|
Vol.25 : Alain Wenckebach (PTS Consulting Japan K.K.)
August 22, 2007
Sharp rise in yen threatens expected profit growth
Japan firms step up India investment
Back to school for engineers
Low-octane economy slows to a crawl
Expanded coverage: Social entrepreneurs gain cred
body shopping：専門家やチームを（プロジェクト等に）配属すること
KPI：主要業績評価指標
deregulation：自由化
auxiliary equipment：補助装置設備
（ A: Alain, T: Terri ）
| T : |
So, now we are going to get to the meat of PTS K.K. How would you describe what you do? |
| A : |
Okay. So, obviously in the first 5 years, we've developed heavily the consulting and project management on the IT, okay...
|
| A : |
...and primarily related to infrastructure...
|
| T : |
Okay, still related to infrastructure. |
| A : |
There was lot of work and we did all the major - a lot of the major relocations here in Tokyo, but primarily for the foreign financial...
|
| A : |
In parallel to that, we were trying to develop sort of a lower fee, but more constant sort of income, which we call Managed Services, and the idea being that you know chunks of the businesses be outsourced to PTS, like a helpdesk or portion of the IT - there is always a fine line between, you know, body shopping and providing a true managed service.
And I think it's only probably the last couple of years where we are entering truly complete outsource solution where the client binds us with a service level agreement...
|
| A : |
...with KPIs and so on.
|
| A : |
Key Performance Indicators to see how we're performing as an outsource, okay. |
| T : |
I see. It's like milestones to check if things... |
| A : |
Yeah, I mean, for instance that we are effectively able to provide reduction of cost, we are... |
| A : |
...running efficiently, that their own internal staff are happy with our services or there is a grading or a measure of what we provide.
|
| A : |
So - but that's fundamentally different from the consulting/project management...
|
| A : |
And so for us, as being signed from two people to, you know...
|
| T : |
Yeah, I was going to get to that. |
| A : |
...being a 140 staff now. We'll be flirting with some of the bigger competitors that have been out there.
|
| A : |
But they tend to operate it more on a global scale.
|
| A : |
And funny enough, they also have the same challenges as we have to penetrate Japan. Japan has always been a bit of a peculiar market...
|
| T : |
Why would you say that? |
| A : |
Strong bonds between vendors and customers that was one very stable economy in the old days, but now it's rocking, so....
|
| A : |
...people are looking more closely to the cost and hence they, you know, they rely more on external consultants to look at their business.
|
| A : |
Now, we are entering maybe a second phase where some of these financial industries are striving to be well established and there's more deregulation in Japan. So, in a way these operators are striving to operate the same way as they operate back in the US or...
|
| T : |
I am much more clear... |
| T : |
...and you have a great way of making it clear, but one thing that I was trying to sort of figure out... the Data Centers. |
| T : |
So, what you have is large organizations that have lots of - any type of - can you give a little background on that? |
| A : |
Okay, so - okay, that's a good one. If you look at the infrastructure that typically existed in the - within our various customers, if you take 10 years ago...
|
| A : |
...were usually within the bank itself.
|
| A : |
Okay. And obviously as the IT has grown the real estate occupied by the Data Center was getting bigger and bigger.
|
| A : |
But we have a big Data Center in the center of Tokyo. It's a very costly exercise, yeah.
|
| T : |
I can't even imagine. |
| A : |
The real estate is hugely expensive.
|
| A : |
At the same time, the phenomenon of IT with the high density equipment, very power consuming.
|
| A : |
Not only the Data Center, but the auxiliary equipment like the mechanical and electrical to support that grew even faster. So, there was a strong push to take all this equipment and transfer them into Data Centers, which are, you know, on the outskirts of Tokyo.
|
| A : |
But still within a reasonable distance...
|
| A : |
...because there is all sort of technology problems like latency...
|
| A : |
...and that shouldn't be too far...
|
| T : |
There shouldn't be a lag in... |
| A : |
...yeah. Exactly. Maybe there are second tiers - equipment that could be very far, but maybe you can then put them in Singapore or China, who knows, yeah.
|
| A : |
So, we - at that time I felt that these Data Centers, which are part of our consulting because, you know, we were consulting on infrastructure, as I mentioned.
|
| A : |
The technology where we were in IT, lacked the know-how of the other side, the Mechanical and Electrical, and they are very tightly connected.
