the latest technology
– Stuart Fraser, Ageas
ten Bos of Ageas: Our
business strategy is to
offer financial solutions
using the ‘Martini
concept’
“Key attention points in these
processes were the ‘moments of truth’–
critical events where you have to provide
an excellent experience to meet the
customer’s expectations,” he added.
Based on anticipated future business
processes, Ageas IT team conducted a gap
analysis of its existing IT environment
and prepared a solution architecture
with three key areas of implementation:
business process management, customer
communication management, and a new
mobile environment for Ageas insurance
agents.
The two-to-three-year implementation
roadmap is now a work in progress, with
the first projects expected to start in
2015. “We are still trying to translate the
strategy into a number of manageable
projects, of a few are potentially large
initiatives.”
“Our business strategy is built around
financial solutions for our customers that
meet their needs and that are offered using
the ‘Martini concept’; they are available
anytime, anyplace and anywhere.”
www.cw.com.hk Mentoring IT talents
ten Bos divides his attention equally—about one-third of time—between
engaging with business stakeholders and
managing/developing his IT team. An important part of his role of CIO is coaching.
The IT department has a 24-month
training program called Gateway, which
is specifically geared towards junior IT
staff with limited work experience.
“We provide explicit steps that
will help the staff to achieve their first
promotion based on buddy support,
technical training, personal development
and support from IT management,” ten
Bos explained.
He supplements the program by organizing sessions with small groups of junior IT staff once or twice a year to walk
them through the highlights of the business and IT strategy. “These sessions enable them to spend time with the CIO and
ask any questions they might have.”
Last year, to stimulate creative thinking in his team, innovation groups of four
to five people across his IT organization
were allowed to use a percentage of their
time to work on something innovative.
“This approach has helped staff at
all levels to think outside the box, open
themselves for new, alternative ideas and
to get a better understanding about current
technologies available in the market; and,
validate their potential benefits to Ageas.”
While ten Bos is open to new technologies, he maintains a healthy skepticism of next-big-things being touted in
the market.
“The word ‘disruption’ is much discussed in IT circles these days. The message almost always seems to be: transform your existing business overnight,
otherwise you’ll be out of business tomorrow,” he said.
ten Bos noted: “Although there are
definitely cases where such impactful transformations have happened, I do
think that technologies are still frequently
overhyped. It is therefore the role of the
CIO to educate people about these technologies, their relevance and feasibility
for implementation.” 3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 17
Druva inSync offers no tradeoff between security and file
sharing and is the only integrated data governance solution
that meets the needs of both IT departments and business users
What to look for in Enterprise File
Synchronization and Sharing
WORKFORCE MOBILITY AND BYOD are bringing new challenges
to IT organizations as employees collaborate and share data
internally and externally. Confounding the headache is the use
of consumer-grade file sharing solutions installed on most mobile
devices.
“IT needs to ensure that corporate data is shared securely,” said
Jason Tam, Assistant Product Manager of The I-Consulting Group
(ICG). “Consumer solutions cause rampant exposure to sensitive
corporate data. IT needs to balance security and compliance
consideration with the needs of end users, especially around ease
of use.”
He stressed it is requisite for companies not only to secure their
confidential information stored in endpoint devices, but to back
them up for business continuity.
“But deploying two separate solutions for backup and
collaboration usually results in major inefficiencies,” Tam added.
Advantages of Enterprise File Sharing
It is no easy task to balance the need to open up the enterprise
to file-sharing and collaboration requirements demanded by
today’s business users and IT’s duty to protect the integrity of
corporate information. Now, walking that tightrope is even
more challenging as employees become increasingly untethered
from desktops – increasingly turning to endpoint devices as their
platform of choice.
According to ICG, the time has come for companies to take a
serious look at enterprise-grade solution that seamlessly delivers
both file sharing and security. The company offers six criteria that
IT departments should keep in mind when looking into enterprise
file sharing:
1. User experience
Secure file sharing must provide end users with an easy and
seamless way to collaborate. This will ensure that they do not
resort to unsanctioned ways of sharing.
“On average, there are 2.8 connected devices per employee, so
real-time sync of files and folders across multiple devices ensures
easy access to all data from any device,” Tam noted. “Users should
be able to specify which files and folders they would like synced
across which devices.”
On laptops, file sharing should integrate into the user’s natural
file system environment to provide a familiar interface for easy
file sharing. On mobile devices, users should be able to share files
directly from the mobile app for effective collaboration when
working remotely.
Integrating file sharing with endpoint backup and DLP yields huge efficiencies and
savings in cost, time and effort in endpoint management.
– Jason Tam, Assistant Product Manager of The I-Consulting Group (ICG)
Brought to you by ICG
inSync Share
Secure Enterprise
File Sharing & Collaboration
“Users should also be able to set view and edit permissions
and restrict download when sharing data. Notifications keep
users informed about changes to shared files,” Tam added.
out companies with 10,000 employees can save more than US$47
million a year by unifying endpoint management into one solution
2. IT control
instead of four disparate ones.
Through policy management, IT should be able to enable or
Using a single client enables IT to easily apply the same policies
disable file sharing
employees, and to control an employee’s
across
backup,
file sharing,– DLP and data governance, saving
THEforCHALLENGE
THE
SOLUTION
ability to share files within and outside of the organization. With
valuable IT time and resources.
Druva’s inSync Share
To easily ITshare
files or
and
collaborate
coworkers,
device-level permission,
can enable
disable
sharing with
on mobile,
employees
bringing their
consumer-grade
as well as enable
data lossare
protection
(DLP)preferred
on mobile
devices that fileSecure
collaboration
with
Druva inSync
is the only solution
thatDruva
meets theinSync
needs of
access corporate
data.solutions inside the enterprise. This trend creates the
According to Tam, Druva inSync is the only solution that delivers
sharing
both IT departments and end users.
enterprise-grade security, while offering full-featured file sharing
following challenges:
• End users
a full-featured
fileas
sharing
solution that
is as
3. IT visibility
that get
is as
easy to use
its consumer
equivalents.
• Consumer solutions cause rampant exposure of sensitivecapabilities
easy
to
use
as
consumer
solutions.
File sharing solutions need to provide IT with visibility into
Enterprise-grade security protects critical corporate data that ends
corporate data, IT needs to ensure that corporate data is
where and how data is shared – something that is critical for data
up on•any
external
devices.
IT user-owned
departments or
benefit
from
inSync’s enterprise-grade
shared securely.
governance and e-discovery proposes.
InSync
Sharerich
is policy
integrated
seamlessly
backup
security,
management,
and with
deep inSync’s
integration
• ITanalytics
needs to balance
security
and compliance
considerations
Reporting and
are key
features
that provide
IT
and DLPwith
modules,
which
enables
to enjoy
benefit
endpoint
backup,
datacompanies
loss prevention
(DLP),the
and
with the
of end
users, especially
around
of use. of unified
with detailed insights
intoneeds
sharing
patterns
and trends
in ease
order
data
management for end-to-end data protection and
data
analytics.
to understand and
the
right policies
to protect
• ITthen
needsimplement
to ensure that
corporate
data stored
on endpointsgovernance. End users, on the other hand, gain a unified client
corporate data. With
activityup
streams,
IT cancontinuity.
track activities
within twoexperience across all their endpoint data.
is backed
for business
But deploying
specific user groups,
endpoints
and
data
sets.
“IT gets visibility into all sharing activities within the
separate solutions for backup and collaboration usually
organization,”
Tam said. “Visibility is instrumental in understanding
results in major inefficiencies.
4. Enterprise-grade security
patterns and implementing the right policies to safeguard your
Enterprise-grade file sharing solutions must feature the
company’s information.”
strongest possible security. Corporate data should be encrypted in
inSync is designed from the ground up for endpoints with
transit, in storage and on device.
the understanding that endpoints often connect over WANs and
Because shared files are frequently accessed and downloaded
VPN-less networks. inSync encrypts data in transit with 256-bit SSL
onto mobile devices, DLP capabilities are critical. When IT has the
encryption, while data at rest is secured by strict authentication
ability to geo-locate devices and remotely wipe corporate data,
and access control, as well as with 256-bit AES encryption.
companies do not have to worry about data leaks if a device is lost
Established in 2008, Druva is known for its unified endpoint
or stolen.
governance solution with expanded capabilities beyond backup to
include self-restore, mobile access, sync and share, e-discovery and
5. Performance
remote wipe. For two years in a row, it has been ranked number
Backup should be integrated into the file sharing solution so
one by Gartner in terms of capabilities and user-friendliness.
it can leverage features of endpoint backup, such as deduplication
With the help of ICG, its value-added reseller that brings Druva
and WAN optimization.
inSync to Hong Kong, Druva has rapidly grown its customer base
With global deduplication, only a single copy of a file is uploaded
to include SCMP, Gammon Construction, Hsin Chong Group, China
to and stored on the server regardless of how many users actually
Everbright, Altana Group, Rouse Legal and other major investment
receive it. Less data in transit and storage result in faster syncing for
banks and fund houses in the city.
performance benefits for file sharing as well as backup.
6. Unified management
Centralized administration provides IT with a single place to
manage file sharing for any number of global users. IT can create
groups to easily apply the same file-sharing policies across users,
including external link sharing, mobile access, data retention rules
and user quotas.
“Integrating file sharing with endpoint backup and DLP yields
huge efficiencies and savings in cost, time and effort in endpoint
management,” Tam said.
Quoting a research study by Ponemon Institute, he pointed
About ICG
Telephone: +852 3916 8900
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.i-cg.com
2015
From ground to sky: HK Airport sees
no limit to IT innovation
AAHK CIO Andy Bien demonstrates IT excellence in corporate governance,
team leadership, and openness towards emerging technologies
By Carol Ko
R
unning IT at one of the world’s
best international airports is like
piloting a high-speed jet against
a crowded city skyline. While the constant interaction between individuals and
computer devices presents a disruptive
force, the pervasive use of social media,
which results in consumers leading the
enterprises, can become equally disruptive.
Andy Bien, CIO of Airport Authority
of Hong Kong (AAHK) since 2010, was
lauded the CIO of the Year Award—Public Sector Category in Computerworld
Hong Kong CIO Awards 2015.
The judges commended Bien’s well
balanced approach in reshaping his IT
organization, while aligning IT strategies
with business ones. “He has also demonstrated proven abilities in managing 24/7
mission-critical operations at the airport,
while injecting new innovation to benefit
passengers and operations,” stated the
judging panel.
Tapping airport data
The AAHK’s IT team manages an array of mission-critical systems unique to
airport operation. Examples include flight
information display, baggage handling,
check-in, and resource management.
These are all tied together with an airport
operational database. Since 2014, these
systems have undergone major upgrades,
and have performed without interrupting
current operations.
Mobile location services are a key
20 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
AAHK’s Bien: I hope the IT
community can do away with the
split into two camps: “user” and
“vendor”
area of IT development. Since 2013,
the Airport has conducted on-site trials
of Wi-Fi-based tracking. Indeed, Hong
Kong International Airport (HKIA) was
one of the first to launch Google indoor
map and participated in its indoor tracking trials. For higher accuracy levels, IT
will soon adopt a multi-factor approach,
by combining the use of Wi-Fi with Low
Energy Bluetooth (e.g., iBeacon) and other sensing technology (e.g., Audio).
Several partners have been engaged
in big data analytics adoption. In 2013,
AAHK established a data warehouse
to extract operational data for further
analysis. “Additionally, the vast amount
of data generated by weather, flight
patterns, passenger numbers and profile
(not private data), as well as equipment
and smart devices can be explored with
current big data tools to help predict
people flow, congestions for passengers or
baggage, security, customer satisfaction,
and retail opportunities,” Bien said.
