business value & ICT - Orange Business Live Blog: about this blog

This blog is about creating business value from ICT and provides a focal point for passionate discussions about how information and communications technology can bring actual value to your business. The blog is structured around seven topics (see bottom of the page) ranging from application performance to unifying communications. Subjects such as the impact of ICT on business, ROI calculations for communications services, and golden rules for new ICT transformation projects will be tackled. Our pool of authors will grow over time and new members are welcome to join as writers for the Orange Business Live blog.

the genesis

This blog was inspired by the Orange Business Live event held in Berlin in June 2008. Orange Business Live [http://www.orangebusinesslive.com] is an annual conference organised by Orange Business Services that discusses best practices, case studies and developments in enterprise information communications technology (ICT). The event brought together enterprise technologists and Orange experts, and it triggered some interesting and passionate discussions about how ICT can help enterprises meet their business challenges.

the idea

We started this blog to continue the dialogue which was initiated at the event and extend the invitation to the broader community of enterprise readers. It isn't just for technical specialists: we will hold discussions at different levels including strategic decisions about ICT, implementation issues and tips, golden rules and advice, etc. We will initiate discussions on the topics raised in Berlin (see below) and get readers to contribute through their comments. Should you think of a topic that you would like us to cover, please feel free to use the comment link at the end of this article to suggest ideas for us to review.

the authors

The current authors are:

Stewart Baines, freelance journalist
Jean Critcher, Business Acceleration solution director at Orange Business Services
Bill Douglas, head of customer communications at Orange Business Services
Yann Gourvennec, head of digital content, Orange Business Services
Anthony Plewes, freelance journalist

We expect this list to grow as more experts sign up.

The topics covered are:

network optimization: covers how to manage the performance of applications in a networked world, including the different types of technology, service level agreements (SLA) and aligning performance to business needs;
telecommunications in emerging markets: the challenges and solutions, technology and regulatory issues, and other key issues for managing IT in emerging markets;
green IT: sustainability and corporate responsibility is at the top of the board's agenda and we look at how green IT can contribute to cutting enterprises' carbon footprint;
mobility: we look at what challenges arise when deploying a global mobility strategy, how to overcome barriers and the business value of mobility;
innovation: innovations in ICT continue apace and we look at how they have improved areas such as security, performance and response time and user performance;
telephony and VOIP: best practices and key learnings in IP telephony, such as the business case, consolidation and standardization, how to manage organizational challenges, fixed-mobile convergence and future developments;
collaboration: we look at how improving internal/external communications through collaboration and unifying communications can yield significant business benefits by removing human latency from business processes.