'ITSM can reduce operational costs'

IT Services Management (ITSM) may seem like just another industry buzzword, but HP has used it to complete its merger with Compaq. Steve Au-Yeung, Vice President & General Manager, AP Software Global Business Unit, Hewlett-Packard, explains how business can benefit from ITSM

What is the significance of ITSM in enterprises?

It's not really an option for enterprises to endorse ITSM--it'll be mandatory. We are seeing enterprises around the world adopting the ITSM concept, defining it from a business user's angle, and linking it up with business benefits.

What can ITSM do for Indian enterprises?

Implementing ITSM with the ITIL standard will enable the business to reduce the cost of operations or have more resources from traditional IT investment. Proctor & Gamble say that adopting ITSM has saved them $100 million.

This will be a powerful certification particularly for Indian companies involved in outsourcing.

What is the interest level shown in India?

There will soon be an Indian chapter for ITSM and the legal unit should be established by July 2004. We have been talking to 15 organizations that have shown interest. Many people know about the ITSM forum.

Being a member of the ITSM forum, what is HP's strategy for promoting ITSM?

HP has fully embraced ITSM. We got involved with ITIL right at the early stages of development. To split up the whole development we acquired a company called Prolin (from the Netherlands) in 1999.

We believed in it and invested in it over time. When we merged with Compaq, we used ITSM as the framework for building a new organization.

HP now uses ITSM for deploying its outsourcing services. So we really understand ITSM and are very encouraged by the progress of our customers who use ITSM (like P&G, & DHL).

— Brian Pereira