Unlocking strategic IT values
To ensure IT’s development direction aligns with business strategies, Bien
earlier facilitated the formation of the IT
Steering Committee to enable the CEO
and executive directors to discuss and deliberate on IT-related issues.
www.cw.com.hk
2015
Our task is to make our IT infrastructure flexible
enough, so it won’t be constrained by legacy
infrastructure going forward
—Andy Bien, Airport Authority of Hong Kong
In 2013, Bien formed a new unit
called the IT Planning and Architecture
Team. It performs three functions: business engagement, enterprise architecture,
and project design. “Our initial successes
included a better annual planning process,
and a more structured portfolio management process,” he said.
To engage and support local IT startups, AAHK recently established the
HKIA Innovation Centre. With R&D
funding reserved, the Centre will create
a controlled environment to conduct pilot
IT projects, while enabling the Airport to
leverage new technologies. “The Centre
is not exclusive to HKIA,” Bien said. “We
will invite participation from the supporting industries, including airlines, cargo
operation, engineering, catering, police
and immigration.”
The airport is an information hub for
the whole community, IT will participate
in the Government-led open data platform
initiative. “We believe this will stimulate
startups and entrepreneurs to develop innovative services for HKIA’s customers,”
Bien said.
Transforming biz-tech delivery
Next year, IT plans to relocate portion
of its IT environment to third party data
centers. Partly due to aging infrastructure
and capacity limitation, IT also wishes
to benefit from the modern processes of
data center management and skillsets. “To
avoid unacceptable risks of the Internet,
we won’t go wholesale to cloud,” he said.
Indeed, IT demarcates its on-premise network into airport-wide LAN and Wi-Fi.
www.cw.com.hk “We’ll take pains to ensure our network
operation wouldn’t be Internet-dependent.”
For more efficient solutions delivery
and innovation, IT is working on outsourcing generic IT services like ERP, backoffice and smaller non-core solutions.
Instead of utilizing traditional BPM/ERP
platform, IT will adopt a cloud-based service management platform which enables
user self-service.
Building in flexibility for 3rd
runway
With the impending expansion of
the airport in the form of the third runway, which represents a 50% expansion
in terms of physical footprint, passengers
and cargo numbers, Bien anticipates increased technology application for greater
efficiency and capabilities.
“The airport will see greater adoption of robotics for cargo and baggage
handling,” he said. IT is also exploring
software-defined warehouse systems to
provide a flexible infrastructure which
enables the airport to do five to 10 years
of long-term planning.
“We may experience two to three more
technology revolutions between now and
the next 10 years. Our task is to make
our IT infrastructure flexible enough, so
it won’t be constrained by legacy infrastructure going forward,” said Bien.
IT staff development
“Are we facing IT talent shortage today? The answer is both ‘yes’ and ‘no,’”
Bien said. “The question is not whether
you have hired the right people, but how
you develop your staff to become the
right people.”
Bien finds public sector bodies are
generally not strong in human resources
development. Although AAHK’s IT staff
predominantly have an IT background,
they need to develop their soft skills, too.
Instead of providing training, he finds job
rotation is a more practical move.
“There is no replacement for training in action,” he said. “If you have not
led any change, or have not overcome a
difficult project, does that mean you are
good at risk management? Sometimes
one needs to face the reality that in order
to achieve a full outcome, one may need
to kill a project.”
Win-win user-vendor
relationship
“Being part of the IT constituency, I
hope the IT community can do away with
the split into two camps: ‘user’ and ‘vendor’, Bien said.
Instead of focusing on slashing vendors’ costs, he suggested that CIOs should
place primary focus on finding common
goals with IT suppliers, so that both sides
can deliver their technology promises.
Knowing that a system engagement
would bring both procurement return and
public relations value to an IT supplier,
Bien said he would lend his support by
providing good reference for a job well
done. “It doesn’t cost me to appear in
some of the industry events and provide
testimonials to some of these projects, but
I know these are of great value to them.”
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 21
INDUSTRYPROFILE
Hassle-free shipping
Easyship is a venture started by
three young entrepreneurs
Easyship offers professional packing and shipping
services for cost-conscious online retailers
By Gigi Onag
L
ogistics and fulfillment can be a
headache for both old and new
retailers regardless of their level
of experience.
Seeing a need for affordable
e-fulfillment services, new technology
startup Easyship has launched an
online platform that allows Hong Kong
companies of all sizes to outsource this
part of their supply chain with just a few
clicks of the mouse.
“We provide a one-stop solution for the
fulfillment needs of e-commerce sellers,
offering pick-up, packing, shipping and
tracking — all on demand — without
prior contract in place,” said one of the
company’s co-founders Augustin Ceyrac.
New kids on the block
Established in December 2014,
Easyship is a venture of three young
entrepreneurs (Reuben Abraham Philip
and Tommaso Tamburnotti are the other
founders) who bring their complementary
skills in sales, operations, logistics and
technology development.
The company is among the first batch
of promising B2B technology startups
recently selected for the Swire Property’s
blueprint accelerator program.
“Private sellers with no merchant expertise appreciate that our solution handles
their small fulfillment needs, removing
the hassle of setting up and maintaining
accounts with shipping companies. They
also benefit from the bulk-rates we have
pre-negotiated, as they wouldn’t receive
these discounts otherwise,” Ceyrac said.
SMEs, shipping between 50 and
500 orders a month, comprise 80% of
Easyship’s customer base. Large sellers
that ship on average of over 500 orders a
month also use the company’s service to
handle their excess volume.
“It is the fluctuations in their daily
volumes that make them vulnerable to
achieving better cost efficiencies. Easyship represents the best way for them to
outsource, and their reputation is upheld
when they work with a committed fulfillment team like Easyship to ensure the best
experience for their customers,” he said.
Indeed, the company recently marked
its 1,000th shipment.
E-fulfillment on the go
According to Ceyrac, Easyship’s
platform allows SME vendors to process
their orders from any source they manage
— from eBay, Amazon, Lazada and their
own website among others — and enables
them to ship using multiple couriers.
The Easyship algorithm automatically
selects the cheapest and the most reliable
shipping courier to use, depending on
the nature of goods shipped and their
destination. From pickup to customer
delivery, the goods are comprehensively
tracked, allowing sellers to provide
transparency to their customers.
Our on-demand technology enables us to deliver the
same e-fulfillment services without holding the stock
of our customers
– Augustin Ceyrac, Easyship
22 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
“We stand out in the crowd against
other e-fulfillment warehouses, as we
are not a warehouse at all,” Ceyrac said.
“Our on-demand technology enables
us to deliver the same e-fulfillment
services without holding the stock of our
customers. This allows us to service the
needs of large-scale manufacturers and
also SME vendors whose production
cycles are typically smaller or, in some
cases, made to order. This flexibility
makes Easyship a preferred option for
SME vendors who sell their products via
online portals like eBay.”
What Easyship has in terms of
physical infrastructure is a processing
center in Lai Chi Kok where customers’
orders are packed and shipped. Currently,
the company has signed up multinational
couriers such as FedEx and DHL to
provide shipping services.
“Beyond our competitive shipping
cost, we place a small fixed fee on the
pick-up and packing service per customer
shipment. We are flexible at our core and
we consider pricing for each customer on
a case-by-case basis to ensure the best
possible outcome is achieved for our
customers,” Ceyrac said.
Meanwhile,
Easyship
expects
to further expand its operations in
Hong Kong through partnerships with
e-commerce platforms like Lazada and
popular e-commerce software provider
Shopline.
“This will provide Easyship with
greater visibility across all e-commerce
channels. We then plan to expand
Easyship to other parts of Asia and
our business development arm will
investigate opportunities in these regional
markets more closely,” Ceyrac said. 3
www.cw.com.hk
Innovative solution that combines fixed and mobile network, coupled with
a resilient architecture and deep expertise, streamlines car park management.
Operations Support Center
centralizes car park management
in one location.
Vincent So, Director and General
Manager, Wilson Parking sees SmarTone
partnership as a win-win for both.
IN A DENSE URBAN ENVIRONMENT like Hong Kong, car parking
is big business of high complexity. Managing car parking bays in
a variety of buildings and remote areas requires a flexible and
reliable network architecture. It is a challenge that Wilson Parking
faces every day.
A wholly-owned subsidiary of property conglomerate Sun Hung
Kai Properties Limited and established in 1983, Wilson Parking has
seen demand for parking skyrocket. Today, the company manages
nearly 350 car parks comprising of more than 100,000 bays across
the territory.
All car parks are wired to ensure that information from the
onsite Point-of-Sale (POS) systems, access control systems and
other business support data is sent to its three strategically-located
control centers. The information is then relayed to headquarters
for management, decision-making and oversight.
coverage and the need to set up new sites quickly and efficiently.
“We looked beyond giving them a connectivity answer.
Instead, we saw ourselves as a partner, and offered a flexible,
comprehensive and one-stop solution that combined both fixed
and mobile connectivity, as well as custom services and advisory,”
said Stephen Chau, Chief Technology Officer, SmarTone.
Connectivity between the car parks and control centers has
been upgraded to fiber-based broadband backed by the highspeed 4G mobile network. Automatic failover and VPN helped
ensure the network is up and running continually and securely.
Besides offering resiliency, the solution also offers flexibility to car
parks where fixed lines are currently unavailable, with its mobile
network. SmarTone also designed a highly available network
between the three control centers and headquarters to minimize
downtime and continual operation of Wilson Parking’s business.
Growth challenges
Unhinging growth
As volume of transactions rocketed, Wilson Parking needed an
infrastructure that has sufficient bandwidth to match its business
growth.
For a business that runs 24x7, reliability is vital. Each car park
was connected to one of the control centers via fixed line only
which can be the single point of failure. The company required
an uninterrupted delivery of relevant data to respond quickly and
maximize operational efficiency.
“We needed a reliable network and system for centralizing,
controlling and automating the business,” said Vincent So,
Director and General Manager, Wilson Parking. “We knew that
the architecture then was not able to support our business goals,
and we needed one that offers us both reliability and flexibility.”
With these ambitious goals in mind, Wilson Parking soon
turned to SmarTone for the solution.
SmarTone’s holistic approach helped Wilson Parking to
concentrate more on business growth, and less on the network.
“We can now take our business to the next level and
beyond. SmarTone understood our business needs, and offered
an innovative approach that improved reliability and flexibility.
They also helped us improve our cost efficiency by using mobile
networks to boost our operational efficiency,” said So.
For SmarTone, the Wilson Parking project has further
demonstrated its leadership in combining vast ICT expertise with
its experience in deploying business-critical solutions that solve
customer challenges. “Our approach to solving the customer’s
problem first begins with an in-depth understanding of the
customer’s business needs and challenges. We then provide the
best solution, backed by our expertise and proven track record
in both fixed and mobile connectivity as well as ICT products and
services,” said Chau.
More importantly, Wilson Parking views SmarTone as a partner.
“It is a win-win for both of us. To compete and succeed in today’s
market, you need to find the right partners who understand your
business and are committed to your success,” said So.
Parking with the right partner
SmarTone went beyond improving connectivity. The company
endeavored to understand Wilson Parking’s operations and its
unique business challenges, including car park locations, network
Brought to you by SmarTone
Wilson Parking Dials In
Reliability, Efficiency With
SmarTone
Casestudy
Meeting BCP needs with
hybrid cloud storage
Microsoft Azure’s hybrid cloud storage helps MassMutual to
lower opex and meet compliance requirements
By Gigi Onag
T
wo years ago, Massachusettsbased MassMutual Financial
Group issued a new set of requirements to ensure business continuity during regional and local disasters. Listed in
the group’s comprehensive EIRM (Enterprise Information Risk Management)
document, the requirements stipulate in
detail various contingencies that its local
offices need to have in place to assure uninterrupted business operations in times
of unforeseen incidents. The mandatory
requirements apply to all its subsidiaries
worldwide, including the Hong Kongbased MassMutual Asia.
“One of the requirements is to store
all customer data 60 miles away,” recalled Daryl Cheng, senior vice president,
management information systems, MassMutual Asia.
