Fisticuffs Aside, SI Panel Promises Some Fireworks

Inviting system integrators, software suppliers and service providers into the same room, let alone to the same table, is a recipe for entertainment at the least and education at the most.

“It’s like the 800-pound gorilla in the room that no one talks about. All the OSS conferences I’ve ever been to, I’ve never seen a session like this where you have integrators up there and people can ask questions of them,” said Dan Baker, research director for Dittberner Associates Inc. and the moderator of the “Working Successfully With System Integrators and Telecom IT Service Firms” panel. “These guys are highly influential. They’re always behind the scenes.”

When they get out in front a crowd they also have the potential to be volatile.

“I hope to take away a few bruises, but I know [panel member] Shanky [Viswanathan], head of the North American telecom services business unit of TATA Consultancy Services and some of the people on my team know [panel member] Rene Sotola, vice president of global telecom practice of CGI (GNCMA), so I don’t think we’re likely to have fisticuffs,” said John Petrie, vice president of industry marketing for Progress Software (PRGS). “The takeaway for me will be the ability to challenge each other in how we’re creating the most value for the market.”

The value will rest on how much influence these outside advisors and integrators can have on a transforming telecommunications space that is also experiencing and even facilitating shrinking IT organizations. Besides that, there’s the whole economy and the need to conserve cash while upgrading antiquated systems for logical and competitive reasons. It is, in short, a different environment for both the service providers and the SIs.

“With the skinnying down of IT within the carrier, the integrator is taking on an increasingly end-to-end role which includes architecture and technology selection and is in far more than just a gun-for-hire implementation role,” Petrie said. “There’s been a decade-long trend towards cutting IT head count out of the organization.”

That trend hasn’t slowed and may even be accelerating as the economy slides downward. This means that unlike the past, SIs must be prepared to take more than a once-and-done role in a service provider’s operations and the service provider should be prepared to let the SI have more say in the carrier’s overall operations.