Office of the CTO

Why is the midmarket hot now? Three reasons. First, the demanding economy. "As the economy struggles, cost leadership is becoming more of an issue," observes Rick Tober, head of the North American IT outsourcing practice for Capgemini. "Midmarket companies are struggling to remain competitive in a global marketplace. There's more pressure to look at outsourcing seriously."

In IT, GM is extending the most important strategy of new car development –– product simulations and models –– to software development. These simulations typically cut software development projects and expenses by more than 10%, said GM CTO Fred Killeen. Capgemini is heading the visualization effort for GM.

Collaboration fright may be the biggest barrier to an idea called mesh collaboration that Andy Mulholland, CTO of Capgemini, and Nick Earle, senior vice president of European markets at Cisco Systems, developed in their recent book of the same name.

Using a rapid prototyping process developed by Capgemini and software visualization software from iRise, GM has introduced visual modeling into their global application development processes. On average, visual modeling reduced project duration by 10% and the projects received very high customer satisfaction ratings.

Capgemini, a providers of consulting, technology and outsourcing services, recently announced it will leverage Oracle's Information–Driven Value Chain solutions to help its clients with improved supply and demand planning. The solutions are a comprehensive suite of supply chain technologies that help companies manage the emerging complexities of supply chain management.

With increasing competition and the growing complexity of working with multiple channels, retailers have to find new ways of contending with rising labor costs, slow growth, eroding margins and far–flung supply chains. Jeff Miller, vice president of Capgemini's Oracle Service Line, outlines the latest practices retailers are turning to streamline operations, improve the customer experience and ultimately catalyze growth.