CA hosts SMB Summit

From Reliance Industries to the Tata Group, India's biggest business houses all started small. CA India organised a seminar on IT for SMBs. This seminar was attended by Ninad Karpe, Managing Director, and Murad Wagh, Senior Consultant—both from CA India. A panel discussion on how SMBs can and should use IT featured SR Balasubramanian, who is currently the Technology Advisor for Barclays Bank and V Subramaniam, CIO,
Otis India.

“Not only large, but small and medium businesses will also grow because of their hunger and passion for success” said Karpe in his introductory note. Ensuring infrastructure availability, managing risks such as viruses and hacking, cost control and efficient use of technology investments are some critical factors in managing and securing SMBs from the IT perspective. Murad Wagh suggested remedies for problems faced by SMBs. He says, “Choose a solution which is practical, scalable and flexible.”

V Subramaniam and SR Balasubramanian

The most important areas of IT at an SMB are storage, security, desktop and network management. Discussing storage management, Wagh listed a few problems such as business continuity planning, the need for higher application availability and data protection.

When we talk about desktop management; inventory management, standardisation of desktops, deployment of software and function or project based software deployment are key issues. Last but not least, network management is a complex but necessary part of any organisation's IT set-up. Network complexity, high dependency on the network for distributed business applications are important for the continuity of a business. For all these management issues, CA has distinct products which can solve many of these problems efficiently. The company has a Network Management Value Pack at a low price for SMBs.

During the panel discussion, expert solutions for typical IT hurdles were suggested to give the attendees, IT heads of SMBs, a broader view of how The point was underscored that without IT, SMBs can't fully tap their potential. Balasubramanian said, "We have to put away our laidback attitude and work towards growth before some other country overtakes us."

Subramaniam stressed on the importance of e-mail for any organisation. E-mail should be treated as a service. A company needs a strong e-mail policy to restrict the flow of unwanted messages. A small business can't grow without integrating IT within its business. This seminar provided possible solutions for the same.

— Kushal Shah