Looking for an overseas
location
Located in Hong Kong, MassMutual
Asia is the global insurer’s head office
in the region and is currently run by a
team composed of 2,300 consultants and
300 administrative staff. The company
keeps an offsite backup system in a traditional tape vault at a facility with Iron
MassMutual’s Cheng (right): One of the benefits of the solution is its fast deployment
Mountain in Tuen Mun. With the EIRM’s
60-miles-away prerequisite, the company
was forced to look for another backup
site—one that is geographically outside
of Hong Kong.
“Macau is out of the question because
it is just 43 miles away. Taiwan is defined
by the EIRM as part of Mainland China
and we are not allowed by corporate
guidelines to store data on the north side.
So the only option for us was either Singapore or Japan,” Cheng said.
The company considered establishing and operating a new offsite disaster
recovery site in-house. However, it was
quickly taken off the table.
“Cost was one of the major considerations,” Cheng explained. “To establish a
data center in Singapore would involve
Web hosting, investment in hardware,
The solution helped us reduce the running cost of Internet, which would have
been 20 times more expensive if we were using an overseas cable
—Daryl Cheng, MassMutual Asia
24 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
www.cw.com.hk
Pure Storage believes all-flash arrays are now a mainstream option as prices
continue to drop and the technology’s maturity reaches a tipping point
ALL-FLASH STORAGE is ready for primetime as the price barrier has
been breached and innovations in the technology now make it an
attractive alternative for companies who are retiring their existing
storage systems.
“We have redefined flash storage for the data center. We have
worked around the limitations and developed a platform that
made consumer grade MLC flash reliable for enterprise use cases,”
said Michael Cornwell, chief technology officer for Asia-Pacific and
Japan at Pure Storage.
Gone are the days when all-flash arrays are only deployed for
very narrow and very high-performance workload set, which typically comprised 10% of data center applications. The technology is
out to establish a footprint in Tier1 primary SAN storage, according to Cornwell.
“What is happening is that flash is transforming the user experience. It is not just about being faster. It is about using less power
and it is about using less IT resources in order to manage environments. It is about developing new business paradigms based on
the instant access capability of flash.”
Cornwell said flash memory will push hard drives – in the years
ahead – out of the latency path of performance-intensive applications, adding that the technology has become more affordable.
“Flash used to be so expensive that you try to use just a little of
it in order to get the value out of it. Prices have come down significantly to somewhere between US$4 and US$5 per gigabyte usable
capacity with the things that we do in data reduction technologies
like deduplication and data compression. That was in the US$40
or US$50 dollar range or even higher five or six years ago. I think
within next five years, the raw price of flash is going to approach
or exceed the cost of disks from a per gigabyte standpoint.”
Pure Storage is targeting its all-flash offerings to companies
of any size. However, Cornwell advised that companies looking to
transition should “debut” flash in the data center to “address a
pain application”.
“Customers always seem to have a pain application – whether
it is database analytics, virtual desktop or some custom application. We see that people will purchase all-flash to validate the
technology in their own data environment. “
Cornwell noted that companies now are using all-flash as “an
additive while still leveraging their existing storage system”.
“We see customers buy our products while their primary storage arrays still have useful life. They would move these arrays to a
lower tier of storage until those assets have reached the end of its
useful life. So, some people are doing this as a full replacement.”
Pure Storage is relatively new to Asia Pacific, establishing a
foothold in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong
and Singapore over the last two years.
“We have seen this sort of 18- to 24-month adoption cycles
that has accelerated for us, which is surprising for the enterprises,”
said Cornwell, who added that the Pure Storage targets customers
entering into their next “refresh cycle”.
Today, the company is scaling its presence in the region by
“putting the right ecosystem in place” to grow the market.
In Hong Kong, Pure Storage recently signed distribution agreement with Jardine OneSolution Distribution to bring its all-flash
offerings to enterprise customers across physical, virtual and cloudbased environments.
“We looked at a track record of bringing new technologies
into the market. And JOS had the scale and the appreciation of
how to do that with a lot of technologies. And for us, it is about
finding someone with an ecosystem with a lot of large, successful
names already in their portfolio, but has the appreciation and the
ability to look at new technologies and develop a strategy around
it,” Cornwell said.
Brought to you by Jardine OneSolution
All-Flash Storage
is the Future
Casestudy
We are also able to benefit from the new solution’s data deduplication function,
which eliminates duplicate data system-wide for greater efficiency
—Daryl Cheng, MassMutual Asia
software, communications and security
firewalls to name a few. Plus, there would
be spending in the overseas link.”
Overseas cloud with local
connectivity
Under pressure to meet the compliance
requirement at a much lower operating
cost, MassMutual Asia started evaluating
the cloud alternative. And the company
decided to go with a hybrid cloud offering
from Microsoft Azure StorSimple.
The offering, called Cloud-integrated
Storage (CiS), is a combination of on-site
storage array with StorSimple and Azure
public cloud storage. CiS provides an onpremise SAN storage with an automated
data replication to Microsoft’s local data
center, which will then provide a geo-replication to Microsoft’s data center in Singapore. The combination addresses MassMutual Asia’s challenges of data backup
and recovery with a tapeless approach, as
well as greatly reduces the cost of crossborder connectivity.
“We chose Microsoft because they
presented a very clear plan to us. They
clearly explained to us how they would do
the work,” said Cheng. “In terms of cost
for an in-house DR site, just for the telecoms alone, it would cost us HK$200,000
a month because that is an overseas link.
The local link is 10 times cheaper. If
I were to establish a local link in Hong
Kong, it would cost only HK$20,000 a
month.”
Addressing security concerns
To ensure that the company would not
be breaching any regulatory requirements
for storing data outside Hong Kong,
MassMutual Asia sought legal advice
26 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
from their in-house counsel as well as
from the Securities and Futures Commission and the insurance authority.
“According to our knowledge, as long
as it is not production information—and
provided that we have sufficient security
in place, like encryption—it should be
fine,” said Cheng.
He added: “Production data is information that is accessed daily in our premises. But the solution that we have is a
DR backup, which is a passive data set
stored 60 miles away. Normally, we don’t
use this data set, and with encryption, we
fulfill both the compliance and regulatory
requirements.”
Fast and easy deployment
MassMutual Asia deployed the system in March 2014, after spending less
than a month for testing and installation.
According to Cheng, the company spent
about one week for trial run with the support of Microsoft’s technical team. Decision was made quickly after the trial and
the entire system deployment was completed within two weeks.
“One of the benefits of the solution is
its fast deployment. We have evaluated
different cloud solutions like Amazon and
Google. No one could tell me very clearly about their specifications, how they
would replicate information from our
office to their data centers,” said Cheng.
“Only Microsoft was able to give us a
whole plan and specifications,” he said.
Anticipating future needs, MassMutual Asia went with the option of StorSimple
7520 Appliance with 20 terabytes (TB) of
local storage and 100 TB of cloud-based
Azure storage. The data is protected using
AES-256 encryption technology. Cheng
declined to share the total cost, but noted
an estimated savings of 40%-50% with
the CiS as compared with the in-house
option considered earlier.
Immediate cost savings
With data saved on the cloud backup
system hosted on Microsoft’s data center in Hong Kong, MassMutual Asia enjoyed the instant savings from using local
broadband instead of an overseas cable.
“The solution helped us reduce the
running cost of Internet, which would
have been 20 times more expensive if we
were using an overseas cable to transfer
backup data from Hong Kong to Singapore,” Cheng said.
Furthermore, connecting to the cloud
through a local broadband network, the
company can enjoy significantly higher
transfer speeds than with an overseas facility. The savings allow the company to
scale up anytime, without expanding its
on-premises storage when the business
and size of data grow.
At present, MassMutual Asia transfers
and uploads about 1-2TB of backup data
on the cloud daily, which translates to
about 300-400GB of data after compression. StorSimple also allows the company
to enjoy a significantly higher compression ratio.
“We are also able to benefit from the
new solution’s data deduplication function, which eliminates duplicate data
system-wide for greater efficiency,” said
Cheng.
Moving forward, the insurance firm
is evaluating offsite facilities that are 100
miles away from Hong Kong. With the
successful deployment of its StorSimple
solution, Cheng said Microsoft will definitely be included in the company’s shortlist of technology providers.
3
www.cw.com.hk
Brought to you by Binary Tree
Best Practices for
Moving to the Cloud
Binary Tree’s SMART Methodology
Ensures A Seamless Transition for
Enterprises of All Sizes
As a leading migration solutions company, Binary Tree
occupies a significant seat in a relatively narrow niche. How
is that changing?
The messaging niche is actually growing and becoming more
visible in today’s world of multi-national, multi-platform, 24x7x365
enterprises. Uninterrupted, problem-free communications are not
only necessary and critical, but also expected. Various business
decisions can trigger a migration — from mergers, acquisitions, or
divestitures to major technology upgrades, management changes,
new regulations, and the growing trend to move to the cloud.
Is there a best practices methodology that Binary Tree can
recommend based on its twenty-one years of experience?
Moving to the cloud is not as simple as just moving mailboxes —
it requires an intelligent approach. Binary Tree’s four-step SMART
methodology has enabled successful migrations for some of the
largest and most complex environments on the planet.
Step 1: Interoperability
Successful migrations start with an evaluation of corporate assets
to identify those that should and should not leave the enterprise.
At Binary Tree, we understand the ultimate goal of interoperability
is workflow preservation — maintaining user productivity,
including the use of shared content. Not only do we consider
those components that will remain on-premises, but we also
have to ensure interoperability throughout the transition. That is
why most migrations rely on a phased, or gradual, transition. We
want to provide velocity for the migration while also supporting
business-critical communication and user collaboration. Even
moving 10,000 users per week in a 50,000-mailbox enterprise takes
5 weeks, rather than days or hours, to complete.
Step 2: Analysis & Rationalization
When readying your environment for a migration, make sure
your information is accurate, complete, and presented in the most
efficient manner. After you arrange your assets in such a way as to
properly analyze them, you can make informed decisions about
those assets by identifying and interviewing the owners. Some best
practices include: limiting saved emails to 90 days; archiving public
folder information that is no longer used; selecting an archiving
partner for legacy content; storing pictures and videos elsewhere;
and creating a messaging policy to drive future business practices.
James Yip,
Director of Sales, Asia Pacific
and Japan at Binary Tree
Selecting a trusted advisor is
crucial when migrating to the cloud
— your business depends on it;
your employees rely on it; and your
customers demand it.
Step 3: User Transition
Migrating enterprise email should be as seamless as possible. In the
new environment, users should be redirected and reconfigured
with all the same properties, attributes, permissions and access to
all the applications they previously used. An enterprise can make
this change more palatable by either communicating the change
being made as part of a corporate mandate, or conducting a nondisruptive migration so users accept and embrace the change.
Step 4: Content Migration
The distinction between a personal mailbox and a corporate mailbox
is becoming blurred. For your end user base, you should consider
limiting or filtering out content based on your organization’s
guidelines for data storage. For instance, large attachments should
be saved in a document management system, rather than in users’
email. We recommend moving content to a personal archive and
giving your users the timeframe and instructions for filtering prior
to a sweeping deletion.
Binary Tree is extremely proud of our long heritage and
record of success — having migrated over thirty million
users for six thousand customers around the world. Our true
value is our solutions have no impact on user productivity.
So, when we’ve done a great job, the day-to-day business of
communicating remains undisturbed.
More information: www.binarytree.com/CW0415
FINtech
J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Ping An
and UBS.
These selected fintech startups
represent a broad range of business
models: micro-financing for small
businesses (AMP), credit risk evaluation
(Beijing Wecash Wonder Technology),
loan application analysis (FinSuite),
identity authentication for online and
mobile transactions (iDGate), and
“Know Your Customer” and anti-money
laundering software (Jocata). All have
expressed interest in expanding their
footprint in the region.
