About: François Zielemans

François Zielemans

Website: http://sourcingthoughts.blogspot.com

Profile: Over the last ten years I gained deep knowledge and international experience in defining and executing IT & sourcing strategies, improving financial performance, (compliance) risk management and business-IT alignment. I have managed complex international projects with a value-at-risk of more than 60 million and worked in among others FSI, Technology/Telecom and FMCG. As a managing partner at Virtum I advise organisations which want to unleash the full potential of their IT Value Chain.

Posts by François Zielemans:

  • Reducing cost of regulatory compliance

    This post is not meant for the average company which has to worry about SOX and standard privacy laws. It post is based on my experiences of working for a large international bank which did a lot of outsourcing, but did not know well how to translate the large amount of national and international laws and regulations into a manageable and cost effective control and monitor framework. Read more

  • Mumbai attack increases onshore outsourcing

    The recent bomb attack on Mumbai, killing at least twenty people and wounding more than fifty, is one in a series. According to Wikipedia are “as of 2006, at least 232 of the country’s 608 districts afflicted, at differing intensities, by various insurgent and terrorist movements. In August 2008, National Security Advisor M K Narayanan has said that there are as many as 800 terrorist cells operating in the country”. And accordingly to The Economist will the situation not improve anytime soon: “Indian intelligence fears that young Muslims in the country are growing more radical.” Read more

  • Play checkers and chess when sourcing IT

    Technology is everywhere and is becoming of increasing importance to attract and retain consumers and engage with upstream and downstream business partners. It is changing industries, impact the roles of CEO, COO and CIO. Insurance companies are transforming their business model from selling though big, impressive marble decorated buildings and well paid sales men in Porsche cars, to a lean no fuss companies using internet as the primary sales channel. Physical newspapers are increasingly replaced by digital versions and we shop on the internet when it rains or just for our convenience. The part of the IT portfolio where time-to-market, intense business-IT interaction and innovation are the key success factors (Enabling IT). Read more

  • Is Benchmarking of IT obsolete?

    Two weeks ago, I was asked to give my opinion on the proposition “when outsourcing is benchmarking required to prevent a failure” by an editor of an IT magazine. My first thought was: of course it is, as including a benchmark clause in a contract was standard practice when I drafted a contract. But then I thought again and come to a less back-and-white conclusion. Read more

  • Sustainability: run your data center on paprika’s

    The Netherlands has traditionally a leading position in agricultural (Tulip anyone?), but due to the climate many crops are grown in greenhouses that have to be heated during winter. The engines used run on gas and the resulting heat and carbon dioxide are used to create the optimum growing conditions. These ‘micro combined heat and power engines (Micro-CHP) produce also electricity however, and much more than needed to provide artificial lighting during the night hours. One options to feed the access power back to the grid or to feed it directly to nearby houses and company buildings. One such initiative includes using the power of 35 engines used to heat 220 hectares of greenhouses to power a new datacenter. The access heat produced by the datacenter is in turn fed back to the greenhouses. Read more

  • Are you a micro-supplier?

    The interconnections between companies and their external stakeholders become more intense by the day. The world’s leading provider of lithography systems for the semiconductor industry, ASML, is a company where several hundred  external business partners are very closely integrated in the design, development, integration and servicing of the systems used to make CPU’s, GPU’s, memory modules and other advanced microchips. Up to 90% of the total system costs are supplied externally and business partners several tiers deep in the supply chain have access to relevant technology and product development information from ASML. It allows ASML fast access to new innovations created throughout its value chain, without the need to invest themselves in all these areas. ASML focuses on the high value-added integration role, including product competence and manufacturing cycle times while the business partners design and manufacture specialized subsystems. Read more

  • Why smaller outsource suppliers have an edge?

    The economy is picking up again and companies are looking for opportunities to grow. Flexibility, innovation and speed to market are shifting to the top of the wish list. This adjustment has not only an impact on the internal organization, but also on the sourcing strategy. A sourcing strategy which focused the last couple of years on signing contracts aimed at lowering cost through standardization and economies of scale. Read more

  • Innovation requires a different sourcing approach

    Outsourcing either business or IT activities to improve the organizations capabilities to innovate and speed-to-market may look at first sight a contradiction. Typically outsourcing is used to reduce cost, with standardization and less responsiveness regarding new business demand as a side effect. It has to be efficient and low cost comes typically at a price. Read more

  • Outsourcing with Solvency II in mind

    Where within banks the Basel II implementation projects come to an end, are European insurers burning the midnight oil to get Solvency II implemented before the end of 2012. The Solvency II legislation is aimed at improving risk management practices within insurance companies and providing better protection for policyholders. For this purpose, the legislation demands: Read more

  • Looking at the cloud from different angles

    The concept behind cloud computing started off as ‘utility-based computing’, allowing a company to buy CPU cycles, storage and other IT resources. Advances in the area of virtualization and remote access (e.g. Server Based Computing ,HTML5) since then paved the road for more complex services to be delivered by using internet protocols. Read more

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