|
| A : |
If I can give you a simple example...
|
| A : |
...is if you stack the rack with full of equipment, well, it will need a certain cooling capacity, yeah.
|
| A : |
But sometimes these matrices were not fully in-tune with the people supporting the Data Centers, so I am saying the IT might stack up to...
|
| A : |
...to a maximum racks and...
|
| T : |
And then blow everything. |
| A : |
Exactly. So - and the technology itself became a very dense...
|
| A : |
...servers producing more and more heat, okay.
|
ITPM：IT プロジェクトマネジメント
M&E：製造エンジニアリング (Manufacturing and Engineering)
（ A: Alain, T: Terri ）
| A : |
So, what used to be traditional designs are now falling apart because most of the Data Centers here which have a certain legacy maybe 5 years or 10 years, they all have a - they all suffer a problem of heat or hotspots, as they call them, and so on.
|
| A : |
So, the whole integration of the design made it quite a challenge. So, what we did in Tokyo with PTS, we started to develop a Mechanical and Electrical arm with true mechanical and electrical engineers that would work very tightly with the IT... |
| A : |
...and produce, you know best design and best practice for these Data Centers.
So, we did that on the sort of IT/infrastructure environment and I think we had also the same issue on the IT project management and...
|
| T : |
Right. Tell me more about that.
|
| A : |
...we - and construction project management, yeah.
|
| A : |
Okay. There again our ITPM...
|
| A : |
...usually is plugged in a bigger program...
|
| A : |
...which is usually when - when I first came to Japan by the architects, okay. |
| A : |
Nowadays they are run by more specialist companies that focus on probably program management or construction project management.
|
| T : |
Also specifically for that. |
| A : |
The IT still plugs in somewhere underneath, yeah.
|
| A : |
So, we had quite a few situations where we were in large projects...
|
| A : |
...where the IT scheduling was not fully embraced or given the decent, you know, allocation of time and so on...
|
| A : |
...especially because construction firm didn't understand fully the impact of IT...
|
| A : |
...nor its importance.
|
| A : |
Okay, but if you look at the relocation project today, sometimes the IT approach is 40% of the whole budget, so it's quite a significant number. So, saying that we took the approach that we think that in project management there is a generic project management, you know, process and ways of doing things and then there are specialist areas, would be construction and IT. So, we are trying to enfold the whole thing.
|
| T : |
So, it's like you create - is this right, you create sort of a backbone of... |
| T : |
...Project Management. |
| T : |
Good Project Management practice is X, then plug in your construction and your IT. |
| A : |
Completely, exactly.
So, that sort of summarized the Project Management and the consulting area...
|
| A : |
...in how we went to consolidate the ITPM and the construction PM and on the other side...
|
| A : |
...of infrastructure, the M&E and the IT as well.
|
| A : |
In the center, you have this managed service...
|
| A : |
...as we discussed, which still takes about 40% of our business now...
|
| A : |
...in terms of revenue, yeah. And the last 10%, we are trying to take off the ground a Management Consulting practice.
|
| T : |
...in terms of the same area or... |
| A : |
Yeah, so the idea that the management consulting will venture in areas quite different from...
|
| A : |
...what we traditionally do.
|
| A : |
For example, business process reengineering, okay.
|
| A : |
Some cases where a company wants to review how they manage the whole firm and so on. The idea there that, you know, we will put in very specialized consultants - people that have been accustomed to operate in ways that - McKinsey style or, you know...
|
| A : |
...this kind of bigger consulting firms.
|
| A : |
And ultimately these projects should have a rainfall effect on the other practices that we have...
|
| A : |
...in the firm, okay.
|
| A : |
So, it's sort of a balance where we've already had projects running...
|
| A : |
...and we have good hope that this will grow in the future.
|
| T : |
And I have to go to the last question, which is, what if any is your experience with 'The Nikkei Weekly?' |
| A : |
Well, actually we had - recently we had a salesperson that was using 'The Nikkei Weekly' as a sort of, you know informant for leads...
|
| A : |
We've seen some good information, which I think one has led to a prospect, to a customer.
|
 Russell Willis / President
eigoTown.com 
トラックバック
このエントリーのトラックバックURL:
http://blog.eigotown.com/mt33/mt-tb.cgi/3872
|