Local efforts
Is Hong Kong ready for
fintech development?
International players are drawn to Hong Kong’s fintech playfield, but does the city have enough potential to support its
local fintech development?
By Carol Ko
I
n his last Budget speech, Financial
Secretary John Tsang proposed to
set up a steering group to find ways
to develop Hong Kong into a financial
technology hub.
He reasoned, being an international
financial center with rich experience in
technology, Hong Kong is “an ideal place”
to develop fintech. Additionally, many
venture capitalists and crowd funding
efforts are eyeing fintech investment
opportunities.
Is Hong Kong ready to develop itself
into a fintech hub? What are the drivers
and possible hindrances?
New international players
Last December, Accenture set up
its first APAC Fintech Innovation Lab
at the Cyberport. Featuring a 12-week
mentorship program, the Lab will
bridge eight selected fintech startups
with 20 banks across Asia, including
Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Bank
of China (Hong Kong), Barclays, China
Construction Bank (Asia), DBS, HSBC,
Being one of the largest startup
incubators in Hong Kong, Cyberport last
December introduced “fintech” as its fifth
cluster of excellence, besides digitalentertainment, e-commerce, mobile
apps, and social media. Today, Cyberport
houses 30 fintech incubatees/startups/
companies out of its 300 tenants. Its
counterpart, the Science and Technology
Parks, currently accommodates 10
fintech-related companies.
One can broadly classify fintech
companies into two streams: FSI solution
providers and status quo disrupters.
According to Cyberport CEO Herman
Lam, the former comprises companies
that develop solutions for big traditional
financial institutions, to help them
generate more revenue streams, cut cost,
or launch new services.
I’m amazed to see the governments in this region,
especially Hong Kong and Singapore, so engaged in
supporting startups
— Tyson Hackwood, Braintree
28 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
FTSIG’s Charm: Silicon Valley does not make
the biggest investments in fintech, it’s New
York and London
www.cw.com.hk
Contrastingly, the second stream
includes companies that try to disrupt
the status quo. “They would approach
customers directly and bypass existing
financial institutions, and hope to make
them obsolete,” Lam said. An example
of this is Bitspark, a current Cyberport
incubatee that runs a crypto-currency
platform to enable trading exchanges,
cash remittances and provides tools for
businesses to accept payments, all using
bitcoins.
Glory and shame
Last December, Bitspark’s founder
and CEO George Harrap said bitcoin
users in Hong Kong “have grown five
times during the last 12 months.”
Such growth pace matches with global
research figures: by the end of 2019, the
number of active bitcoin users worldwide
will reach 4.7 million, up from just over
1.3 million in 2014 (Juniper Research,
March 2015). Can bitcoin adoption grow
sustainably, as a testimony to Hong
Kong’s fintech hub development?
In January, the city’s faith in bitcoin
trading was somewhat dampened by the
sudden closure of MyCoin.hk, a Hong Kongbased bitcoin trading company. Reportedly
running a pyramid-style Ponzi scheme
packaged as bitcoin trading, MyCoin.hk
has left about 3,000 local investors with
combined losses of HK$3 billion.
Responding to FS’ fintech hub
proposal in February, IT legislator
Charles Mok urged the Government to
embark on studies on bitcoin and develop
a regulatory framework around bitcoin.
Social selling drives
m-payment
Braintree, a US-based e-payment
platform provider, launched its service
in APAC last month. Impressed by Hong
Kong’s high mobile penetration and
connectivity, CEO Bill Ready is confident
of helping innovative startups like Uber
to make and receive payments online,
without going through banks.
Commenting on business-friendliness,
www.cw.com.hk Braintree Head of Asia Tyson Hackwood
said, “I’m amazed to see the governments
in this region, especially Hong Kong
and Singapore, so engaged in supporting
startups—certain other countries haven’t
quite gone there yet.”
e-check in sight
Institution-wise, the Hong Kong
Monetary Authority (HKMA) plans to
launch e-check in 2H 2015. Unlike paper
checks, e-checks will be issued, delivered
and presented electronically.
Per HKMA, earlier survey results
suggested most retail banks have indicated
an interest in offering e-check service.
To guard against unauthorized use,
HKMA will implement various security
measures: virtual check book, two
factor authentication, digital signature,
e-check issuance records, and centralized
presentment service.
Matthias Yeo, Blue Coat’s APAC
CTO, suggested that e-check security
is best achieved with added protection
to e-check’s surrounding architecture:
1) Protect the Web application against
Web attacks using threat intelligence;
and 2) Scan all mobile uploads with indepth architecture defense for malicious
behavior.
Fintech booster
In January, the Hong Kong Computer
Society
established
a
Financial
Technologies Special Interest Group
(FTSIG). Its primary function is to provide
a platform to match fintech startups with
investors like consulting firms, banks and
insurance companies.
“According to the recent GDP figures
from the Census and Statistics Department,
the fintech industry contributes to 15.9%
of Hong Kong’s GDP. This is a large
proportion, considering that the tourism
industry contributes to just 3-4%,” said
David Chung, co-chairperson of FTSIG,
also Cyberport’s CTO.
“Hong Kong has all the prerequisites
to do fintech, only that technology
development lags rather behind,” said Toa
FTSIG’s Chung: It doesn’t mean if you don’t
do fintech today, you won’t be able to do it
tomorrow
Charm, the other FTSIG co-chairperson.
“For example, HSBC used to inject US$6
billion in IT some three, four years ago.
This is huge investment, only that they
are not focusing on developing innovative
or disruptive IT.”
Chung said the whole banking
process in Hong Kong did not need
much innovation because they have
been certain about their profits. “Going
forward, however, doing business will
become harder for banks because the
differences between their interest rates
are diminishing.”
“The city that makes the biggest
investments in fintech is not Silicon
Valley, but New York and London,” said
Charm. Any financial center that wishes
to sustain itself needs to develop fintech,
through investing in startups and talents.
Can Hong Kong sustain its position as
a financial center when Shanghai and
Singapore are fast catching up? Charm
said it is “questionable,” while Chung
said “it doesn’t mean if you don’t do
fintech today, you won’t be able to do it
tomorrow.”
According to Toa, it is on FTSIG’s
agenda to collaborate with The Hong Kong
Institute of Bankers(HKIB). As an industry
association, HKIB provides training for its
banker members. “This year HKIB wants
to introduce technology to their course.
FTSIG can help professionalize their
qualifications by lending training support
in the tech area.”
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 29
bimodalit
Is bimodal the future of
enterprise IT?
Bimodal IT is being touted as the best way to cope with the demands of
the digital economy, but many companies have yet to fully grasp
its implication to their IT organization
By Gigi Onag
C
ompanies seeking to transform
into digital businesses are casting a wary eye on “bimodal IT”,
a catchphrase coined last year by Gartner
as a prescriptive organization model for
enterprise IT.
In a nutshell, the research firm posits that most IT organizations in the near
future will have two modes of operation:
mode-one that is slow and characterized
by the traditional waterfall approach; and
mode-two that is fast, characterized by a
fluid, non-sequential approach geared towards speedy time to market and quicker
returns.
The type-two mode is primarily focused on the business units—the consumers of technology—and what they want
to achieve in the digital world. It gives
corporate IT organizations the capability
to respond to the level of uncertainty and
the need for agility required for a digital
transformation.
“Bimodal IT is one of the most frequently asked topics in our client inquiry,” said Owen Chen, research director at
Gartner. “Most companies realized that
digital business is going to totally reshape
the industry. If they want to capture the
digital opportunities, they must build the
agile capability, which means mode-two
IT must be built.”
According to Gartner, the Asia Pacific
and Japan is slightly ahead of the rest of
world in adopting this nascent organizational model. Based on the firm’s 2014
CIO survey, 48% of the respondents from
the region claimed that they already have
30 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
Bimodal IT enables IT organization to
operate under two modes: one slow and
stable; the other fast and flexible
some form of bimodal IT. The figure is
higher than the global average recorded
at 45%.
Different takes about the digital
journey
Many local CIOs agree an agile approach to applications development and
service delivery is a must-have to futureproof corporate IT.
While they accept the sound premise
behind the concept, they offer varying
views on how companies should evolve
and transition their existing IT setup to a
bimodal approach in IT.
“I believe the keys are revamping the
processes, hiring the right people and a
common understanding of the business
objectives,” said Michael Yung, head of
eproduct and technology planning at Asia
Real-time customer engagement and analytics have
become key success factors which demand the
support of mode-two IT systems
– Ted Suen, MTRC
www.cw.com.hk
If companies want to capture the digital opportunities, they must
build the agile capability, which means mode-two IT must be built
– Owen Chen, Gartner
Miles. “Most of the time, the tricky things
are how to evolve the processes such that
it is not too fast for back office systems
and yet not too slow for customer-facing
systems.”
Yung added that while it is difficult
to estimate the cost of the transition, the
“cost of not doing it will be huge”. “The
model will likely be the company’s future.
I will not be surprised if it takes a year or
two to complete a proper transition.”
Meanwhile, there is no “one size fits
all approach”, according to Henk ten Bos,
CIO and head of the change management
office at insurance company Ageas.
“There are projects for certain systems
and certain processes that are best implemented using a traditional approach. And
I would say probably in a very traditional
environment using very traditional technology, a classic waterfall approach might
still be the best approach to follow,” he
said.
But he agreed that IT initiatives involving the front office are most likely to
benefit from a more agile approach.
“Anything to do with mobile
development, where business process,
user interface, and engagement with your
end customer is extremely important,”
he said. “Usually it cannot be developed
the best way if you use an inside-out
approach.”
For ten Bos, being agile is defined by
a much closer engagement with business
users whether internal or external.
“You continuously engage them in
the process of developing an application
and you take their inputs in small intricate
steps.”
He added: “Agile results in more frequent updates of your applications with
incremental enhancements. If you use a
very classic approach, people will have
to wait maybe three, four or five months
www.cw.com.hk before something is implemented. This is
not acceptable for mobile applications.”
Misconceptions about
bimodal IT
Chen of Gartner cautioned companies
from looking at the type-two mode as
the only mode in the digital era and from
thinking that it is more important than
mode- one.
“The biggest challenge is critical skill
such as agile and BRMs are hard to find
and sustain. The most common pitfall is
realizing that mode-two is fundamentally
different from mode-one and trying to
speed up mode-one to meet the requirements of agility,” he said.
For Ted Suen, head of information
technology at MTR Corporation, it would
be a big mistake for companies to treat
mode-two as an extension of mode-one.
He pointed out that mode-one and
mode-two are not two parallel streams
as resources and projects of two streams
have interface points. “Good management of both modes is the challenge for
the CIO,” he said.
Local adoption of bimodal approach
The MTRC has been held up by Gartner as a good case study for adopting the
bimodal model. The Hong Kong rail operator introduced the concept in late 2013
at its IT Strategy Planning. The focus of
the agile team is around the application of
emerging technologies like cloud, social,
mobile and business analytics. It also focuses at enterprise architecting functions
and organization transformation for better
business-IT alignment.
“With our aspiration to become a value creator to the MTRC, there is a need to
transform the ITSD from being reactive
to being proactive in collaborating with
business and advising technology solutions that are aligned to business objec-
tives and MTRC’s corporate strategy,”
Suen said.
To date, the company has spent an
estimated US$1 million on its bimodal
transformation over the last one and a
half years. The MTRC’s mode-two team
composed of 22 people, which represents
about 20% of its IT staff.
Suen said there are challenges in the
transition process, primarily the lack of
expertise on architecting, mobile and
user experience design under the modetwo approach, as well as the lack of
commercial acumen and mindset change
required for the IT team and business users.
But he believes that enterprise IT is
inevitably moving towards a bimodal approach.
