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Limited outsourcing stifles innovation in IT

SQS to share secrets to tackling the pace of IT change at World Congress for Software Quality

With many businesses struggling to keep up with the pace of IT change, SQS, the world’s leading software quality firm, is calling for businesses to experiment with outsourcing to multiple, specialist suppliers.

A common IT belief is that by reducing the number of suppliers you immediately reduce management overhead and simplify things by having a single point of accountability. However, this often leads to a lack of agility and flexibility as a single vendor controls more of the IT estate and gets bogged down in contractual and commercial constrains. They are also less likely to have the full range of specialist skills for the entire IT estate. By adding a few different specialist vendors, agility and innovation is improved.

With the pace of IT change accelerating at an unprecedented rate, businesses are increasingly being faced with last year’s cutting edge application becoming today’s legacy system. Earlier this year, Gartner revealed that by 2016, the impact of technologies such as the cloud will relegate even highly customised systems to “legacy” status.

There are a number of ways businesses can tackle these challenges. In the increasingly competitive market, outsourcing provides organisations speed-to-market whilst, at the same time, enabling firms to share the risk. Rather than outsourcing to a limited number of larger suppliers, adopting an adaptive and more flexible approach to sourcing, based on the relevant experience and expertise of vendors, will best deliver the required business outcomes of the project.

David Rigler, director of UK retail and manufacturing at SQS, explains: “This doesn’t necessarily mean businesses should shun larger suppliers with plentiful resources. Each supplier should be selected based on its skills, experience and expertise in a specific area and its ability to meet the characteristics of the new IT architecture. For example, suppliers may be selected on their ability to support an agile approach to IT delivery or continuous delivery of testing and deployment.”

Ben Fry, manager and quality evangelist at SQS, continues: “Spreading IT delivery across a number of carefully selected suppliers is actually not as crazy as it sounds; it is, perhaps, the most effective way an organisation can keep up with technological advances and the rate of consumer-led IT change. In our experience, most businesses already do this to some extent. One insurance company that we work with has a large outsourcing deal for the majority of their software development but uses a specialist boutique for the development of the actuarial algorithms. We would suggest they take this to the next level and break down the key IT processes even further, outsourcing these to different suppliers based on expertise and specialisation.”

Ben and David will be divulging the secrets behind tackling the rapid pace of change in today’s IT world at this year’s World Congress for Software Quality on 2nd July. With over forty years of experience between them, Ben and David will share their expertise, drawing on real world examples, to enlighten delegates on outsourcing, as well as explaining legacy IT systems, agile development and how to manage transition in today’s ever changing technological world.

ENDS

Notes to editors

This year marks the 6th World Congress for Software Quality and brings together the world’s leading experts in software quality to share best practise and look towards the future. The event will take place from 1st to 3rd of July at the Hilton Metropole, Edgware Road, in London.

If you would like to attend Ben and David’s talk or speak to either of them about the issues above, please contact Berkeley PR on 01189090909 or sqs@berkeleypr.co.uk.

About SQS Software Quality Systems

SQS is the world’s leading specialist in software quality. This position stems from over 30 years of successful consultancy operations. SQS consultants provide solutions for all aspects of quality throughout the whole software product lifecycle driven by a standardised methodology, high offshore automation processes and deep domain knowledge in various industries. Headquartered in Cologne, Germany, the company employs approximately 3,900 staff since the acquisition of Thinksoft Global Services. SQS (including Thinksoft) has offices in Germany, the UK, Australia, Austria, Egypt, Finland, France, India, Ireland, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, the US and the United Arab Emirates. In addition, SQS maintains a minority stake in a company in Portugal. In 2013, SQS generated revenues of 225.8 million Euros.

SQS is the first German company to have a primary listing on the AIM (Alternative Investment Market) in London. In addition, SQS shares are also traded on the German Stock Exchange in Frankfurt am Main.

With over 7,000 completed projects under its belt, SQS has a strong client base, including half of the DAX 30, nearly a third of the STOXX 50 and 20 per cent of the FTSE 100 companies. These include, among others, Allianz, Beazley, BP, Centrica, Commerzbank, Daimler, Deutsche Post, Generali, JP Morgan, Meteor, Reuters, UBS and Volkswagen as well as other companies from the six key industries of SQS.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by SQS .