“More innovative applications are first
available on the cloud. Extensive and fast
cloud adoption enables mode-two projects. For example, Amazon’s revenue is
doubling every two years in recent period,
while the price per TB storage has come
down from US$97 in 2012 to US$30 in
2014. Furthermore, legacy ERP applications are now having cloud and mobile
offerings,” Suen explained.
He added that globalization, e-commerce platforms such as Alibaba, and
mobile payment capabilities have transformed the landscape of business and
generate the need to more mode-two projects.
“Real-time customer engagement and
analytics have become key success factors, which demand the support of modetwo IT systems” said Suen.
Another reason why bimodal IT is the
future, according to Suen is that “generations X and Y in the workforce are increasingly adopting social and mobile as
both their professional and personal digital platforms,” he concluded.
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 31
FUTUREWORKPLACE
Future workplace transformation:
A tug of war
Enabling future workplace transformation is more than the adoption of new
technologies. It also requires a painstaking overhaul of business processes
and cultural change across all stakeholders
By Carol Ko
A
t the Future Workplace Forum
2015, business and technology
leaders exchanged views on the
technology and cultural changes brought
by future workplace transformation, and
how best to manage them.
The forum titled “Managing the
mobile, virtual and digital workforce”
was hosted by Computerworld Hong
Kong on February 11, held at The Mira
Hong Kong. Some 200 business leaders,
HR heads and IT decision makers from
across industries attended the event.
At an executive panel discussion, three
IT and HR leaders shared highlights of
their workplace transformation roadmaps,
the changes occurring at their workplaces,
and the driving factors behind them. The
panelists also shared some game-changing
SFC’s Langley: Collaboration is our corporate
strategy. Trying to deliver it is a real challenge
strategies and technologies to manage and
enable growth of their mobile workforce.
Information confidentiality
reigns
At the Securities and Futures
Commission (SFC), mobility adoption is
supposedly a low-hanging fruit as all the
800 staff work in the one single building.
Given its fairly traditional organization
structure, the SFC has grown to become a
department-based organization in the last
25 years, said Stephen Langley, SFC’s
deputy CIO.
To drive transformation within a
department-based organization, the real
issue lies in pushing applications into a
collaboration mode. “Collaboration is our
corporate strategy. Trying to deliver it is a
real challenge,” he said.
The challenge is doubled by the culture
of information confidentiality at SFC,
as it handles a great deal of confidential
market information.
“The trick is to try to tell people that
not everything is confidential. There are
things that we can share,” Langley said.
“To strike that balance and break down
barriers across departments, we need
to get the executives’ support to drive
transformation.”
Company-wide transformation
Malaysia-based
carrier
Celcom
Axiata has just completed an 18-month
transformation program to enable
company-wide collaboration.
Essentially, Celcom’s transformation
32 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
program was to drive better customer
experience via: 1) increased sales through
cross-sell and upsell; 2) faster time to
market products; 3) increased customer
service staff productivity; 4) increased
branch and dealer productivity; and 5)
improvement in system availability.
Below are highlights of some of
Celcom’s key transformation objects:
Celcom separates its customers into
post- and pre-paid customers. One of the
transformation objects is to display the
information of both types of customers in
a single screen for the frontline staff.
“If a customer has family members,
their information will be shown on the
same screen,” said Suharti Mohammed
Ali, Celcom Axiata’s SVP of IT
transformation.
At Celcom, SIM card production
used to be “a very manual process”,
requiring about 2.5 months. Upon
allocation of phone numbers, Celcom
would produce the SIM cards in China. A
key transformation object was to enable
automated SIM card creation and testing
processes.
“This represented a huge challenge
to Celcom, because all those SIM card
suppliers and packaging staff used to
belong to different organizations,” she
said. “Imagine if we were challenged to
integrate all these into one whole process.
Getting ownership to run functions across
was our biggest challenge.”
Effecting cultural change
Where
information
confidentiality
www.cw.com.hk
Business leaders, HR heads and IT decision makers attended the Future Workplace Forum
reigns in an organization, or when
data ownership rests with a myriad of
stakeholders, how did the IT leaders
convince users to adopt a more
collaborative approach?
“It is very difficult to change culture,”
said Langley. “Technology is the easy bit.
Driving change is the difficult part.” IT is
currently trying to get people to buy into a
more collaborative mode of work.
As for Celcom, six months after the
transformation project, the company
is still retraining its staff to adopt the
Celcom’s Suharti: Training is not just about
coming to a class and explaining what the
processes were then and now
Senior executives come and go. HR and finance stay
forever. You’ll always want to stay friends with them
— Stephen Langley, Securities and Futures Commission
new business processes. “Training is
not just about coming to a class and
explaining what the processes were then
and now. When the staff returned to their
workplace, they would do whatever they
used to do the day before,” said Suharti.
To achieve cultural change, IT has
been organizing months of handholding
sessions with the end users of the business
operations team, while putting in place a
supervisor to monitor the progress.
HR as close partners
Where workplace transformation
requires changes in business process and
business workflow, how do IT executives
work with HR executives in terms of
relationships?
At Celcom, the first challenge IT had
when it set up the project team was the
recruitment of people with new skills and
experience to work with a whole new IT
stack.
“Instead of making new hires, we went
for light contracting for temporary staff
and acquired people from body shops to
www.cw.com.hk augment the skill sets,” Suharti said.
“The challenge was that, upon project
completion, we still needed to keep those
people, and HR was on my back. So I had
to buy them coffee every day a few times
a day,” she said jokingly.
According to OVOLO’s Group
HR director Cassady Winston, IT is
increasingly seen as the main internal
partner for HR, both in terms of IT and
communications.
For example, where HR needed to
put forward major initiatives, it would
need IT’s help with coding, building user
interface, and user accessibility. In terms
of communications, HR would also need
IT’s help to effectively spread its message
to the workforce.
“These were the two main areas where
I think we had wasted time by not finding
a successful partnership,” Winston said.
Finally, SFC’s Langley said “One of
the things that I’ve learned in my career is
that, senior executives come and go. HR
and finance stay forever. You’ll always
want to stay friends with them.”
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 33
TALKTECH
Openness in IT architecture to
drive customer loyalty
Data center leaders gathered to discuss the upcoming trends of
open cloud to bring options for customers
By Sheila Lam
D
emands and requirements of
cloud computing services are no
longer the same with its maturing
adoption in Hong Kong. Diversifying
needs between cloud customers, pressure
in network capacity and managing burst
are some of the factors driving interest in
open cloud among data center operators
and users.
In a recent roundtable discussion
among local data center operators,
organized by Computerworld Hong Kong
and HP, technology and business leaders
shared the rising challenges of running
a data center. They also discussed the
role of industry standards and how cooperation within the industry is critical
to bring enhanced cloud services and
offerings.
Diverging demand drives
operating cost
According to the local data center
34 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
operators, one major challenge is meeting
the diversifying demands among different
users as cloud computing matures.
Peter Yan, executive director
and CEO of SUNeVision said cloud
providers are increasingly being pulled
to understand the business nature and
industry compliance requirements of their
cloud customers. “The first thing financial
customer demand is data security while
cloud service providers at our facilities
treasure our global connectivity.” he said.
“I have a shared cloud environment,
but the same infrastructure is also
supporting a company from the
healthcare industry, which are subject to
very different measures,” added Thomas
Tam, regional head of operation at Atos.
Tam added the different industry and
compliance requirements are driving up
the cost of operation. “We need to build
in additional cost, in order to address all
the regulatory requirements,” he said.
“Cloud is about saving, better
efficiency,” added Taylor Man, executive
VP cloud division of NTT Com Asia.
“We are making investments to make sure
our cloud meets the diversified business
needs, and security is definitely at the top
of the list.”
Michael Mudd, representative of the
Open Computing Alliance, suggested
data center operators can offer different
tier of services like the Airbus 380 model.
“So enterprise will be first class, business
will be business and everybody else is
at the back of the bus and charge prices
accordingly,” he said.
But YC Lee, head of data center at
Hutchison Global Communication, noted
that all data center operators are physically
restricted with limited space, power and
infrastructure to meet customers’ demand
and offering a variety of services. “By
having virtualization, we can be more
flexible to meet customers’ needs,” said
Lee.
Nevertheless, the use of virtualization
in a cloud creates problems with network
availability.
“Virtualization does put pressure on
the agility of the network,” said Charles
Wong, VP of data center and engineering
services at Wharf T&T. “[Enterprises]
are worried about [data] migration and
that is a key thing we are handling.”
Wong added currently silo networks
do not help to cope with the network
agility required for virtualization. “That’s
why we are talking about SDN (software
defined network),” he said. “It is a matter
of standardization for us. We are looking
www.cw.com.hk
TALKTECH
at different platforms and services to
provide us the agility and facilities to
serve our cloud business.”
SDN to drive speed and service
offering
HP’s CTO of enterprise group APJ
Thomas Sennhauser agreed that data
center operators can no longer rely on
traditional networks to meet customers’
demand and more are turning towards
SDN, an open source technology to
virtualize network management.
“Operators are getting into trouble
investing more into traditional networks
because you are not creating enough
revenue out of it,” said Sennhauser. “You
need to find a balance, there’s technology
ready today and SDN will help you
achieve a hybrid network.”
He added that SDN is increasingly
being implemented among telcos within
the region, including South Korea,
Japan, as well as Myanmar. Most of
these implementations aim to enhance
their existing networks. “It is more
about capacity, they need the capacity
specifically for accessing data centers,”
he said.
At Pacnet, the operator is also
leveraging SDN technologies to offer
network agility for its customers.
“Pacnet has a co-location business and
is also at the forefront of SDN,” said Giles
Proctor, VP of data center operations from
Pacnet. “We are allowing customers to
create connectivity with various locations
within our ports without the traditional
way of buying telco services. So we allow
customers to buy a service from us and
provision that service themselves.”
Proctor added that SDN is a critical
technology that helps to bring the dream
of utility computing into reality, as it could
“pick up a compute load somewhere and
move it across the country and region.”
“If we are talking about the rising
scale of the workloads from IoT—we
really need to be nimble to move those
around. We are on the verge of seeing this
happen,” he said.
HP’s Sennhauser: Operators are getting into
trouble investing more into traditional networks
Dealing with burst
Apart from network availability,
managing the burst of demand for
computing power is another challenge for
many cloud providers.
“It’s more difficult [to operate a cloud
business] because of the burst of sudden
needs. There are so many different groups
of end users using other services. If you
cannot supply the necessary resources,
they will go away,” added Yan from
SUNeVision. “As a service provider like
Data center architecture fundamentally has to change
once you move into that [cloud openness] realm
Pacnet’s Proctor: SDN is a critical
technology that bring the dream of utility
computing into reality
– Jacqueline Teo, Telstra
www.cw.com.hk Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 35
TALKTECH
Yan from SUNeVision: It’s more difficult
[to operate a cloud business] because of
the burst of sudden needs
us, we will have to find a cost effective
way to meet their needs.”
Jacqueline Teo, head of international
IT portfolio services at Telstra added that
managing burst is particularly critical
for businesses in the financial and telco
sector. “The moment your user cannot get
a banking or telco service your regulator
is going to be on your doorstep,” she said.
Teo also noted most of these
enterprises
would
have
blocked
additional computing resources to handle
the burst and ensure consistent service.
She said what enterprise cloud users are
demanding instead is the connectivity of
data and application between their private
and public clouds.
“More customers are saying ‘we don’t
care how you guys connect us up, you
just have to connect us up,’” said Teo.
Although most users may not understand
SDN or demand that from the cloud
providers, enterprises understand the
importance of openness and it is driving
data center operators to review their
infrastructure.
“Data center architecture fundamentally has to change once you move into that
realm,” said Teo. “Changes are not necessarily at the network layer, but it needs to
change the architectures around it.”
Realization of interoperability
Mudd from Open Computing Alliance:
The need for interoperability is paramount
“Enterprises would like to see
transparency and [application] integration
ability [between clouds],” added Daniel
Leung, general manager, enterprise ICT
solutions at SmarTone. “They would also
like the flexibility to move [data] from one
data center to another and it is a headache.
So openness is essential.”
Cally Chan, managing director of
HP Hong Kong, also added that “more
enterprises are realizing the potential
problem of cloud. They are demanding
interoperability between different cloud
service providers and also between their
private clouds.”
“The need for interoperability is
paramount,” said Mudd. “To handle the
types of traffic that is going to be required,
we need to carefully look at the standards
and the way technology is rolled out in
data centers.”
Meanwhile,
technologies
are
developing at a faster speed than the
industry standards. Currently opening
APIs of data center is available to enable
customers to move data between cloud
providers, noted Teo from Telstra Global.
“Technology exists today—I can move
customer data to any one of the data
centers,” she added.
More importantly, according to most
data center operators, is the development
of an open standard within the industry
to enable the interoperability and data
movement.
“Open standard can create the
momentum of economies of scale,” added
Leung from SmarTone.
He added that the importance of
standards together with open cloud
technologies will offer choices for
customers. “In this domain, the
competition is in the service and then a
customer can earn a service not only the
resources,” said Leung.
“Co-operation is critical. As telcos
and data center operators, if you are able
to co-operate together, it will help you to
create more revenue for each other, as the
market is big enough,” Sennhauser from
HP concluded.
3
[Enterprises] are demanding interoperability between different cloud
service providers and also between their private clouds
– Cally Chan, HP
36 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
www.cw.com.hk
C
M
Y
CM
MY
CY
CMY
K
TALKTECH
It’s all about data
In an increasingly digital economy, companies are preparing
for the technological shifts that come with the inevitable
business transformation
By Gigi Onag
I
nnovation today is about the effective
collection of corporate data to allow
business managers to see patterns
and trends, as well as to come up with
predictive analyses, which can help go to
market with new products and services to
their customers.
This was largely the consensus of
the CIOs and other senior IT executives
at the recent roundtable about “driving
innovation in the digital economy” hosted
by Computerworld Hong Kong and
Hitachi Data System (HDS).
However, consolidation of data
across an organization’s different
systems remains a major sticking point
38 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
for many enterprises. This challenge is
further exacerbated by the proliferation
of unstructured data from today’s social
media.
The problem of how to pool all the
data into one central repository has been
festering for years. For some, building
a full-grown data warehouse does not
solve the fundamental issue of getting
business insights from the mountains of
information.
“The challenge is that there are a lot of
unstructured data from social media. You
have a bunch of data all over the place. If
you want to get all the data in, it’d be no
use. How to manage the content and turn it
into something useful?” asked Perry Lai,
vice president of information technology,
Langham Hotels International. “I hesitate
to go through the big data phase because
how do you put all the unstructured data
together to form the big picture?”
Problem-centric approach
Dave Chan, regional director for
business intelligence at UBM Asia,
suggested taking baby steps in their data
consolidation journey.
“The approach is to start with a
problem. If your biggest concern is sales
and marketing, then build a data store;
make a connection with your marketing
data banks, and then try to get insights
from there,” he said. “If you need financial
information to drive the decision, then
you connect to the financial piece of
data. You might end up building a data
warehouse but you start from keeping the
core smaller.”
Chan’s position had swung to the
www.cw.com.hk
TALKTECH
The top-down approach works to establish [data] ownership
but it is a culture change
– Samuel Cheng, Allianz Global Investor
opposite end of the scale over the last five
years.
“If you had asked many IT managers
20 or 10 years ago, they would have said
a full-grown data warehouse was the way
to go. If you had asked me five years ago,
I would have had a different mindset. It is
not like you just dump everything into the
data warehouse,” he said.
“We spent years doing that in a
big bank and it didn’t work. I heard it
also happened in other banks that took
the same path. The emerging type of
warehousing would be problem-centric,
and it is going back to a debate between
the bottom-up and top-down approach to
warehousing,” Chan added.
For Jardine Restaurant Group, which
operates the Pizza Hut and KFC chains
in Hong Kong, it is about looking at the
company’s needs from a customer-centric
point of view.
“The main thing is to focus on the
customer. You give them what they want,”
said the company’s group IT director
Ravel Lai.
This year, Jardine Restaurant Group
embarked on a social CRM initiative to
collect business insights from social media
such as Facebook, in-game advertising
and its own mobile apps. It was aimed
at turning social media comments into
ideas for new menu offerings, as well as
to enable the company to “understand the
connection between people to trigger a
purchase”.
But instead of using traditional data
warehouse software from which the
information can be stored and analyzed,
the company went for a cloud-based
solution.
“We decided to use cloud computing.
I can load all data and use my business
sense to play around with the data. I don’t
need a programmer,” said Lai.
Putting standards first
UBM Asia’s Chan: The emerging type of
warehousing would be problem-centric
www.cw.com.hk Chan of UBM Asia pointed out that
before the discussions about technologies,
enterprises need a set of standards.
“Standards and governance is
something that you will always need.
Otherwise, you would end up with a
spaghetti of different things,” he added.
Samuel Cheng, head of financial
information management at Allianz
Global Investors, added that “definitions
and ownership would be a good start”.
In order to derive business insights
with a holistic picture, a common
connection between these sets of data
needs to be established. Allianz is trying
to ensure data integrity by assigning
different senior executives with ownership
of the data.
Lai from Jardine Restaurant Group:
We decided to use cloud computing [for
analytics]
“When there’s something I want from
the data, I come to you. And you have
the responsibility of making sure that it
is right and you have the mechanism of
making it right when it fails,” he said.
“They are the owners of the data and they
can delegate [the database maintenance
and management].”
Cheng warned it could be a very long
and challenging journey.
“The top-down approach works to
establish ownership but it is a culture
change and it is about conquering that little
battle first,” he said. “You just build on
it. Once you established value of the data
and recruited sponsors, bigger investment
can follow to bring more cohesiveness
between information upstream and
downstream to paint a bigger picture.”
However, Cheng noted that a lot
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 39
TALKTECH
Langham Hotel Group’s Lai: I hesitate to go
through the big data phase because how do
you put all the unstructured data together to
form the big picture?
Hefferman from HDS: How do we migrate
from those traditional vertical databases into
object storage?
We will see a common structure, a common process,
and common protocols develop in the next 12 to
18 months
– Michael Hefferman, HDS
of data consolidation and business
intelligence initiatives can be driven from
the back office.
“From the back office finance point of
view, people [from the front office] used
to report backwards to them in order to
identify what happened in the last five
days,” he said. “Now, they are looking
at [what’s happening in] the next five
days. This is the pipeline and this is how
the business will look like at the end of
this month. The finance guys are looking
forward for a change.”
He added that the finance executives
are looking at data about product
combination and they are learning to
interpret data into business insights.
“This is interesting and created a new
dynamics,” Cheng added.
Resistance is high
Nevertheless, executive endorsement
is needed for any data warehouse-BI
deployment, in order to be widely used by
people within the organization, according
to Lai of Langham Hotels.
“People get used to doing their job
in a certain way. Resistance is high,” he
said. “If there are some glitches you hear
[people] raising voices and they would go
back to how things were,” he said.
Lai added that a fancy BI deployment
could go unused if employees still prefer
to do their reports and analyses on Excel
spreadsheets.
From vertical database to
object storage
“Most of the databases today are
the traditional databases which I call
vertical—it’s Oracle and SQL—it
is stored on a SAN-based storage
40 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
networks,” said Michael Hefferman,
HDS’s director of emerging technology
and big data Asia Pacific. “The next
generation is all about new technologies
like IoT, mobile apps, and they are now
storing data in object storage. And this is
the critical change.”
“How do we migrate from those
traditional vertical databases into object
storage?” he asked.
Hefferman added there are many
terminologies or methodology in data
management, “it is about how the data
is stored, and what format the data is
stored.”
Chan of UBM said that it is not so
much about the technology platform, but
more about driving value from data.
“How do you get your business users
to understand the data?” he said. “You
need some front end tool so that people
with some training can do some analysis
and get a handle of it... So we are relying
on those tools to derive value.”
The inevitable shift
Hefferman of HDS said businesses
must be prepared for the technological
shifts that come with the inevitable
business transformation.
“It is about looking at your current
strategies in your environments and
tweaking it in a step-by-step approach,”
he said. “Over time, you add BI on top
of that to enable you to create unique and
valuable products for your customers.”
He added: “Social innovation and the
digital world have really started to evolve
and we will see a common structure, a
common process, and common protocols
develop in the next 12 to 18 months. And
this is going to help all of us.”
3
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TALKTECH
Building a workplace for tomorrow
to enhance business outcomes
To enable the future workplace, the main technology
themes are mobility, user-centricity and flexibility
By Lachlan Colquhoun
T
omorrow’s workplace is a
combination of re-designing the
physical space with choosing the
right suite of new technologies, from
wireless infrastructure to applications
development to policies on staff devices.
Traditional business environments
are no longer relevant to the shifting
demographic patterns and skyrocketing
office rental costs. Inflexible working
hours, the inefficient use of space and a
lack of meeting places are compromising
collaboration and damaging productivity.
In the workplace of tomorrow, the
main technology themes are mobility,
user-centricity and flexibility. The
challenge for business is to enable the next
generation staff with a complimentary
environment, and technologies, to
enhance their productivity.
These themes were the subject of
a recent CIO roundtable discussion,
organized by Computerworld Hong Kong
and Dimension Data.
Drivers of future workplace
Dimension Data’s Nichollas: Three factors
play into the shift between device centric to
user centric IT
To
kickstart
the
discussion,
Dimension Data’s regional lead for
enterprise mobility David Nichollas
noted that three major drivers to build
the future workplace are: mobility, the
next generation demographics of new
staff, and cost reduction. “These are the
three things which always come up when
talking to clients,” he said.
Nichollas noted that enabling
mobility in the future workplace is about
controlling, managing and securing data
and applications. In terms of managing
the next generation workforce, the
workplace and network capability need to
cater for staff that have “never known a
To create a standardized working environment means
a lot of market research is needed
– Mark Griffith, Cathay Pacific
42 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
time before connectivity,” he added.
“All these [factors] play into the shift
between device centric to user centric [IT
environment], which has been going on
for some time already, and how you use
the existing technology to support and
enable the workforce,” said Nichollas.
Securing collaboration
More Hong Kong organizations are
having staff spread across geographies.
When project teams are located in different
cities, the demand for collaborative tools
is high to enable efficiency. The demand
for larger offices has also changed with
more staff working from home or on the
road. Therefore, some organizations are
moving to an open office plan, with hot
desks and meeting rooms available in an
on-demand basis.
Security, however, becomes a key
issue.
“95% of our staff are real estate agents
and they are highly mobile,” said Francis
Fung, chief technology officer at Midland
Reality in Hong Kong. “But beyond
mobility, our core issue is the sensitivity
of the information, because quite a lot of
the customer and vendor information is
quite sensitive.”
To enable a mobile and secure
environment, Fung said the company is
considering mobile VPN.
Online and offline collaborative
environment
Meanwhile, for other organizations,
existing mobile and Wi-Fi technologies
are still not developed enough to cater
for their needs. International architectural
firm Aedas, for example, admits it
is hamstrung in creating a dynamic
workplace.
“We are really lagging behind in some
www.cw.com.hk
TALKTECH
Aedas has, however, offered an open
space environment, where the only rooms
in the office are meeting rooms. Ip said
the next stage of building a collaborative
environment will involve collaborative
technologies, allowing staff to work
on the same drawings and 3D models
together, even when they are located at
different offices.
Virtual team for highly
regulated environment
Fung from Midland Realty: 95% of our staff
are real estate agents and they are highly mobile
of these technologies because the files
and data that we manage are quite huge,”
Jacky Ip, head of IT at Aedas, told the
roundtable. “We try considering desktop
virtualization, but we cannot achieve this
because of the file size we are dealing
with.”
He
added
that
architectural
professionals and designers require a lot
of computing power for their work, and
most mobile devices cannot accommodate
these needs.
The banking industry is one which
is highly regulated, which often limits
innovation and flexibility.
ICBC’s co-head of systems and
information technology Jansun Lai
said that regulators placed “a lot of
restriction around [accessing] customer
and personal data” and this is limiting the
ability to maximize the benefit of BYOD
deployment.
Meanwhile, mobility is critical on the
customer facing front. Wi-Fi will soon be
available in most of the branches, aiming
to drive customers to visit the ICBC home
page and introduce different product
offerings to facilitate cross-selling.
For some traditional banks, the
organization has a “very old fashioned
way of working.” “But we are getting a
lot of younger people into the workplace,
so we also need to manage all of the
competing ideas and requirements,” said
an IT executive.
Handelsbanken’s head of IT for
Greater China, Danny Wong, agreed
that there is a major gap between what
is available for internal staff and the
customers, in terms of mobile support.
“There’s a big gap,” said Wong. “We
do not open mobility for everyone in the
bank, only senior management. But on
the customer side, we want to provide
more apps and innovative technologies.”
Enabling productivity
Ip from Adeas: The files and data that we
manage are quite huge
www.cw.com.hk At Cathay Pacific, a dynamic work
environment is established for “enabling
people to get done what they have to do,
with [whatever] the tools available,” said
Mark Griffith, head of infrastructure and
operations.
To support the airline’s highly decentralized workforce, Griffith said
the work environment is very much
centralized.
“To create that [environment] means a
lot of market research is needed, so it has
been all about going out there and talking
to people and understanding what they
are trying to do,” he said.
To achieve this, Griffith said the
company required “rigid standardization,
and standard processes across what we
do.”
Collaboration between staff in different
locations is very important for Germanowned garment maker s.Oliver Asia.
Head of IT Ravi Lulia said that although
the company is very conservative, 2014
was a “landmark year” as the firm got out
from its comfort zone and offered mobile
devices for its sales staff.
“But within the offices we are still very
traditional,” Lulia told the roundtable.
“Yes we do have desktop virtualization
for certain departments, and where it
makes sense, particularly for the design
team.”
But the major pain point for s.Oliver
is enabling its design and executive
teams. While the design teams are based
in Germany, the execution teams are in
Asia.
“They are constantly discussing
garments and design changes,” said Lulia.
“They make comments in a traditional
way, by scanning and commenting on a
design. But if we had something online
and real time, that would be very helpful
for us.”
He added that for the fashion industry,
time to market is everything. “Getting a
garment from idea to concept into a store
in the shortest possible time is extremely
important, so anything that might help us
collaborate faster is definitely a big plus,
and if it can be done on the move, even
better,” he said.
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 43
PersonalSupplyChain
Redefining customer relationships
with personal supply chain
Many retailers are only beginning to understand changing consumer behavior.
To stay competitive, they are starting to explore a personal supply chain strategy
By Lye-Ching Lam
H
ong Kong consumers are
increasingly shopping online
using a variety of digital devices
to request for a range of delivery and
purchasing services. With the rise of
omni-channel retailing, e-shoppers are
demanding personalized service not only
in terms of product customization, but
also the shopping experience and the
product delivery process.
This was driving the discussion
at a recent event with a title of
“Redefining customer relationship with
personal supply chain” organized by
Computerworld Hong Kong and Telstra.
Many retailers—who used to
having physical stores as their business
models—are only beginning to realize the
changes in consumer behavior. To stay
competitive, they are starting to explore
an infrastructure that supports personal
supply chain, according to Telstra.
This is particularly true for Hong
Kong where omni-channel retailing—a
multichannel approach to sales that
provide customers with a seamless
shopping experience on various platforms
using a desktop or mobile device, by
telephone or in a bricks and mortar
store—is slowly gaining traction. A UPS
survey released in March 2015 showed
11% of Hong Kong consumers use their
mobile phone exclusively to make online
purchases from multi-channel retailers in
Hong Kong following the top spot, South
Korea (14%).
Omni-channel drives personal
supply chain
“Omni-channel’s effect on the retail
and logistics sectors has been profound,
and is driving a revolution in the way
that businesses and consumers now
connect and exchange value,” according
to Telstra’s whitepaper with the title of
Personal Supply Chain. “At its heart is
the connected, engaged omni-channel
shopper—a person who is no longer
prepared to stand by, but wants to actively
participate in the supply chain. This has
resulted in a new phenomenon we call the
personal supply chain.”
The
traditional
supply
chain
management involved B2B collaboration
and consumers were the recipient of
the value it created. However, things
have changed with the rising of IoT and
consumers are now able to use their
devices to connect with businesses. These
trends are enabling consumers to be an
active collaborator in the supply chain
with retailers, transport companies and
manufacturers in the creation of value.
For example, consumers can specify
Now your brand has five or six faces. Whichever face
that consumers interact with, it will be the last face
they remember
– Gareth Jude, Telstra
44 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
what they want, how and when they want
it to be delivered to suit their schedules,
including paying a premium for services
like same-day delivery or even designing
their own products online.
Consumers also want to interact
with retailers both within physical stores
and on digital channels, according to
Telstra’s Charlie Macdonald, co-author
of Telstra’s latest whitepaper. Macdonald,
also industry executive for industry
development manufacturing transport and
logistics at Telstra, added that consumers
want to purchase goods with different
delivery options ranging from home or
workplace delivery to pick up at parcel
locker facility, convenience store or
stores.
Local e-commerce
development behind China
However, some industrial players
in Hong Kong see a slower take up of
e-commerce compared to China. One of
the major reasons was the availability and
convenience of retail outlets.
“Hong Kong is unique compared
to the rest of China. Speed matters a lot
more in China than in Hong Kong. [In
China], it is instant gratification,” said
Peter Deacon, director of Bloom & Grow,
a wholesale distributor and retailer of the
infant and maternity products in the AsiaPacific region.
He noted that a logistics provider
in China is proactively taking steps to
meet consumers’ needs with additional
value. The provider offers an option
for online shoppers to pick-up orders at
www.cw.com.hk
Macdonald from Telstra:
Consumers want to purchase
goods with different delivery
options
Telstra’s Jude: Logistics
companies have a crucial
role to play in developing the
brand’s image
their outlets, where changing rooms are
available, offering a nice and comfortable
environment. Consumers can also get a
refund at the outlet, reducing the cost of
returning products.
Transforming the logistics
industry
Regardless of the status of development
of omni-channel retail in each country, a
retailer knows it can now have several
touch points for the consumer with the
changing business environment.
“Now your brand has five or six
faces. Whichever face that consumers
interact with, it will be the last face
they remember,” added Gareth Jude,
a co-author of the whitepaper and a
retail industry executive for industry
development at Telstra. “The consumers
don’t see supply chains. All they see is the
brand.”
The consumer may not be aware of
supply chain management. If the last
interaction is with the logistics providers,
then that experience will influence the
consumer’s impression of the retailer
or brand. Jude added that the logistics
companies have a crucial role to play in
the development of the brand’s image and
this can be challenging.
Some local logistics providers
that used to connect manufacturers
to warehouses and retailers are also
transforming to extend their services to
www.cw.com.hk Bloom & Grow’s Deacon:
Speed matters a lot more in
China than in Hong Kong
deliver directly to the consumer.
“We are working on a lot of home
delivery for different brands and we
understand that we are representing the
brand,” said Wilson Lee, director of IT
at Kerry Logistics. “It is very important
at the service level that we maintain the
quality of the whole delivery experience
with consumers.”
GPS tracking and drones
To meet these requirements, logistics
companies will have to overhaul their
operations to cope with the variety of
changes in consumer expectations. In
the meantime, it is an opportunity for
them to build a brand and engage with
end-customers with mobile platforms
and cloud-based computing resources.
Technologies like GPS-enabled devices
for the tracking of vehicles and goods,
as well as field staff using mobile
communication devices to attend service
calls, are means for logistics providers to
enhance services and reduce cost.
Telstra’s whitepaper added that supply
chain players are no longer a supporting
business activity. It offered some possible
applications of the latest technologies to
transform the logistics industry: “Drone—
an unmanned aircraft—will be able to
identify the location of the customer for
goods delivery and augmented reality,
allowing the customer to see a real time
view of its surrounding,” stated the
Lee from Kerry Logistics:
We used to be a B2B service
provider, but most of our
customers are going to be from
the B2C wave
whitepaper.
“We used to be in B2B,” said Lee.
“Bulk order and small transactions
with large amounts, but now we need
to take care of more small transactions,
tailor-made services and fulfilling the
individual’s expectations in the market.”
He added that the market is shifting
to a B2C environment. “We used to be
a B2B service provider, but most of our
customers are going to be from the B2C
wave, so we need to go with them to
change the business model.”
Although some businesses worry
about a physical and digital divide leading
to conflicts and competition within
the same brand or retailer, Macdonald
explained how the chain of John Lewis,
an up-market department store operating
in Great Britain overcame this issue. It
offers store managers credit for sales
made online within their catchment area.
“Straightaway they had collaboration
between their physical and digital
stores,” said Macdonald. “Consumers
do not realize the channels. People can
use the stores as a showroom and the
mobile phone as an enabler.”
“It’s the entire purchasing experience
that matters. The ability to provide a
seamless integration of the consumer
shopping experience across physical
stores, websites, catalogues, mobile
apps, social media and other platforms,”
concluded Macdonald.
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 45
CHINAWATCH
Alibaba enters US cloud market
with global ambitions
Alibaba’s cloud business is expected to face an uphill battle in the US market
By Michael Kan, IDG News Service (Beijing Bureau)
with the world’s biggest IPO at US$25
billion. The company runs two of China’s
largest online retail sites, but in addition,
Alibaba has been building up its cloud
computing services.
In the public cloud space, Alibaba
has over 1.4 million customers in China,
where it’s competing against Amazon and
Microsoft for a share of the market.
To succeed in the US, Alibaba will
have to find a way to stand out in a
crowded market, Dai said. To do so,
the Chinese company might choose
to highlight its experience in running
reliable e-commerce platforms.
After Alibaba’s record-breaking IPO, the company is ready to demonstrate its global potential
C
hinese
e-commerce
giant
Alibaba Group is making a push
into the US cloud computing
market, where it’s expected to run into
competition from Amazon.com, Google
and Microsoft.
Alibaba subsidiary Aliyun is already
the biggest cloud player in its home
market, and last month, it opened a data
center in California, its first data center
outside of China.
The US business will first focus on
attracting Chinese enterprises based in the
country, before it expands to international
customers in this year’s second half,
Alibaba said in a statement.
Intense competition ahead
No doubt Alibaba will face intense
competition in the US, where Amazon
Web Services and Microsoft Azure are
major players. But opening the data center
in Silicon Valley sends another message
that it wants to be a global company, said
Charlie Dai, an analyst with Forrester
Research.
Although revenues from the US
business may be small at first, Dai added,
“I think this is a good move, especially
after their IPO. Every investor wants to
know whether Alibaba has any huge
potential globally.”
Last year, Alibaba listed in the US,
To succeed in the US, Alibaba will have to find a way
to stand out in a crowded market
– Charlie Dai, Forrester Research
46 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
Uphill battle for many Chinese
tech vendors
Many Chinese businesses are also
going global, giving Alibaba’s cloud
business a potential stream of new
customers in the US. But not all Chinese
tech companies have fared well in the US
market.
Back in 2012, networking equipment
suppliers Huawei and ZTE faced US
congressional scrutiny over alleged ties
with the Chinese government. Given that
Alibaba is based in China, a country often
accused of sponsoring hacking attacks,
the company’s cloud business could also
face concerns over how it stores customer
data.
Alibaba’s use of its own proprietary
technology for its cloud business could
pose problems, Dai said. “It’s totally
different from Amazon and Microsoft,”
he added. “It could be difficult if some
customers want to migrate from their old
platform to the Aliyun platform.”
3
www.cw.com.hk
China defends cybersecurity demands,
amid complaints from US
Proposed security rules from China would demand US tech companies
hand over sensitive technology to the country’s government
By Michael Kan, IDG News Service (Beijing Bureau)
P
resident Barack Obama isn’t happy
with new rules from China that
would require US tech companies
to abide by strict cybersecurity measures,
and the country was quick to defend the
proposed regulations.
“All countries are paying attention to
and taking measures to safeguard their
own information security. This is beyond
reproach,” said China’s Foreign Ministry
spokesman Hua Chunying in a news
briefing.
She made the statement after Obama
criticized a proposed anti-terror law that
he said could stifle US tech business in
China. The legislation would require
companies to hand over encryption keys
to the country’s government, and create
“back doors” into their systems to give the
Chinese government surveillance access.
“This is something that I’ve raised
directly with President Xi,” Obama said in
an interview with Reuters. “We have made it
very clear to them that this is something they
are going to have to change if they are to do
business with the United States.”
US trade groups are also against
another set of proposed regulations that
would require vendors selling to China’s
telecommunication and banking sector to
hand over sensitive intellectual property
to the country’s government.
Protection from espionage
Although China hasn’t approved the
proposed regulations, the country has
made cybersecurity a national priority
over the past year. This came after leaks
from US National Security Agency
www.cw.com.hk China signaled that there was a
clear need to protect the country
from cyber espionage
contractor Edward Snowden alleged
that the US had been secretly spying on
Chinese companies and schools through
cyber surveillance.
Last month, China signaled that there
was a clear need to protect the country
from cyber espionage. Foreign Ministry
spokeswoman Hua pointed to recent
reports alleging that the US and the UK
had hacked into a SIM card maker for
surveillance purposes as an example.
“I would like to point out that China
has consistently opposed using one’s
superiority in information technology,
or using IT products to support cyber
surveillance,” she said, adding that
the anti-terror legislation relates to the
country’s domestic affairs.
China already imposes tough
regulations on US tech businesses through
its strict online censorship that has blocked
websites such as Facebook and Twitter.
But last May, the country announced it
was developing a new “cybersecurity
vetting system” meant to weed out secret
spying activities. Companies that failed to
pass the vetting would be blocked from
the market.
3
All countries are paying attention to and taking
measures to safeguard their own information security.
This is beyond reproach
—Hua Chunying, China Foreign Ministry
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 47
TECHREVIEW
First look: VMware
vSphere 6 keeps its edge
With welcome improvements to key features, as well as
the bundling of backup and recovery, the virtualization
platform doesn’t disappoint
By Paul Venezia, Computerworld (US)
I
n the not so distant past, VMware
held a long and commanding lead
in the server virtualization space, offering core features that were simply unmatched by the competition. In the past
few years, however, competition in virtualization has been fierce, the competitors
have drawn near, and VMware has been
left with fewer ways to distinguish itself.
The competition may have grown
over the years, and VMware may not enjoy quite as large a lead as it once did—
but it still enjoys a lead. With useful improvements to a number of key features,
as well as the bundling of functions such
as backup and recovery that were previously available separately, vSphere 6 is a
worthy addition to the vSphere line. That
said, some of the major advances in this
version, such as long-distance vMotion,
will matter most to larger vSphere shops.
Big changes in vSphere 6
The big changes in vSphere 6 revolve
around expanded resource limits, enhanced
48 Computerworld Hong Kong January/February
March/April 2015 2015
vMotion capabilities, a more complete version of the Linux-based vCenter Server
Appliance, storage offloading and enhancements to the Web client. The Data Protection Advanced backup and recovery tools
are now included as well.
VMware vSphere 6 offers advances
in the previously existing fault tolerance
feature. Fault tolerance is the technology
by which a single VM can have presence
on multiple physical servers simultaneously. Should the physical server running
the active instance fail, the secondary instance is immediately activated. Without
fault tolerance, the VM could be automatically restarted on another host, but would
require time to detect the failure and boot
on the new host. With fault tolerance, that
step is avoided.
In previous versions of vSphere, fault
tolerance supported only a single vCPU
per VM and four fault-tolerant VMs per
host. In vSphere 6, the limits are now four
vCPUs per VM and either eight vCPUs or
four VMs per host.
Long-distance vMotion
The vMotion improvements will be
more germane to those with multiple data
centers spread over wide geographic areas. Prior to vSphere 6, live-migrating
VMs over large distances was problematic and required high bandwidth and
low-latency connections to succeed. In
vSphere 6, the network tolerances have
been extended, and vMotions can now be
completed over links with 100ms latency
or less, requiring 250 megabits of bandwidth per vMotion.
In addition, VMs can be vMotioned
between vCenter servers, and with a
proper underlying infrastructure, vMotions can be completed without common
shared storage. There are restrictions that
come with these expanded capabilities,
mostly in the form of proper network layouts at each side to allow for proper communication of the VMs on each network.
The ESXi 6.0 hypervisor in vSphere
6 can handle up to 64 physical hosts
per cluster, up from 32 hosts, and each
www.cw.com.hk
With useful improvements, a number of key features
and the bundling of functions, vSphere 6 is a worthy
addition to the vSphere line
instance can now support up to 480 CPUs,
12TB of RAM and 1,000 VMs. Each VM
can now be run with up to 128 vCPUs
and 4TB of RAM, with vNUMA hot-add
memory capabilities.
VMware vCenter Server
improvements
On the management side, the vCenter
Server Appliance is now feature-complete, on par with its Windows counterpart. Previously, you could run the
Linux-based vCenter Server Appliance
and manage ESXi hosts, but some of the
more advanced features (notably Update
Manager) of the Windows-based vCenter
Server were not available. As of vSphere
6, the appliance can handle all the tasks
that a Windows installation can. This
is significant news to those who prefer
to not manage a Windows server to run
vCenter.
Those who run vCenter Server on
Windows will notice that the installation
procedure is simplified, though it takes
www.cw.com.hk quite a while to complete. All of the moving parts that make up vCenter Server are
installed in a single action now, including the new Platform Services Controller,
which handles SSO, licensing and certificate management. vCenter Server can be
deployed with all components on a single
system, or it can be split across multiple systems with the Platform Services
Controller and vCenter Server installed
separately.
Both vCenter Server for Windows and
the vCenter Server Appliance now use
a local PostgreSQL database by default,
though external Microsoft SQL Server
and Oracle databases are also supported
on Windows and Oracle databases on the
appliance. The switch to PostgreSQL will
be important to those running with local
databases on earlier versions of vSphere
due to the fact that the limitations of the
previous Microsoft database are no longer present; thus, local databases can now
support 1,000 hosts and 10,000 VMs.
VMware Virtual Volumes
VMware introduces a new storage integration concept with vSphere 6 called
Virtual Volumes. This is essentially
tighter integration with SAN and NAS
devices to manage storage operations at
the virtual disk level. Virtual Volumes are
designed to eliminate the need to carve
out large numbers of LUNs or volumes
for virtualization hosts and to offload
storage-related operations to compatible
arrays, with granularity at the virtual disk
level.
This integration includes vSphere
Storage Policy Based Management, which
uses VMware’s storage API to communicate with storage arrays and connects
the administration of VMs and storage
through to the vSphere UI. Thus, policies can be created and applied to VMs
through vCenter while related functions
are performed natively by the arrays.
VMware now includes vSphere Data
Protection with vSphere Essentials Plus
and higher editions of vSphere 6. This is
a VM backup and recovery tool that was
previously known as vSphere Data Protection Advanced, a separate option. This
tool can be used to provide applicationaware VM backup and restoration, including support for Microsoft SQL Server,
Microsoft Exchange down to the mailbox
level, and other popular databases and
applications.
Up from vSphere 5.5
With vSphere 6, VMware offers a collection of welcome features that are now
bundled in rather than separate products,
advances a number of pre-existing features, and streamlines the installation process. The Web client may still cause more
than a few grumbles from those who have
been using the stand-alone client from
the beginning, but it’s significantly better
than in previous iterations.
The advances in vMotion and other
cross-site features are of limited use to
shops not running multiple interconnected data centers with sufficient dedicated
bandwidth to support those features. But
as VMware increases the tolerances to
lower bandwidth and higher latency, the
viability of introducing such features
grows.
There’s no mistaking the fact that
VMware continues to hold the leadership
role in server virtualization, but as the
feature sets of the top vendors continue
to converge and competing solutions continue to get more robust, we may see more
of this feature bundling and simplified licensing in the future. For now, vSphere
6 maintains its place as the cream of the
crop.
3
Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015 49
HKCSVIEW eric yeung
Hong Kong’s IT industry – Where to go?
Eric Yueng is a council member
of the Hong Kong Computer
Society. He’s also the founder and
managing director of FlexWorkflow
T
hough small in number, Hong Kong’s information and
communication technology (ICT) professionals are
contributing significantly to the thriving local economy.
Despite making up only 2% of the city’s total workforce, they
contribute roughly 6.1% of Hong Kong’s GDP. And IT plays a
big part in the city. Internet users make up 80.9% of the total
population and mobile penetration rate peaks at 231%.
Despite the impressive figures, the reality is that the local IT
industry does not enjoy the recognition it deserves. Investors and
ICT professionals may be aware of the long-term problems the
industry faces. For instance, while the industry is crying out loud
for IT talents, university graduates continue to prefer a career in
business or medicine.
In addition, local technology products are often neglected
in the government procurement process. Hong Kong’s market
is too small to support local ICT products for major overseas
expansion, thus local players that has yet to make an international
footprint rely on the endorsement from public sector to build a
sustainable business.
Former GCIO Daniel Lai witnessed great development of
the ICT industry in Hong Kong during his tenure. Now that he
has retired, the Government is recruiting new talent to lead the
OGCIO. Meanwhile the proposed Innovation & Technology
Bureau (ITB) is still under debate for its establishment. People in
the industry like me are waiting in hope for a new bureau, which
can align interests of the whole industry with the given resources
for maximum efficiency.
Government authorities will certainly play a big role in
the development of the ICT industry in Hong Kong. OGCIO
as well as the proposed ITB will guide the information and
The reality is that the local IT industry
does not enjoy the recognition it
deserves
50 Computerworld Hong Kong March/April 2015
communications technology industry to create transcendent
value for Hong Kong society. To take full advantage of these
government bodies, it is important to first define the future of our
ICT industry.
Commercialize, globalize and strategize
Among the many expectations drawn from ICT experts, three
points stand out as common requirements.
Commercialization—it means creating opportunities for
local products to deliver business value. It is indisputable that we
have great talent in ICT R&D. People in this industry embrace
incredible ideas and are able to turn them into great innovations.
However, these innovations cannot create commercial value
without proper guidance. Funding and policy support are needed
to realize booming business value.
Globalization—this requires an international market for
local innovations. The trend of globalization means the moment
an ICT product emerges, it faces competition from all over the
world. Singapore’s Ministry of Trade & Industry and the Office
of Science and Technology Policy from the US are devoted to
exploring an international market for domestic ICT companies.
Therefore, I strongly believe the Hong Kong SAR Government,
like many other developed countries, should dedicate resources
for the same mission.
Strategize—the future of ICT in Hong Kong is promising. But
we can’t deny the fact that we have yet to formulate a strategy
for further development. With the lack of recognition given to
ICT, our youth are not enthusiastic about the related curriculum.
To create a culture and spirit of ICT, the government should
highlight key areas and dedicate resources for their development.
Regulations should also be aligned with such strategies to create
an attractive environment.
To sum up, Hong Kong needs an ICT development leader.
That person should be someone who understands technology
and has a passion to lead innovation. With more practical
experience, that leader will trump those sheltered by the
administrative system.
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The 26th International Communications and Information Technology
Exhibition & Conference